Pub Date : 2024-01-04DOI: 10.1007/s13752-023-00454-0
Lenny Moss
{"title":"Concepts of Agency: Introduction to the Thematic Section","authors":"Lenny Moss","doi":"10.1007/s13752-023-00454-0","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s13752-023-00454-0","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":72374,"journal":{"name":"Biological theory","volume":"55 16","pages":"1-3"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-01-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139385655","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-01-01Epub Date: 2024-02-26DOI: 10.1007/s13752-024-00455-7
Peter Takacs, Pierrick Bourrat
In a recent reply to Takacs and Bourrat's article (Biol Philos 37:12, 2022), Autzen and Okasha (Biol Philos 37:37, 2022) question our characterization of the relationship between the geometric mean and arithmetic mean measures of fitness. We here take issue with the claim that our characterization falls prey to the mistakes they highlight. Briefly revisiting what Takacs and Bourrat (Biol Philos 37:12, 2022) accomplished reveals that the key issue of difference concerns cases of deterministic but nonconstant growth. Restricting focus to such cases shows that there is in fact no reason for disagreement.
{"title":"Context Matters: A Response to Autzen and Okasha's Reply to Takacs and Bourrat.","authors":"Peter Takacs, Pierrick Bourrat","doi":"10.1007/s13752-024-00455-7","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s13752-024-00455-7","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>In a recent reply to Takacs and Bourrat's article (Biol Philos 37:12, 2022), Autzen and Okasha (Biol Philos 37:37, 2022) question our characterization of the relationship between the geometric mean and arithmetic mean measures of fitness. We here take issue with the claim that our characterization falls prey to the mistakes they highlight. Briefly revisiting what Takacs and Bourrat (Biol Philos 37:12, 2022) accomplished reveals that the key issue of difference concerns cases of deterministic but nonconstant growth. Restricting focus to such cases shows that there is in fact no reason for disagreement.</p>","PeriodicalId":72374,"journal":{"name":"Biological theory","volume":"19 3","pages":"170-176"},"PeriodicalIF":1.9,"publicationDate":"2024-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11324713/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142001704","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-01-01Epub Date: 2024-08-14DOI: 10.1007/s13752-024-00471-7
Bernd Rosslenbroich, Susanna Kümmell, Benjamin Bembé
A central characteristic of living organisms is their agency, that is, their intrinsic activity, both in terms of their basic life processes and their behavior in the environment. This aspect is currently a subject of debate and this article provides an overview of some of the relevant publications on this topic. We develop the argument that agency is immanent in living organisms. There is no life without agency. Even the basic life processes are an intrinsic activity, which we call the organismic level of agency. In addition to this we describe several further levels. These capture different qualities that occur or transform during evolution. In addition to the organismic level, we propose an ontogenetic level, a level of directed agency, directed agency with extended flexibility, and a level that includes the capacities to follow preconceived goals. A further property of organisms is their autonomy. It has been shown that the capacity for autonomy changed during evolution. Here we propose that the two organismic properties autonomy and agency are closely related. Enhanced physiological and behavioral autonomy extends the scope of self-generated, flexible actions and reactions. The increase in autonomy through the evolution of a widened scope of behavioral possibilities and versatility in organisms coincides with extended levels of agency. Especially the human organization, including the sophisticated brain, is the basis for an extended level of agency referring to the capacities to follow preconceived goals. However, it is important for the understanding of the phenomenon of agency not only to assume this latter form, but also to look at the different levels of agency.
