This book provides a straightforward introduction to teleology in biology, the work it did and the work it can do. Informed by history and philosophy, it focuses on scientific concerns. Seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth century biologists proposed a menagerie of biological “actors” to explain power without appealing to Aristotelian vegetable souls and final causes. Three constraints on teleology narrowed the field, selecting among the various actors as they mutated and recombined. Methodological naturalism, local adaptation, and blind chance each represent a significant philosophical advance in biology. Kant, Darwin, and the Modern Synthesis provided a new teleology, grounded in natural selection, an etiological recursion of form and function, and the details of carbon chemistry on Earth. They naturalized teleology, but they also finalized nature, shifting conceptions about the world and science. Understanding these links – historical, philosophical, and theoretical – sets the stage for new work moving forward.

This book provides a straightforward introduction to teleology in biology, the work it did and the work it can do. Informed by history and philosophy, it focuses on scientific concerns. Seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth century biologists proposed a menagerie of biological "actors" to explain power without appealing to Aristotelian vegetable souls and final causes. Three constraints on teleology narrowed the field, selecting among the various actors as they mutated and recombined. Methodological naturalism, local adaptation, and blind chance each represent a significant philosophical advance in biology. Kant, Darwin, and the Modern Synthesis provided a new teleology, grounded in natural selection, an etiological recursion of form and function, and the details of carbon chemistry on Earth. They naturalized teleology, but they also finalized nature, shifting conceptions about the world and science. Understanding these links - historical, philosophical, and theoretical - sets the stage for new work moving forward. Dr. Lucas John Mix is the Blumberg NASA/Library of Congress Chair in Astrobiology and an associate in Organismic and Evolutionary Biology at Harvard. He studies life concepts at the intersection of science, philosophy and theology and has worked with NASA Astrobiology programs for the last 25 years on understanding the meaning and extent of life. His previous books include Life in Space: Astrobiology for Everyone (2009) and Life Concepts from Aristotle to Darwin: On Vegetable Souls (2018).

This book provides a detailed analysis of Aristotle’s Parts of Animals. It presents the wealth of information provided in the biological works of Aristotle and revisits the detailed natural history observations that inform, and in many ways penetrate, the philosophical argument. It raises the question of how easy it is to clearly distinguish between what some might describe as “merely” biological and the philosophical. It explores the notion and consequences of describing the activity in which Aristotle is engaged as philosophical biology. The book examines such questions as: do readers of Aristotle have in mind organisms like Ascidians or Holothurians when trying to understand Aristotle’s argument regarding plant-like animals? Do they need the phenomena in front of them to understand the terms of the philosophical argument in a richer way? The discussion of plant-like animals is important in Aristotle because of the question about the continuum between plant and animal life. Where does Aristotle draw the line? Plant-like animals bring this question into focus and demonstrate the indeterminacy of any potential solution to the division. This analysis of Parts of Animals shows that the study of the nature of the organic world was Aristotle’s way into such ontological problems as the relationship between matter and form, or form and function, or the heterogeneity of the many different kinds of being.​

This volume presents an interconnected set of sixteen essays, four of which are previously unpublished, by Allan Gotthelf—one of the leading experts in the study of Aristotle's biological writings. Gotthelf addresses three main topics across Aristotle's three main biological treatises. Starting with his own ground-breaking study of Aristotle's natural teleology and its illuminating relationship with the Generation of Animals, Gotthelf proceeds to the axiomatic structure of biological explanation (and the first principles such explanation proceeds from) in the Parts of Animals. After an exploration of the implications of these two treatises for our understanding of Aristotle's metaphysics, Gotthelf examines important aspects of the method by which Aristotle organizes his data in the History of Animals to make possible such a systematic, explanatory study of animals, offering a new view of the place of classification in that enterprise. In a concluding section on 'Aristotle as Theoretical Biologist', Gotthelf explores the basis of Charles Darwin's great praise of Aristotle and, in the first printing of a lecture delivered worldwide, provides an overview of Aristotle as a philosophically-oriented scientist, and 'a proper verdict' on his greatness as scientist.

