| Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology | ||||
| Ariew (Andre), Cummins (Robert) & Perlman (Mark) | ||||
| This Page provides (where held) the Abstract of the above Book and those of all the Papers contained in it. | ||||
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Oxford University Press, 2002. Nice paperback copy.
"Allen (Colin) - Real Traits, Real Functions?"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
Philosophers Index AbstractDiscussions of the functions of biological traits generally take the notion of a trait for granted. Defining this notion is a nontrivial problem. Different approaches to function place different constraints on adequate accounts of the notion of a trait. Accounts of function based on engineering-style analyses allow trait boundaries to be a matter of human interest. Accounts of function based on natural selection have typically been taken to require trait boundaries that are objectively real. After canvassing problems raised by each approach, I conclude with some facts that satisfactory notions of trait must respect.
"Ariew (Andre) - Platonic and Aristotelian Roots of Teleological Arguments in Cosmology and Biology"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
Philosophers Index AbstractAristotle's central argument for teleology--though not necessarily his conclusion--is repeated in the teleological arguments of Isaac Newton, Immanuel Kant, William Paley, and Charles Darwin. To appreciate Aristotle's argument and its influence I assert, first, that Aristotle's naturalistic teleology must be distinguished from Plato's anthropomorphic one; second, the form of Aristotle's arguments for teleology should be read as instances of inferences to the best explanation. On my reading, then, both Newton's and Paley's teleological arguments are Aristotelian while their conclusions are Platonic. Kant and Darwin's arguments are likewise Aristotelian while their conclusions are unique.
"Ariew (Andre) & Perlman (Mark) - Functions: Introduction"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
"Boorse (Christopher) - A Rebuttal on Functions"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
Philosophers Index AbstractThis chapter answers most major objections to a general goal-contribution (GGC) analysis of functions as causal contributions to goals of a goal-directed system. Such an analysis, which applies univocally to function statements about artifacts and organisms, is defended against the following criticisms: that its choice of goals cannot be objective; that it cannot accommodate functional explanation; that it gives objects external to an organism biological functions; that it relativizes biological functions to an organism's environment; that it eliminates both maladaptive and unperformed functions; that it cannot distinguish functions from beneficial accidents; and that it conflates the functions of protective coloration in Batesian mimic and model. Applied to organisms, a GGC analysis, if supplemented by the statistical idea of the species-typical, also explains biomedical normality. Such a view is defended against writers who use typically unperformed functions, pandemic diseases, or Plantinga's cases to attack any statistical concept of biomedical normality.
"Buller (David) - Function and Design Revisited"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
Philosophers Index AbstractSeveral analyses of biological function (for example, those of Williams, Millikan, and Kitcher) identify an item's function with what natural selection designed it to do. Allen and Bekoff claim, in contrast, that design by selection is a special case of biological function. I argue that Allen and Bekoff's account of natural design is unduly restrictive and that it fails to mark a principled distinction between function and design. I distinguish two approaches to natural design--the 'trait-centered' approach of Allen and Bekoff and the 'organism-centered' approach--and defend the latter, according to which function and design are coinstantiated phenomena.
"Cummins (Robert) - Neo-Teleology"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
Philosophers Index AbstractNeo-teleology is the two part thesis that, e.g., (i) we have hearts because of what hearts are for : Hearts are for blood circulation, not the production of a pulse, so hearts are there--animals have them--because their function is to circulate the blood, and (ii) that (i) is explained by natural selection: traits spread through populations because of their functions. This paper attacks this popular doctrine. The presence of a biological trait or structure is not explained by appeal to its function. To suppose otherwise is to trivialize natural selection.
"Enc (Berent) - Indeterminacy of Function Attributions"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
Philosophers Index AbstractA popular thesis maintains that among the many effects brought about by a system, at most one can be identified with the function of that system. An examination of this thesis reveals that there are good reasons for denying it. It is then observed that the indeterminacy entailed by this denial will have consequences to teleosemantics--to our attempt at finding a unique determinate representational content for detection systems by looking to see what specific function they have been selected for. It is then suggested that the nonuniqueness involved is appropriate to the representational richness of these subdoxastic systems.
"Hardcastle (Valerie Gray) - On the Normativity of Functions"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
Philosophers Index AbstractWhen we pick out a property's function, we are isolating one of its effects from among the many it has as the thing it is supposed to do. Proponents of an etiological view of function claim that pragmatist approaches cannot answer this question. This chapter examines this claim. I argue that, despite appearances, we can get a robust sense of normativity out of pragmatic views of function; moreover, being relative to something else does not distinguish pragmatic versions of function from etiological ones.
