Genes and the Agents of Life

the Individual in the Fragile Sciences - Biology

Robert A. Wilson

296 pages, parution le 03/11/2004

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Résumé

What are the agents of life? Central to our conception of the biological world is the idea that it contains various kinds of individuals, including genes, organisms, and species. How we conceive of these agents of life is central to our understanding of the relationship between life and mind, the place of hierarchical thinking in the biological sciences, and pluralistic views of biological agency.

Genes and the Agents of Life undertakes to rethink the place of the individual in the biological sciences, drawing parallels with the cognitive and social sciences. Genes, organisms, and species are all agents of life, but how are each of these conceptualized within genetics, developmental biology, evolutionary biology, and systematics? The book includes highly accessible discussions of genetic encoding, species and natural kinds, and pluralism above the levels of selection, drawing on work from across the biological sciences.

The book is a companion to the author's Boundaries of the Mind, also available from Cambridge University Press, in which the focus is the cognitive sciences, and will appeal to a broad range of professionals and students in philosophy, biology, and the history of science.

L'auteur - Robert A. Wilson

ROBERT A. WILSON was born in Broken Hill, Australia, and lives in Edmonton, Canada. He is the author or editor of five other books, including the award-winning The MIT Encyclopedia of the Cognitiue Sciences (1999) and Boundaries of the Mind (Cambridge 2004).

Sommaire

Individuals, Agency, and Biology
- Individuals and biology
- Thinking about biological agents
Species, Organisms, and Biological Natural Kinds
- What is an organism?
- Exploring the tripartite view
- Specious individuals
Genes and Organismic Development
- Genetic agency
- Conceptualizing development
Groups and Natural Selection
- Groups as agents of selection
- Arguing about group selection: the myxoma case
- Pluralism, entwinement, and the levels of selection

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Caractéristiques techniques

	PAPIER
Éditeur(s)	Cambridge University Press
Auteur(s)	Robert A. Wilson
Parution	03/11/2004
Nb. de pages	296
Format	15 x 23
Couverture	Broché
Poids	426g
Intérieur	Noir et Blanc
EAN13	9780521544955
ISBN13	978-0-521-54495-5