Brigandt, Ingo (2007) Typology now: Homology and developmental constraints explain evolvability. In: UNSPECIFIED.

Preview

PDF 6_Brigandt_Typology_now.pdf Download (86kB)

Abstract

By linking the concepts of homology and morphological organization to evolvability, this paper attempts to 1) bridge the gap between developmental and phylogenetic approaches to homology and to 2) show that developmental constraints and natural selection are compatible and in fact complementary. I conceive of a homologue as a unit of morphological evolvability, i.e., as a part of an organism that can exhibit heritable phenotypic variation independently of the organism’s other homologues. An account of homology therefore consists in explaining how an organism’s developmental constitution results in different homologues/characters as units that can evolve independently of each other. The explanans of an account of homology is developmental, yet the very explanandum is an evolutionary phenomenon: evolvability in a character-by-character fashion, which manifests itself in phylogenetic patterns as recognized by phylogenetic approaches to homology. While developmental constraints and selection have often been viewed as antagonistic forces, I argue that both are complementary as they concern different parts of the evolutionary process. Developmental constraints, conceived of as the presence of the same set of homologues across phenotypic change, pertain to how heritable variation can be generated in the first place (evolvability), while natural selection operates subsequently on the produced variation.

---

Export/Citation:

EndNote | BibTeX | Dublin Core | ASCII/Text Citation (Chicago) | HTML Citation | OpenURL

Social Networking:

Share |

---

Item Type:	Conference or Workshop Item (UNSPECIFIED)
Creators:	Creators Email ORCID Brigandt, Ingo
Additional Information:	Presented as part of the symposium ‘The Importance of Homology for Biology and Philosophy’ at ISHPSSB 2007 (July 25-29, Exeter). To appear together with the other symposium papers in a special issue of Biology and Philosophy (2007, volume 22, issue 5, guest-editors: I. Brigandt and P.E. Griffiths).
Keywords:	developmental constraints, evolutionary developmental biology, evolvability, explanation, homology, organization, theoretical integration
Subjects:	Specific Sciences > Biology
Depositing User:	Ingo Brigandt
Date Deposited:	12 Sep 2007
Last Modified:	07 Oct 2010 15:15
Item ID:	3514
Subjects:	Specific Sciences > Biology
Date:	2007
URI:	https://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/id/eprint/3514

Monthly Views for the past 3 years

Monthly Downloads for the past 3 years

Plum Analytics

Actions (login required)

View Item