{"title":"Agency as an Inherent Property of Living Organisms.","authors":"Bernd Rosslenbroich, Susanna Kümmell, Benjamin Bembé","doi":"10.1007/s13752-024-00471-7","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s13752-024-00471-7","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>A central characteristic of living organisms is their agency, that is, their intrinsic activity, both in terms of their basic life processes and their behavior in the environment. This aspect is currently a subject of debate and this article provides an overview of some of the relevant publications on this topic. We develop the argument that agency is immanent in living organisms. There is no life without agency. Even the basic life processes are an intrinsic activity, which we call the organismic level of agency. In addition to this we describe several further levels. These capture different qualities that occur or transform during evolution. In addition to the organismic level, we propose an ontogenetic level, a level of directed agency, directed agency with extended flexibility, and a level that includes the capacities to follow preconceived goals. A further property of organisms is their autonomy. It has been shown that the capacity for autonomy changed during evolution. Here we propose that the two organismic properties autonomy and agency are closely related. Enhanced physiological and behavioral autonomy extends the scope of self-generated, flexible actions and reactions. The increase in autonomy through the evolution of a widened scope of behavioral possibilities and versatility in organisms coincides with extended levels of agency. Especially the human organization, including the sophisticated brain, is the basis for an extended level of agency referring to the capacities to follow preconceived goals. However, it is important for the understanding of the phenomenon of agency not only to assume this latter form, but also to look at the different levels of agency.</p>","PeriodicalId":72374,"journal":{"name":"Biological theory","volume":"19 4","pages":"224-236"},"PeriodicalIF":1.9,"publicationDate":"2024-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11652585/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142866551","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-12-18DOI: 10.1007/s13752-023-00453-1
David Depew
{"title":"Correction to: Richard Lewontin and Theodosius Dobzhansky: Genetics, Race, and the Anxiety of Influence","authors":"David Depew","doi":"10.1007/s13752-023-00453-1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s13752-023-00453-1","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":72374,"journal":{"name":"Biological theory","volume":" 37","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-12-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138964481","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-27DOI: 10.1007/s13752-023-00450-4
Laura Nuño de la Rosa, James G. Lennox
{"title":"From the Method of Division to the Theory of Transformations: Thompson After Aristotle, and Aristotle After Thompson","authors":"Laura Nuño de la Rosa, James G. Lennox","doi":"10.1007/s13752-023-00450-4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s13752-023-00450-4","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":72374,"journal":{"name":"Biological theory","volume":"60 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139229840","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-23DOI: 10.1007/s13752-023-00452-2
David Depew
{"title":"Richard Lewontin and Theodosius Dobzhansky: Genetics, Race, and the Anxiety of Influence","authors":"David Depew","doi":"10.1007/s13752-023-00452-2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s13752-023-00452-2","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":72374,"journal":{"name":"Biological theory","volume":"284 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139243940","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-08DOI: 10.1007/s13752-023-00447-z
Richard Watson
Abstract In this essay we aim to present some considerations regarding a minimal but concrete notion of agency and goal-directed behavior that are useful for characterizing biological systems at different scales. These considerations are a particular perspective, bringing together concepts from dynamical systems, combinatorial problem-solving, and connectionist learning with an emphasis on the relationship between parts and wholes. This perspective affords some ways to think about agents that are concrete and quantifiable, and relevant to some important biological issues. Instead of advocating for a strict definition of minimally agential characteristics, we focus on how (even for a modest notion of agency) the agency of a system can be more than the sum of the agency of its parts. We quantify this in terms of the problem-solving competency of a system with respect to resolution of the frustrations between its parts. This requires goal-directed behavior in the sense of delayed gratification, i.e., taking dynamical trajectories that forego short-term gains (or sustain short-term stress or frustration) in favor of long-term gains. In order for this competency to belong to the system (rather than to its parts or given by its construction or design), it can involve distributed systemic knowledge that is acquired through experience, i.e., changes in the organization of the relationships among its parts (without presupposing a system-level reward function for such changes). This conception of agency helps us think about the ways in which cells, organisms, and perhaps other biological scales, can be agential (i.e., more agential than their parts) in a quantifiable sense, without denying that the behavior of the whole depends on the behaviors of the parts in their current organization.
