Rosenberg "reductionism" Darwin Thought Research

Alexander Rosenberg, the R. Taylor Cole Professor of Philosophy at Duke University, who received the Lakatos Award in1993. His interests focus on problems in metaphysics, mainly surrounding causality, the philosophy of social sciences, especially economics, and most of all, the philosophy of biology, in particular the relationship between molecular, functional and evolutionary biology. Rosenberg is among the few biologists and fewer philosophers of science who reject the consensus view that combines physicalism with antireductionism.This dissertation is intended to be based on the dual perspective of Reductionism and the Theory of Natural Selection to analyze and judge Rosenberg’s thought of Darwinian Reductionism. In my opinion, Rosenberg established the position of physicalism and reductionism on one hand, and found a new way to mediate Reductionism and the Theory of Natural Selection on the other hand. In this dissertation, I take Rosenberg’s works as the basic resource, the thought of Darwinian Reductionism as the basic clue, the unification of textual, empirical and comparative as the basic methods. The main content is as follows,Chapter Ⅰ introduces the literature review at home and abroad, and provides main lines, points of innovation and shortcomings of this dissertation.Chapter Ⅱ introduces the source and background of the thought of Darwinian Reductionism. In my view, the idea of Darwinian Reductionism, which inherited the achievements of molecular and evolutionary biology and also the tradition of reductionist research, was provided with the background of antireductionist consensus about biology.Chapter Ⅲ discusses the principle and appeal of Darwinian Reductionism. Rosenberg argued that the Darwinism was equally indispensable to functional and molecular biology, so we should reconfigure the debate about reduction. He introduced the notions of how-possible explanations and why-necessary explanations to perfect biological why-necessary explanations, but still remained a serious lacuna, viz. the theory of natural selection.Chapter Ⅳ introduces biological laws and molecular explanation. Rosenberg argued that the only laws in biology were the principle of natural selection (PNS), and that biological explanation was historical, which went all the way down to the molecules. In Rosenberg’s discussion, regulatory gene networks construed the control of the developmental process in terms of Boolean switching rules.ChapterⅤ is about fitness. Rosenberg argued that two things——defining fitness and empirically distinguishing drift and selection——could only be accomplished by a theory that did have some use for individual organisms and their biographies, in Rosenberg’s view, fitness was a primitive term, and ecological fitness supervened on all those relations between an individual and its environment that contributed to the individual’s success.ChapterⅥ introduces molecular PNS. Rosenberg argued that the PNS was neither emerged from purely physical processes, nor it was a derived law of chemistry or physics. In Rosenberg’s view, The PNS was a basic law of physical science, which could make natural selection safe for reductionism.ChapterⅦ is about the evaluation and criticism of the thought of Darwinian Reductionism. In the end, on basis of the research of "Synthia", I am just willing to make a little defense for reductionism in principle.The achievement of this dissertation may be as follows:it might be the first time to study biological philosophy of Rosenberg domestically and systematically; it expatiates on the theoretical frame and background, contribution and meanings of the thought of Darwinian Reductionism; this article shows that Rosenberg is a philosopher of physicalist and reductionist.