Denying Biology

Denying Biology PDF Author: Warren Shapiro
Publisher: University Press of America
ISBN: 9780761803218
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 260

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Book Description
We know that human beings are part of nature yet Philosophical systems around the world deny or minimize this fact. As the first book to take a systematic account of the universal human tendency to deny or minimize biology, this book considers a wide variety of these anti-biological systems and their relation to larger issues, particularly gender studies. Discussed in this book are a wide variety of expressions of the antithesis between human beings and natural processes in which the latter are denied, denigrated, or minimized. Contents: Introduction, Warren Shapiro; Sexual Imagery in Spanish Carnival, David D. Gilmore; Symbolic Reproduction and Sherpa Monasticism, Robert A. Paul; Witches and Wizards: A Male/Female Dichotomy?, James L. Brian; Coping with the Dilemmas of Masculinity and Female Disempowerment in Icelandic Mythology, Uli Linke; The Quest for Purity in Anthropological Inquiry, Warren Shapiro; Procreation, Gender, and Pollution, Ward H. Goodenough; Bibliography, Index.

Denying Biology

Denying Biology PDF Author: Warren Shapiro
Publisher: University Press of America
ISBN: 9780761803218
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 260

Get Book Here

Book Description
We know that human beings are part of nature yet Philosophical systems around the world deny or minimize this fact. As the first book to take a systematic account of the universal human tendency to deny or minimize biology, this book considers a wide variety of these anti-biological systems and their relation to larger issues, particularly gender studies. Discussed in this book are a wide variety of expressions of the antithesis between human beings and natural processes in which the latter are denied, denigrated, or minimized. Contents: Introduction, Warren Shapiro; Sexual Imagery in Spanish Carnival, David D. Gilmore; Symbolic Reproduction and Sherpa Monasticism, Robert A. Paul; Witches and Wizards: A Male/Female Dichotomy?, James L. Brian; Coping with the Dilemmas of Masculinity and Female Disempowerment in Icelandic Mythology, Uli Linke; The Quest for Purity in Anthropological Inquiry, Warren Shapiro; Procreation, Gender, and Pollution, Ward H. Goodenough; Bibliography, Index.

Darwinian Reductionism

Darwinian Reductionism PDF Author: Alexander Rosenberg
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226727319
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 275

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Book Description
After the discovery of the structure of DNA in 1953, scientists working in molecular biology embraced reductionism—the theory that all complex systems can be understood in terms of their components. Reductionism, however, has been widely resisted by both nonmolecular biologists and scientists working outside the field of biology. Many of these antireductionists, nevertheless, embrace the notion of physicalism—the idea that all biological processes are physical in nature. How, Alexander Rosenberg asks, can these self-proclaimed physicalists also be antireductionists? With clarity and wit, Darwinian Reductionism navigates this difficult and seemingly intractable dualism with convincing analysis and timely evidence. In the spirit of the few distinguished biologists who accept reductionism—E. O. Wilson, Francis Crick, Jacques Monod, James Watson, and Richard Dawkins—Rosenberg provides a philosophically sophisticated defense of reductionism and applies it to molecular developmental biology and the theory of natural selection, ultimately proving that the physicalist must also be a reductionist.

The Vital Question

The Vital Question PDF Author: Nick Lane
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781781250372
Category : Cells
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
A game-changing book on the origins of life, called the most important scientific discovery 'since the Copernican revolution' in The Observer.

Material Girls

Material Girls PDF Author: Kathleen Stock
Publisher: Fleet
ISBN: 9780349726625
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description
'A clear, concise, easy-to-read account of the issues between sex, gender and feminism . . . an important book' Evening Standard 'A call for cool heads at a time of great heat and a vital reminder that revolutions don't always end well' Sunday Times Material Girls is a timely and trenchant critique of the influential theory that we all have an inner feeling known as a gender identity, and that this feeling is more socially significant than our biological sex. Professor Kathleen Stock surveys the philosophical ideas that led to this point, and closely interrogates each one, from De Beauvoir's statement that, 'One is not born, but rather becomes a woman' (an assertion she contends has been misinterpreted and repurposed), to Judith Butler's claim that language creates biological reality, rather than describing it. She looks at biological sex in a range of important contexts, including women-only spaces and resources, healthcare, epidemiology, political organization and data collection. Material Girls makes a clear, humane and feminist case for our retaining the ability to discuss reality, and concludes with a positive vision for the future, in which trans rights activists and feminists can collaborate to achieve some of their political aims.

Essential Mathematical Biology

Essential Mathematical Biology PDF Author: Nicholas F. Britton
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 1447100492
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 347

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Book Description
This self-contained introduction to the fast-growing field of Mathematical Biology is written for students with a mathematical background. It sets the subject in a historical context and guides the reader towards questions of current research interest. A broad range of topics is covered including: Population dynamics, Infectious diseases, Population genetics and evolution, Dispersal, Molecular and cellular biology, Pattern formation, and Cancer modelling. Particular attention is paid to situations where the simple assumptions of homogenity made in early models break down and the process of mathematical modelling is seen in action.

Biological Transmutation

Biological Transmutation PDF Author: George Ohsawa
Publisher: George Ohsawa Macrobiotic
ISBN: 0918860652
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 74

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Book Description
George Ohsawa's translation and interpretation of Kervran's theory of biological transmutation, in which elements can transmute to other elements in the biological body.

