Species

Abstract

I defend a view of the species category, pluralistic realism, which is designed to do justice to the insights of many different groups of systematists. After arguing that species are sets and not individuals, I proceed to outline briefly some defects of the biological species concept. I draw the general moral that similar shortcomings arise for other popular views of the nature of species. These shortcomings arise because the legitimate interests of biology are diverse, and these diverse interests are reflected in different legitimate approaches to the classification of organisms. In the final section, I show briefly how the pluralistic approach can help to illuminate some areas of biological and philosophical dispute.

Microbial diversity and the “lower-limit” problem of biodiversity

“…This concept is well known for its elusiveness (e.g. Mayr 1982;Kitcher 1984;Sober 1984;Wilson 1999), and, despite its very frequent use as the unit of biodiversity, its applicability to biodiversity studies has been strongly questioned and reassessed (e.g. Rojas 1992; MacLaurin and Sterelny 2008).…”

Beyond Reduction and Pluralism: Toward an Epistemology of Explanatory Integration in Biology

“…3 different individuals into a species (Kitcher, 1984b). More generally, John Dupré (1993) argued that there is a plethora of legitimate ways to represent nature and to form kinds, controversially maintaining that conceptual and classificatory schemes used in scientific and non-scientific contexts are equally valid (e.g., classifying plants / animals in terms of common ancestry and in terms of culinary preferences).…”

Species as family resemblance concepts: The (dis‐)solution of the species problem?

“…On the matter of what sort of ''things'' species are, Kitcher, (26) contrary to Mishler and Brandon, proposed that species are Table 2. Some of the major themes dominating philosophical discussions of the species problem.…”

“…Splitter (27) suggests that species are not natural kinds, an idea thatwith an interesting twist that includes arguments concerning human brain's physiology-has been revisited by biologist Hey in a recent book. (10) We then come to pluralism, the suggestion-put forth in different fashions by Mishler and Donoghue, (28) Kitcher, (26) and Dupré (29) -that the reason there are many species concepts is because biologists are legitimately interested in a heterogeneous group of questions, each of which requires logically independent, and equally valid, concepts of species. The idea is that there are at least two such components to biological endeavors, which Kitcher terms the historical/ evolutionary and the structural/functional inquiries.…”