From Biological Determination to Entangled Causation
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From Biological Determination to Entangled Causation Davide Vecchi1,2 · Paul‑Antoine Miquel3 · Isaac Hernández3 Received: 5 June 2017 / Accepted: 29 August 2018 © Springer Nature B.V. 2018
Abstract Biologists and philosophers often use the language of determination in order to describe the nature of developmental phenomena. Accounts in terms of determination have often been reductionist. One common idea is that DNA is supposed to play a special explanatory role in developmental explanations, namely, that DNA is a developmental determinant. In this article we try to make sense of determination claims in developmental biology. Adopting a manipulationist approach, we shall first argue that the notion of developmental determinant is causal. We suggest that two different theses concerning developmental determination can be articulated: determination of occurrence and structural determination. We shall argue that, while the first thesis is problematic, the second, opportunely qualified, is feasible. Finally, we shall argue that an analysis of biological causation in terms of determination cannot account for entangled dynamics. Characterising causal entanglement as a particular kind of interactive causation whereby difference-making causes ascribable to different levels of biological organisation influence a particular ontogenetic outcome, we shall, via two illustrative examples, diagnose some potential limits of a reductionist, molecular and intra-level understanding of biological causation. Keywords Developmental causation · Developmental determinant · Manipulationism · Biological determination · Causal entanglement · Biological reductionism
* Davide Vecchi [email protected] 1
Centro de Filosofia das Ciências, Departamento de História e Filosofia das Ciências, Faculdade de Ciências, Universidade de Lisboa, 1749‑016 Lisbon, Portugal
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Departamento de Filosofía, Facultad de Humanidades, Universidad de Santiago de Chile, Avenida Libertador Bernardo O’Higgins #3677, Santiago, Chile
3
Laboratoire ERRAPHIS, PhSciVi, Université Toulouse Jean Jaurès, Maison de la Recherche 5 allée Antonio‑Machado, 31058 Toulouse Cedex 9, France
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1 A Brief History of Determination in Biology Biologists and philosophers often use the language of determination in order to describe the nature of developmental phenomena. Conrad Hal Waddington (Sarkar 2005, chapter 14) was probably the first biologist to propose a coherent idea of developmental determination. Waddington (1939) proposed an interpretation of gene action that was deterministic despite the well-known complexity of the genotype-environment relationship. The idea of epigenetic landscape was already implicit in Waddington’s conceptualisation of development at the time: development can be represented as a system of branching paths, that is, as a series of discrete steps or bifurcations with no intermediates between them; evocators (i.e., genes) “decide” which path is taken by the developing organism at every bifurcation. The up
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