"Matthen (Mohan) - Human Rationality and the Unique Origin Constraint"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
Philosophers Index AbstractMore than one philosopher has hypothesized that the function of rationality is to lead us to true beliefs. In the context of evolution, this means that human rationality was selected for this capacity. If so, human rationality ought to approximate to the best systems of deductive and inductive logic, a consequence that many philosophers have accepted on independent grounds. However, there are two problems with the above hypothesis concerning function. First, empirical research indicates that human reasoning systematically falls short of 'logic'. But, the hypothesis about function implies that all systems of rationality would converge upon logic. Secondly, this convergence claim is methodologically suspect because it violates the unique origin constraint on function attributions, a constraint formulated and supported in this chapter. If this is right, rationality must be an accidental product of natural selection; a suggestion is made about how it could have originated.
"Millikan (Ruth Garrett) - Biofunctions: Two Paradigms"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
Philosophers Index AbstractApplications to biological systems of Robert Cummins's notion of 'function' from his classic paper 'Functional Analysis' (Cummins 1975) and of my notion 'proper function' from Language, Thought and Other Biological Categories (LTOBC) (Millikan 1984) are discussed and compared. Neither notion is fully determinate in its application to life forms, always cutting decisively between 'functions' of the designated kind and 'mere effects'. Nor do we need a notion of function in biology that is fully determinate in this way. The dimensions of indeterminacy for both concepts are explored. (edited)
"Neander (Karen) - Types of Traits: Function, structure, and homology in the classification of traits"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
"Perlman (Mark) - Pagan Teleology: Adaptational Role and the Philosophy of Mind"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
Philosophers Index AbstractThough teleology seems a promising source of help in explaining mental representation and mental content, it will not solve the main problem of mental content: misrepresentation. Thus, biological functions cannot adequately provide the basis of mental content. I examine three attempts to ground the content of mental representations on biological functions, Millikan, Dretske, and Papineau, and show how they fail to meet the conditions that must be satisfied for functions to solve the problem of mental content. Other related theories fail for related reasons. I will also discuss Neander's distinction between two forms of teleology, and explain why I will insist on a third alternative. This is not a diatribe against teleology per se, and does in fact admit that we can assign clear functions to mental representations, as well as mental processes and mechanisms. But these functions will not have the content needed to underwrite misrepresentation.
"Ruse (Michael) - Evolutionary Biology and Teleological Thinking"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
"Schwartz (Peter) - The Continuing Usefulness Account of Proper Function"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
Philosophers Index AbstractModern history' views claim that in order for a trait X to have the proper function F, X must have been recently favored by natural selection for doing F (Griffiths 1992, 1993; Godfrey-Smith 1994). For many traits with prototypical proper functions, however, such recent selection may not have occurred, since traits may have been maintained owing to lack of variation or selection for other effects. I explore this flaw in modern history accounts and offer an alternative etiological theory, which I call the 'continuing usefulness' account. (edited)
"Walsh (D.M.) - Brentano's Chestnuts"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
Philosophers Index AbstractThe teleosemantics programme is a reductive approach to naturalizing intentionality. It comprises three phases: (i) the reduction of intentional content to intentional function, (ii) the reduction of intentional function to evolutionary function, and (iii) the reduction of evolutionary function to selectional history. I argue that phases (ii) and (iii) fail. Phase (ii) fails because any notion of intentional function rich enough to serve the purposes of phase (i) is too rich to be reduced to evolutionary function. Phase (iii) fails because it misconstrues the relation between function and selectional history. I argue that phase (i) alone constitutes an adequately naturalistic account of intentionality. The teleology inherent in the notion of intentional function needs no reduction.
"Wimsatt (William) - Functional Organization, Analogy, and Inference"
Source: Ariew, Cummins & Perlman - Functions: New Essays in the Philosophy of Psychology and Biology, 2002
Philosophers Index AbstractThis chapter builds upon my earlier selectionist analysis (Wimsatt 1972) to characterize functional organization, to examine judgments of functional analogy, and to give conditions for evaluating functional inference. The problem of teleology was not invented for philosophers' amusement, so a good analysis should give some methodological guidance in the construction and evaluation of descriptions of functional organization that could be useful for practitioners. I thus analyze and then move beyond 'ideal' functional hierarchies to consider the kinds of pragmatic compromises necessary in the field, and to bring our analyses closer to our practice. (edited)
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