Loading Events

HPASS: “One Kind of Adaptationism” – Rose Novick, University of Washington

Mar 14 @ 4:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Dodd Hall 275,
March 14, 2025 | 4:00PM – 6:00PM
Dodd Hall 275 & Zoom
RSVP HERE

 

Join us on Friday, March 14, 2025 in Dodd Hall 275 for a talk by Rose Novick, University of Washington, as part of the History, Philosophy, and Science of Science (HPASS) speaker series.

 

One Kind of Adaptationism

 

There is only kind of adaptationism: explanatory adaptationism. Explanatory adaptationism claims that adaptation is the “big question” in evolutionary biology, and natural selection is the “big answer”. In recent decades, philosophers of biology have largely come to agree, first, that explanatory adaptationism is only one kind of adaptationism among many (at the high end, seven) and, second, that these kinds are logically independent and so can, in principle, be accepted or rejected in any combination. On the surface, this is true. Beneath the surface, it is not. When the arguments supporting various forms of allegedly non-explanatory adaptationism are interrogated closely, each turns out to essentially rely on explanatory adaptationism. The different kinds of adaptationism should be recognized as different ways of understanding the import of explanatory adaptationism. In the end, every adaptationist is an explanatory adaptationist.

 

 

 

 

Join our mailing list!

Sign up for our mailing list to stay up-to-date with future UCLA Philosophy events, conferences, and colloquia!

SIGN UP HERE

Details

Date:
Mar 14
Time:
4:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Event Category:
Event Tags:

Venue

Dodd Hall 275

Organizer

UCLA Department of Philosophy