The new mechanistic philosophy is divided into two largely disconnected projects. One deals with a metaphysical inquiry into how mechanisms relate to issues such as causation, capacities and levels of organization, while the other deals with epistemic issues related to the discovery of mechanisms and the intelligibility of mechanistic representations. Tudor Baetu explores and explains these projects, and shows how the gap between them can be bridged. His proposed account is compatible both with the assumptions and practices of experimental design in biological research, and with scientifically accepted interpretations of experimental results.
Author(s): Tudor M. Baetu
Series: Cambridge Elements in the Philosophy of Biology
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Year: 2019
Pages: 74
City: Cambridge UP
Cover
Title page
Copyright page
Mechanisms in Molecular Biology
Contents
1 Mechanisms and Their Discovery
1.1 Mechanisms and Mechanistic Explanations
1.2 The Discovery of Biological Mechanisms
1.3 Experimental Methodology First
2 What Is a Phenomenon?
2.1 Data
2.2 Experimental Models of Phenomena
2.3 Reproducibility
2.4 Noise
2.5 The Data-Phenomena Distinction
2.6 AWorking Characterization of Phenomena
3 How Do Mechanisms and Phenomena Relate to One Another?
3.1 Causal Relevance
3.2 The Etiological Account
3.3 The Constitutive Account
3.4 The Causal Mediation Account
3.5 A Level-Free Conception of Mechanisms
3.6 The Completeness of Mechanistic Explanations
4 What Is the Physical Nature of Biological Mechanisms?
4.1 Beyond the Minimal Experimental Interpretation
4.2 Part–Whole Composition
4.3 Properties, Interactions, and Causal Transmission
4.4 Physical Identities
4.5 Structures and Capacities
4.6 Functions, Abstract Models, and Biological Significance
4.7 Activities and Productive Causation
4.8 An Overview and Classification of Mechanistic Accounts
A Recapitulation and Some Clarifications
References