{"title":"Agency, Goal-Directed Behavior, and Part-Whole Relationships in Biological Systems","authors":"Richard Watson","doi":"10.1007/s13752-023-00447-z","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s13752-023-00447-z","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract In this essay we aim to present some considerations regarding a minimal but concrete notion of agency and goal-directed behavior that are useful for characterizing biological systems at different scales. These considerations are a particular perspective, bringing together concepts from dynamical systems, combinatorial problem-solving, and connectionist learning with an emphasis on the relationship between parts and wholes. This perspective affords some ways to think about agents that are concrete and quantifiable, and relevant to some important biological issues. Instead of advocating for a strict definition of minimally agential characteristics, we focus on how (even for a modest notion of agency) the agency of a system can be more than the sum of the agency of its parts. We quantify this in terms of the problem-solving competency of a system with respect to resolution of the frustrations between its parts. This requires goal-directed behavior in the sense of delayed gratification, i.e., taking dynamical trajectories that forego short-term gains (or sustain short-term stress or frustration) in favor of long-term gains. In order for this competency to belong to the system (rather than to its parts or given by its construction or design), it can involve distributed systemic knowledge that is acquired through experience, i.e., changes in the organization of the relationships among its parts (without presupposing a system-level reward function for such changes). This conception of agency helps us think about the ways in which cells, organisms, and perhaps other biological scales, can be agential (i.e., more agential than their parts) in a quantifiable sense, without denying that the behavior of the whole depends on the behaviors of the parts in their current organization.","PeriodicalId":72374,"journal":{"name":"Biological theory","volume":"28 48","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135390934","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-10-12DOI: 10.1007/s13752-023-00449-x
Matthew Jarron
Abstract D’Arcy Thompson’s On Growth and Form is one of the key works at the intersection of science and the imagination. This introductory essay explores the book and its context, drawing on archival sources to provide a unique perspective. It looks at Thompson’s own life and career, his experiences at University College, Dundee, and how he came to write the book. It describes the contents of the 1917 first edition (as many today are familiar only with the 1961 abridgement of the 1942 second edition). It looks at the book’s initial reception, exploring the context of biological ideas of the time, particularly in regard to Thompson’s perceived opposition to Darwinian theory and the debate between vitalism and mechanism. It explores the early influence of the book on ecologists and systems theorists and other early attempts at mathematical biology, as well as its significant influence on artists and architects. It then describes the development of the second edition of the book and the subsequent increase of interest in his work from both artists and scientists. It concludes by summarizing recent initiatives in the D’Arcy Thompson Zoology Museum.
{"title":"“A Single and Indivisible Principle of Unity”: On Growth and Form in Context","authors":"Matthew Jarron","doi":"10.1007/s13752-023-00449-x","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s13752-023-00449-x","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract D’Arcy Thompson’s On Growth and Form is one of the key works at the intersection of science and the imagination. This introductory essay explores the book and its context, drawing on archival sources to provide a unique perspective. It looks at Thompson’s own life and career, his experiences at University College, Dundee, and how he came to write the book. It describes the contents of the 1917 first edition (as many today are familiar only with the 1961 abridgement of the 1942 second edition). It looks at the book’s initial reception, exploring the context of biological ideas of the time, particularly in regard to Thompson’s perceived opposition to Darwinian theory and the debate between vitalism and mechanism. It explores the early influence of the book on ecologists and systems theorists and other early attempts at mathematical biology, as well as its significant influence on artists and architects. It then describes the development of the second edition of the book and the subsequent increase of interest in his work from both artists and scientists. It concludes by summarizing recent initiatives in the D’Arcy Thompson Zoology Museum.","PeriodicalId":72374,"journal":{"name":"Biological theory","volume":"112 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136013227","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-07DOI: 10.1007/s13752-023-00448-y
Ross Pain, Ceri Shipton, Rachael L. Brown
{"title":"Archaeology and Cognitive Evolution: Introduction to the Thematic Section","authors":"Ross Pain, Ceri Shipton, Rachael L. Brown","doi":"10.1007/s13752-023-00448-y","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s13752-023-00448-y","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":72374,"journal":{"name":"Biological theory","volume":"37 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"134997237","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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