Organisms and Artifacts: Design in Nature and Elsewhere (Life and Mind: Philosophical Issues in Biology and Psychology) (Paperback)

by Tim Lewens (Author) "Biology is unique among the natural sciences in its use of a family of concepts that might seem better suited to the description and explanation..." (more)
Key Phrases: artifact thinking, artifact talk, biological function concept, Understanding of Ends, Karen Neander (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"I find the work extremely original and philosophically quite sound. Lewens's work successfully removes a lot of the irrelevant issues that contrast material theories of evolution by natural selection with notions of human design."
—Richard Lewontin, Alexander Agassiz Research Professor, Harvard University

"I had long thought that the topic of function in biology was exhausted. Organisms and Artifacts, Tim Lewens's splendid new book, shows that I was quite wrong. Lewens unites a deep understanding of biology with a keen nose for a philosophical problem, and he has produced a work that is insightful and (just as important) highly interesting. This book will give an old problem really new life, and must be the starting point for all future discussion."
—Michael Ruse, Lucyle T. Werkmeister Professor of Philosophy, Florida State University

Product Description
In Organisms and Artifacts, Tim Lewens investigates the analogical use of the language of design in evolutionary biology. Uniquely among the natural sciences, biology uses descriptive and explanatory terms more suited to artifacts than organisms. When biologists discuss, for example, the purpose of the panda's thumb and look for functional explanations for organic traits, they borrow from a vocabulary of intelligent design that Darwin's findings could have made irrelevant over a hundred years ago. Lewens argues that examining the analogy between the processes of evolution and the processes by which artifacts are created— looking at organisms as analogical artifacts—sheds light on explanations of the form of both organic and inorganic objects. He argues further that understanding the analogy is important for what it can tell us not only about biology but about technology and philosophy.

In the course of his argument, Lewens discusses issues of interest to philosophers of biology, biologists, philosophers of mind, and students of technology. These issues include the pitfalls of the design-based thinking of adaptationism, the possible conflict between selection explanations and developmental explanations, a proposed explanation of biological function, and prospects for an informative evolutionary model of technological change. Emerging from these discussions is an explanation of the use of the vocabulary of intelligence and intention in biology that does not itself draw on the ideas of intelligent design, which will be of interest in the ongoing debate over intelligent design creationism.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 195 pages
• Publisher: The MIT Press (September 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0262621991
• ISBN-13: 978-0262621991
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.9 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,443,853 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting premise, dense writing, September 23, 2004

By	wiredweird "wiredweird" (Earth, or somewhere nearby) - See all my reviews (TOP 100 REVIEWER)

This review is from: Organisms and Artifacts: Design in Nature and Elsewhere (Life and Mind: Philosophical Issues in Biology and Psychology) (Hardcover)

If you listen to biologists talk for just a few minutes, you're likely to hear how some organ has function X, how well a protein is designed for purpose Y, or how some piece of DNA has meaning Z. These aren't creationists, but hard-headed scientists discussing the blind operation of nature. Nothing in nature "means" anything in the sense that a human word has meaning, nothing has "purpose" in the sense that some intelligence has assigned a goal to the object. They why do serious people use such anthropomorphic terms?

Most of all, why does this language lead to such stunning successes in understanding the mechanisms of life?

That is Lewens' goal, to figure out just what the thought processes are behind those words. His search isn't just intellectual word-play, it's a search for the basis of human understanding in biology. As in any experimental science, biological tests are phrased as questions: do real-world facts contradict the statement in question, yes or no? The scientific outcome of the experiment is just a physical phenomenon, but the answer to the question is semantic. That is the point that Lewens addresses: how the meaning of the question maps into physical phenomena, and how results map from phenomena to meaningful answers. The meaning of the question is the most fundamental factor in the scientific process.

Lewens does a very good job in this analysis. He avoids the dogmatic absolutism that seems to characterize other philosophers' answers. Biologists, after all, are usually happy to look at any one problem in two or three ways that contradict each other. Lewens seems to place more importance on what the practicing scientists believe than in philosophical theory - a habit that lends relevance to his work, or avoids immediate irrelevance. Despite his generally sound foundation in scientific fact, Lewens still shies from answers in statistical form; future work should address that weakness, but it did not detract from the general thrust of his discussion.

Lewens has chosen an important field of study, and has addressed it with respect for the people who work in that field. He succeeds in showing that philosophy can be a constructive force in modern life and thought. I have to admit, however, that many of his distinctions were drawn so finely that the details blur together for me even a little while later. There are times when the words matter, but scientists tend to putter along quite happily without approaching this level of fussiness. This book is interesting, but not easy to apply within the field that it addresses.

//wiredweird