parsimony/biology

[Phil Bunch]

The distinction between a conceptualized "individual" and a process is
crucial.  The human brain processes sensory information and organizes
it into a model of the "outside" world.  In doing so it must simplify
a very complex, ever changing array of events.  What we think of as a
thing or individual is actually nothing but a process or set of
processes.  Even a rock is a process subject to change at all times.
It is worthwhile keeping this in mind when thinking about organisms.
The critter you see now is not the critter you saw five minuets ago.
It may even have changed genetically in that period of time.  When one
thinks of a species things get worse.  The business of taxonomy is
making processes into "things."   It's a necessary evil but I don't
think one should be deceived by ones conceptualizations.

Phil Bunch

-----Original Message-----
From: Kirk Fitzhugh <kfitzhug at NHM.ORG>
To: TAXACOM at USOBI.ORG <TAXACOM at USOBI.ORG>
Date: Tuesday, February 27, 2001 11:21 AM
Subject: Re: parsimony/biology


>Tom,
>
>On the subject of things and events, things are involved in events,
but
>events themselves are not things. Nice discussions on these matters
can be
>found in Strawson's (1959) "Individuals," and in the writings of
Wesley
>Salmon on causality, and I think in Mahner & Bunge's (1997)
"Foundations of
>Biophilosophy." For instance, Strawson (1959: 46, original emphasis)
>states, "Another distinction, worth mentioning now, to which I shall
later
>refer is that between, e.g., events and processes which, as named and
>conceived of by us, necessarily are *of*, or performed or undergone
*by*,
>material bodies or things possessing material bodies, and events and
>processes not of this kind."
>
>If we do agree that cladograms are statements of initial causal
conditions
>that account for observed shared similarities, then cladograms do
>hypothesize the past existence of individuals, in the form of
organisms in
>ancestral species. Cladograms also indicate that those individuals
were
>involved in events, such as speciation. That it is the case that
events do
>not have the ontological qualities of things, but denote the changes
in
>things over time, a monophyletic taxon, as indicated from a
cladogram,
>cannot be a thing as well. Monophyletic taxa are instances of causal
>events, which places them in the realm of classes, not individuals. A
very
>good exposition on the nature of individuals can be found in Gracia's
>(1988), "Individuality." I consider the same argument to apply to
species,
>which are instances of hybridization events (or asexual reproductive
events
>as the case might be). Taxa do not have the quality of
non-instantiability,
>which is the hallmark of individuality. Again, if a cladogram is to
be
>construed as an explanation for what we observe, which are the
properties
>of organisms, then taxa derived from cladograms represent instances
from a
>class of events.
>
>You mention that "In the process of defining characters we percieve
>patterns of shared properties amongst individual organisms."
Actually, the
>act of "defining" a character starts at the point of observing just a
>single instance. There is no requirement that one name a property
only
>after seeing n+1 instances. That there is a pattern is already
entailed
>with the proposition, "individuals A and B both have property x."
>
>You then say that, "In a further stage of character definition, we
infer
>that these shared properties are homologies - they are the "same"
things,
>present as a result of descent from a common ancestor." This is not a
>"further stage" for defining a property. The same properties in A and
B are
>already firmly established at the point of having the perceptual
belief
>that x manifests itself in A and B. The following act of inferring a
>homology hypothesis is to causally account for the existence of
property x
>in A and B outside of my mind. There is a clear distinction to be
made
>between the existence of properties of things and the inference of
possible
>explanations for the existence of those properties.
>
>Your conclusion is that, "In other words we see a pattern amongst
things
>which we recognize as the various manifestations of a single
historical
>'thing'." This is only possible insofar as stating that from a causal
>standpoint A and B exhibit the same properties because they are
derived
>from a common ancestor with that property. The only historical things
to be
>referred to are the individuals of that ancestral species that also
had
>property x prior to some speciation event. There are no other
"individuals"
>to be considered, species, genera, families, or otherwise. Reference
to a
>common ancestral species cannot be reference to a thing, but a set of
>individual organisms that existed in the past that were involved in
>hybridization events. If we pooled 100 people into a room, we would
not say
>we have "an individual" simply because all of them are derived from
some
>ancestral species. We recognize those 100 individuals as part of the
same
>species only because we infer their existence is due to a series of
causal
>events. Making the clear distinction between individuals and the fact
that
>events involve individuals, but are not themselves individuals, makes
it
>very clear how to refer to the causal aspects of cladograms and taxa.
>
>Kirk
>