Biological Individuality
The Identity and Persistence of Living Entities

Wilson resolves paradoxes that arise when one applies past notions of individuality to biological examples.

Jack Wilson (Author)

9780521624251, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 28 August 1999

150 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1 cm, 0.37 kg

What makes a biological entity an individual? Jack Wilson shows that past philosophers have failed to explicate the conditions an entity must satisfy to be a living individual. He explores the reason for this failure and explains why we should limit ourselves to examples involving real organisms rather than thought experiments. This book explores and resolves paradoxes that arise when one applies past notions of individuality to biological examples beyond the conventional range and presents an analysis of identity and persistence. The book's main purpose is to bring together two lines of research, theoretical biology and metaphysics, which have dealt with the same subject in isolation from one another. Wilson explains an alternative theory about biological individuality which solves problems which cannot be addressed by either field alone. He presents a more fine-grained vocabulary of individuation based on diverse kinds of living things, allowing him to clarify previously muddled disputes about individuality in biology.

Acknowledgements
Part I. Beyond Horses and Oak Trees: A New Theory of Individuation for Living Entities: 1. Introduction
2. The meaning of 'a life'
3. The poverty of examples
4. Imaginary examples and conceptual analysis
5. What is it?
Part II. The Biological and Philosophical Roots of Individuality: 6. Why biologists (should) care about individuality
7. Philosophers on living entities
8. Natural kinds and substantial kinds
9. Patterns and natural kinds
Part III. Individuality and Equivocation: 10. Paradigm individuals: the higher animals
11. Other possible solutions
12. The proposed solution
Part IV. The Necessity of Biological Origin and Substantial Kinds: 13. A valid argument for sortal essentialism
14. The necessity of biological origin
15. Sex
16. Species membership and the necessity of genealogy
Part V. Generation and Corruption: 17. Genetic individuals
18. Functional individuals
19. Developmental individuals
20. Raising the dead
Part VI. Personal Identity Naturalized: Our Bodies, Our Selves: 21. Human beings as biological entities
22. Is a person a human being?
23. Conclusions
Appendix. Identity and sortals: why relative identity is self-contradictory
Notes
References
Index.

Subject Areas: Philosophy of science [PDA], Social & political philosophy [HPS]