Genetic Information about Phenotype: A Teleosemantic Point of View

The common idea that a gene encodes a phenotypic character has played an important role in the theory of evolution, one of whose origin is population genetics. Today, the relationship between a gene and a phenotype is sometimes interpreted informationally, i.e., a gene conveys phenotypic information. In this study, the nature of genetic information about phenotypes is discussed by considering teleosemantics. It shows that phenotypic information is not carried by a single gene, but by a genome containing multiple genes and the regulatory regions which form the related gene