It is readily conceded that “pain” is a term in a public language. But the concession leads us at once to speak of a criterion or criteria for its proper ascription; and the concept of a criterion of pain is a particularly difficult concept to lay bare. The issue has its classic source in Wittgenstein, where it extends far beyond the boundaries of mental entities. It is hard to say what Wittgenstein's view actually is regarding criteria; and it may be (...) more profitable to canvass certain untenable possibilities, with an eye to the problem, than to settle what can only be a question of a sort of archaeology. (shrink)

Species are central to biology, but there is currently no agreement on what the adequate species concept should be, and many have adopted a pluralist stance: different species concepts will be required for different purposes. This thesis is a multidimensional analysis of species pluralism. First I explicate how pluralism differs monism and relativism. I then consider the history of species pluralism. I argue that we must re-frame the species problem, and that re-evaluating Aristotle's role in the histories of systematics can (...) shed light on pluralism. Next I consider different forms of pluralism: evolutionary and extra-evolutionary species pluralism, which differ in their stance on evolutionary theory. I show that pluralism is more than a debate about the species category, but a debate about which concepts are legitimate and a claim about how they interact with one another. Following that, I consider what sort of ontology is required for different forms of species pluralism. I argue that pluralists who deny the unity of biology will require a further plurality of frameworks, while those that ground their pluralism in evolution need only one framework. Finally, I consider what pluralism means for biological practice. I argue that species concepts are tools, and reflect on how pluralism can illuminate the way systematists approach the discovery of new species of yeast. Pluralism can make sense of the way species concepts are used, and can be developed to aid researchers in thinking about how to use the right tools for the right jobs. (shrink)

The essentialism story is a version of the history of biological classification that was fabricated between 1953 and 1968 by Ernst Mayr, who combined contributions from Arthur Cain and David Hull with his own grudge against Plato. It portrays pre-Darwinian taxonomists as caught in the grip of an ancient philosophy called essentialism, from which they were not released until Charles Darwin's 1859 Origin of Species. Mayr's motive was to promote the Modern Synthesis in opposition to the typology of idealist morphologists; (...) demonizing Plato served this end. Arthur Cain's picture of Linnaeus as a follower of 'Aristotelian' (scholastic) logic was woven into the story, along with David Hull's application of Karl Popper's term, 'essentialism', which Mayr accepted in 1968 as a synonym for what he had called 'typological thinking'. Although Mayr also pointed out the importance of empiricism in the history of taxonomy, the essentialism story still dominates the secondary literature. The history of the first telling of the essentialism story exposes its scant basis in fact. (shrink)

Michael Pardo and Dennis Patterson have recently put forward several provocative and stimulating criticisms that strike at the heart of much work that has been done at the crossroads of neuroscience and the law. My goal in this essay is to argue that their criticisms of the nascent but growing field of neurolaw are ultimately based on questionable assumptions concerning the nature of the ever evolving relationship between scientific discovery and ordinary language. For while the marriage between ordinary language and (...) scientific discovery is admittedly not always a happy one, it is an awkward union that nevertheless seems to work itself out with the passage of time. In the following pages, I will try to show that Pardo and Patterson’s primary argumentative strategy ultimately depends on basic assumptions concerning the fixity of language that we should reject. (shrink)