Mechanism schemas and the relationship between biological theories

Abstract

Current accounts of the relationship between classical genetics and molecular biology favor the 'explanatory extension' thesis, according to which molecular biology elucidates aspects of inheritance unexplained by classical genetics. I identify however an unresolved tension between the 'explanatory extension' account and examples of 'explanatory interference' (cases when the accommodation of data from molecular biology results in a more precise genotyping and more adequate classical explanations). This paper provides a new way of analyzing the relationship between classical genetics and molecular biology capable of resolving this tension.The proposed solution makes use of the properties of mechanism schemas and sketches, which can be completed by elucidating some or all of their remaining 'black boxes' and instantiated via the filling-in of phenomenon-specific details. This result has implications for the reductionismantireductionism debate since it shows that molecular elucidations have a positive impact on classical explanations without entailing the reduction of classical genetics to molecular biology.

Unificatory Explanation

“…Scientific progress and integration, she now argues, occur through a progressive discovery of separatebut-serially-connected mechanisms with working entities of various sizes, which are gradually filled in with more specific descriptions of components and activities. Similar analyses have also been offered by other authors associated with this mechanistic philosophy, who argue that fields are integrated via the addition of constraints to the organization of mechanisms (Craver [2007]; Baetu [2011]; Craver and Darden [2013]).…”

Explanation in Biology

“…13 "A mechanism schema is a truncated abstract description of a mechanism that can be easily instantiated by filling it with more specific descriptions of component entities and activities" (Darden 2006, 111-12). biology to other fields of investigation, such as bioinformatics and systems biology (Baetu 2011b(Baetu , 2012b. Since a lot is known about the molecular basis of biological activity, the starting point of current modeling efforts is, more often than not, prior knowledge of molecular mechanisms.…”