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Species Have (Partly) Intrinsic Essences

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Michael Devitt
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Abstract

The paper defends the doctrine that Linnaean taxa, including species, have essences that are, at least partly, underlying intrinsic, mostly genetic, properties. The consensus among philosophers of biology is that such essentialism is deeply wrong, indeed incompatible with Darwinism. I argue that biological generalizations about the morphology, physiology, and behavior of species require structural explanations that must advert to these essential properties. The paper concludes by summarizing my responses to the objection that, according to current “species concepts,” species are relational, and to the objection that essentialism cannot accommodate features of Darwinism associated with variation and change.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 77 , Issue 5 , December 2010 , pp. 648 - 661
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

‡

This paper is a greatly shortened version of my “Resurrecting Biological Essentialism” (2008).

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