Reasoning in Biological Discoveries

Reasoning in Biological Discoveries brings together a series of essays which focus on one of the most heavily debated topics of scientific discovery today. Collected together and richly illustrated for the first time in this edition, Darden’s essays represent a ground-breaking foray into one of the major problems facing scientists and philosophers of science. Divided into three sections, the essays focus on broad themes, notably historical and philosophical issues at play in discussions of biological mechanism; and the problem of developing and refining reasoning strategies, including interfield relations and anomaly resolution. Published here for the first time, Darden summarizes the philosophy of discovery and elaborates on the role that mechanisms play in biological discovery. Throughout the book, she uses historical case studies to extract advisory reasoning strategies for discovery. Examples in genetics, molecular biology, biochemistry, immunology, neuroscience, and evolutionary biology reveal the process of discovery in action.

• Presents a new philosophy of discovery as an extended, rational process • Presents an original and compelling synthesis of philosophy, history, and biology • Provides reasoning strategies for discovering mechanisms in biology, a task in which biologists often engage

Part I. Biological Mechanisms: 1. Thinking about mechanisms with Peter Machamer and Carl F. Craver; 2. Discovering mechanisms in neurobiology: the case of spatial memory with Carl F. Craver; 3. Strategies in the interfield discovery of the mechanism of protein synthesis with Carl F. Craver; 4. Relations among fields: Mendelian, cytological and molecular mechanisms; Part II. Reasoning Strategies: Relating Fields, Resolving Anomalies: 5. Interfield theories with Nancy Maull; 6. Theory construction in genetics; 7. Relations among fields in the evolutionary synthesis; 8. Selection type theories with Joseph A. Cain; 9. Strategies for anomaly resolution: diagnosis and redesign; 10. Exemplars, abstractions, and anomalies: representations and theory change in Mendelian and molecular genetics; 11. Strategies for anomaly resolution in the case of adaptive mutation; Part III. Discovering Mechanisms: Construction, Evaluation, Revision: 12. Strategies for discovering mechanisms: construction, evaluation, revision.