Atheists assert that the natural world has no meaning or purpose. Dr Denis Alexander, Emeritus Director of The Faraday Institute for Science and Religion at St. Edmunds College, Cambridge, draws a different conclusion. Not only do recent evolutionary biological data appear inconsistent with the claim that the world is purposeless, but the Christian doctrine of creation has provided and continues to provide both context and stimulus for the study of the natural world. Christians started biology! However, is a belief in an omnipotent, benign Creator consistent with a world of pain and suffering? From a lifetime's study in the biological sciences, Denis Alexander believes that whilst the cost of existence is extremely high, it can nonetheless be squared with the idea of a God of love whose ultimate purposes for humankind render that cost more comprehensible.

The intricate forms of living things bespeak design, and thus a creator: nearly 150 years after Darwin's theory of natural selection called this argument into question, we still speak of life in terms of design--the function of the eye, the purpose of the webbed foot, the design of the fins. Why is the "argument from design" so tenacious, and does Darwinism--itself still evolving after all these years--necessarily undo it? The definitive work on these contentious questions, Darwin and Design surveys the argument from design from its introduction by the Greeks, through the coming of Darwinism, down to the present day. In clear, non-technical language Michael Ruse, a well-known authority on the history and philosophy of Darwinism, offers a full and fair assessment of the status of the argument from design in light of both the advances of modern evolutionary biology and the thinking of today's philosophers--with special attention given to the supporters and critics of "intelligent design." The first comprehensive history and exposition of Western thought about design in the natural world, this important work suggests directions for our thinking as we move into the twenty-first century. A thoroughgoing guide to a perennially controversial issue, the book makes its own substantial contribution to the ongoing debate about the relationship between science and religion, and between evolution and its religious critics. Table of Contents: Preface Introduction 1. Two Thousand Years of Design 2. Paley and Kant Fight Back 3. Sowing the Seeds of Evolution 4. A Plurality of Problems 5. Charles Darwin 6. A Subject Too Profound 7. Darwinian against Darwinian 8. The Century of Evolutionism 9. Adaptation in Action 10. Theory and Test 11. Formalism Redux 12. From Function to Design 13. Design as Metaphor 14. Natural Theology Evolves 15. Turning Back the Clock Sources and Suggested Reading Illustration Credits Acknowledgments Index Reviews of this book: Ruse examines the concept of 'design' in nature, explaining why it still remains a strong influence despite the scientific revolution, and historically, how it dominated Western thought from ancient Greece (Plato) to the advent and predominance of Christianity...A rich and compelling book. --J. S. Schwartz, Choice Reviews of this book: Anyone who is interested in the 'science wars' controversy or the history of evolutionary thought will find this book fascinating and rewarding. The prose is masterfill--relaxed, colloquial, rich in information, and suffused with flashes of malicious wit and delicious historical tidbits. --Matt Cartmill, Reports of the National Center for Science Education Reviews of this book: To anyone interested in the evolution of evolution, I recommend this book. --John Tyler Bonner, Natural History Reviews of this book: This has to be the best of Ruse's many books, and it is hard to imagine how a better one could be written on this subject. With an understanding erudition spiced with good-natured wit and occasional sly ribaldry, Ruse moves easily and assuredly among biology, philosophy, history, and theology. --Robert T. Pennock, Science Reviews of this book: Michael Ruse's latest book, Darwin and Design, is an intellectual history of the design argument and its Darwinian solution...His story is a fascinating one, enlivened especially by his accounts of various imaginative attempts before Darwin to solve the design problem without recourse to a deity. --Daniel W. McShea, American Scientist

Bringing Biology to Life is a guided tour of the philosophy of biology, canvassing three broad areas: the early history of biology, from Aristotle to Darwin; traditional debates regarding species, function, and units of selection; and recent efforts to better understand the human condition in light of evolutionary biology. Topics are addressed using no more technical jargon than necessary, and without presupposing any advanced knowledge of biology or the philosophy of science on the part of the reader. Discussion questions are also provided to encourage reader reflection.