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http://www.anatomy.usyd.edu.au/danny/book-reviews/h/Metaphysics_Species.html

     title: Metaphysics and the Origin of Species
        by: Michael T. Ghiselin
 publisher: State University of New York Press 1997
     other: 377 pages, bibliography, index, US$24.95

Ghiselin is best known for arguing that species are logical individuals
rather than classes, most notably in a 1974 paper "A radical solution to
the species problem".  This individuality thesis is apparently simple, but
it has surprisingly broad implications.  In _Metaphysics and the Origin
of Species_ Ghiselin explores these implications, in the process resolving
some of the philosophical confusions that have beset evolutionary biology
and laying metaphysical foundations for the discipline.

_Metaphysics and the Origin of Species_ begins with nothing less than the
construction of a natural system of ontological categories, following
Aristotle and Kant.  This is used as a basis for elucidating various
philosophical concepts, most importantly the properties of individuals
(and, against them, classes): individuals are concrete (while classes
admit abstraction); they lack defining properties and their proper names
are defined ostensively; they are spatio-temporally restricted (while
classes are not); they have no instances, but enter into part-whole
relationships with other individuals; they participate in processes
(which classes can not); they are ontologically autonomous; and they
don't appear in laws of nature.

This sounds rather abstruse, and much of of _Metaphysics and the
Origin of Species_ will be heavy going for those without a background
in philosophy.  But it is not just abstract speculation.  Ghiselin
connects his philosophical analyses and explanations to biological
"applications" and provides effective non-biological analogies and
examples.  His philosophy also reflects familiarity with everyday
scientific practice, not just knowledge of the theory.

After a chapter on definitions and proper names (and their relationship
to essentialism), Ghiselin moves on to the key concept of 'species'.
He presents an extended discussion of different definitions, arguing for
the biological species concept and against alternatives.  He examines,
and dismisses, some of the alternatives to the individuality thesis
which have been suggested -- that species are neither individuals nor
classes, or are both, for example.  And he also explores some of the
more suggestive analogies for species -- languages and firms -- and
addresses the question of why species exist and what they do.

Turning to systematics, Ghiselin considers the differences between
objective and subjective classification systems, and between natural
and artificial ones.  He sees systematics as afflicted by naive
inductionism; phenetics was tainted with phenomenalism, but evolutionary
and cladistic systematists have inherited some of its metaphysical
(and epistemological) confusions.  Ghiselin also considers definitions
of characters and the concepts of homology and analogy.  Homologues are
parts of individuals, related by a shared, historically specific causal
influences (lineal descent from a common ancestor).  Analogues are parts
of class members and result from convergent evolution, on which there
is no spatio-temporal restriction.  A later chapter on the "artifactual
basis of macroevolution" highlights the artificiality of higher taxonomic
classifications, particularly in the choice of rank for taxa; this
is illustrated with a survey of the Metazoan phyla.  Also covered are
pseudoextinctions and other artifacts of the fossil record.

Ghiselin argues convincingly that biology does have laws, but that
they must refer to kinds of species, not to particular species.
Some hypotheses about hermaphroditism, sexual selection, and sex ratios
are presented as examples.  He goes on to consider the principles
of historical inference, drawing on the earth sciences as a model.
Distinguishing laws of nature from historical facts and contingencies
can be difficult: as an illustration of this Ghiselin surveys the
history of embryology and relationships between ontogeny and phylogeny.
In his final chapter, after a digression on definitions of "fitness" and
"function", Ghiselin places the study of life among the other sciences.
He argues that the goal of evolutionary biology is the synthesis of
the nomothetic -- laws of nature -- and the idiographic -- contingent
facts, the production of a historical narrative which relates sequences
of events to laws of nature.

_Metaphysics and the Origin of Species_ jumps from topic to topic in
slightly haphazard fashion.  Noteworthy in this context is the appendix,
a kind of glossary with the terms arranged conceptually, which is an
effective summary of the volume.

It is most unlikely anyone will agree with Ghiselin on everything;
on the other hand, it is also most unlikely that anyone interested in
philosophy will fail to find something worth chewing on in the almost
profligate smorgasboard of ideas he has laid out.  There is no other
work which treats this material so comprehensively.  _Metaphysics and
the Origin of Species_ brings a cobweb-clearing scythe to the philosophy
of biology and a welcome freshness to metaphysics -- it has convinced
me that "applied metaphysics" isn't an oxymoron!

--

Disclaimer: I requested and received a review copy of _Metaphysics and
the Origin of Species_ from the State University of New York Press,
but I have no stake, financial or otherwise, in its success.

--

%T	Metaphysics and the Origin of Species
%A	Michael T. Ghiselin
%I	State University of New York Press
%C	Albany
%D	1997
%O	paperback, bibliography, index
%G	ISBN 0-7914-3468-0
%P	xi,377pp
%U	http://www.sunypress.edu/sunyp/backads/html/ghiselin.html
%K	philosophy, evolution, philosophy of science

25 January 1998

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        Copyright (c) 1998 Danny Yee (danny@cs.usyd.edu.au)
        http://www.anatomy.usyd.edu.au/danny/book-reviews/
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