Denial

Denial PDF Author: Ajit Varki
Publisher: Twelve
ISBN: 1455511927
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 290

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Book Description
The history of science abounds with momentous theories that disrupted conventional wisdom and yet were eventually proven true. Ajit Varki and Danny Brower's "Mind over Reality" theory is poised to be one such idea-a concept that runs counter to commonly-held notions about human evolution but that may hold the key to understanding why humans evolved as we did, leaving all other related species far behind. At a chance meeting in 2005, Brower, a geneticist, posed an unusual idea to Varki that he believed could explain the origins of human uniqueness among the world's species: Why is there no humanlike elephant or humanlike dolphin, despite millions of years of evolutionary opportunity? Why is it that humans alone can understand the minds of others? Haunted by their encounter, Varki tried years later to contact Brower only to discover that he had died unexpectedly. Inspired by an incomplete manuscript Brower left behind, Denial presents a radical new theory on the origins of our species. It was not, the authors argue, a biological leap that set humanity apart from other species, but a psychological one: namely, the uniquely human ability to deny reality in the face of inarguable evidence-including the willful ignorance of our own inevitable deaths. The awareness of our own mortality could have caused anxieties that resulted in our avoiding the risks of competing to procreate-an evolutionary dead-end. Humans therefore needed to evolve a mechanism for overcoming this hurdle: the denial of reality. As a consequence of this evolutionary quirk we now deny any aspects of reality that are not to our liking-we smoke cigarettes, eat unhealthy foods, and avoid exercise, knowing these habits are a prescription for an early death. And so what has worked to establish our species could be our undoing if we continue to deny the consequences of unrealistic approaches to everything from personal health to financial risk-taking to climate change. On the other hand reality-denial affords us many valuable attributes, such as optimism, confidence, and courage in the face of long odds. Presented in homage to Brower's original thinking, Denial offers a powerful warning about the dangers inherent in our remarkable ability to ignore reality-a gift that will either lead to our downfall, or continue to be our greatest asset.

The Explanatory Autonomy of the Biological Sciences

The Explanatory Autonomy of the Biological Sciences PDF Author: Wei Fang
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000513106
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 197

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Book Description
This book argues for the explanatory autonomy of the biological sciences. It does so by showing that scientific explanations in the biological sciences cannot be reduced to explanations in the fundamental sciences such as physics and chemistry and by demonstrating that biological explanations are advanced by models rather than laws of nature. To maintain the explanatory autonomy of the biological sciences, the author argues against explanatory reductionism and shows that explanation in the biological sciences can be achieved without reduction. Then, he demonstrates that the biological sciences do not have laws of nature. Instead of laws, he suggests that biological models usually do the explanatory work. To understand how a biological model can explain phenomena in the world, the author proposes an inferential account of model explanation. The basic idea of this account is that, for a model to be explanatory, it must answer two kinds of questions: counterfactual-dependence questions that concern the model itself and hypothetical questions that concern the relationship between the model and its target system. The reason a biological model can answer these two kinds of questions is due to the fact that a model is a structure, and the holistic relationship between the model and its target warrants the hypothetical inference from the model to its target and thus helps to answer the second kind of question. The Explanatory Autonomy of the Biological Sciences will be of interest to researchers and advanced students working in philosophy of science, philosophy of biology and metaphysics.

Feminism and Evolutionary Biology

Feminism and Evolutionary Biology PDF Author: Patricia Gowaty
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 1461559855
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 629

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Book Description
Standing at the intersection of evolutionary biology and feminist theory is a large audience interested in the questions one field raises for the other. Have evolutionary biologists worked largely or strictly within a masculine paradigm, seeing males as evolving and females as merely reacting passively or carried along with the tide? Would our view of nature `red in tooth in claw' be different if women had played a larger role in the creation of evolutionary theory and through education in its transmission to younger generations? Is there any such thing as a feminist science or feminist methodology? For feminists, does any kind of biological determinism undermine their contention that gender roles purely constructed, not inherent in the human species? Does the study of animals have anything to say to those preoccupied with the evolution and behavior of humans? All these questions and many more are addressed by this book, whose contributing authors include leading scholars in both feminism and evolutionary biology. Bound to be controversial, this book is addressed to evolutionary biologists and to feminists and to the large number of people interested in women's studies.

Contemporary Debates in Philosophy of Biology

Contemporary Debates in Philosophy of Biology PDF Author: Francisco J. Ayala
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 9781444314939
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 440

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Book Description
This collection of specially commissioned essays puts top scholarshead to head to debate the central issues in the lively and fastgrowing field of philosophy of biology Brings together original essays on ten of the most hotlydebated questions in philosophy of biology Lively head-to-head debate format sharply defines the issuesand paves the way for further discussion Includes coverage of the new and vital area of evolutionarydevelopmental biology, as well as the concept of a unified species,the role of genes in selection, the differences between micro- andmacro-evolution, and much more Each section features an introduction to the topic as well assuggestions for further reading Offers an accessible overview of this fast-growing and dynamicfield, whilst also capturing the imagination of professionalphilosophers and biologists