Publicaties
WeismannU+2019s Barrier and CrickU+2019s Barrier still preclude two kinds of Lamarckism : a commentary to Denis NobleU+2019s U+2018The Illusions of the Modern SynthesisU+2019 Universiteit Gent
In his target article 'The Illusions of the Modern Synthesis', Denis Noble argues that the Modern Synthesis is undermined by the major findings of molecular biology. The supposed falsification of Weisman's Barrier and of standard interpretations of Francis Crick's Central Dogma has paved the way for Lamarckian forms of inheritance which are prohibited by that theory of evolution. I argue that August Weismann postulated two barriers against two ...
Interpreting the history of evolutionary biology through a Kuhnian prism : sense or nonsense? Universiteit Gent
Traditionally, Thomas S. KuhnU+2019s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962) is largely identified with his analysis of the structure of scientific revolutions. Here, we contribute to a minority tradition in the Kuhn literature by interpreting the history of evolutionary biology through the prism of the entire historical developmental model of sciences that he elaborates in The Structure. This research not only reveals a certain match ...
Needed : an ethics and ideology for spaceship Earth Universiteit Gent
This target article summarizes our discourse on one of the major questions raised in our recent book U+201CEvolution Science and Ethics in the Third Millennium,U+201D namely, to what degree are traditional religious belief systems and modern secular ideologies capable of contributing to an evolutionarily based ethical framework that can guide humanity to higher levels of hominization within the context of a further progressing modernization and ...
The fate of William WhewellU+2019s four palætiological domains : a comparative study Universiteit Gent
In 1847, the British polymath William Whewell pointed out that the sciences for which he, in 1837, had coined the term U+201CpalætiologicalU+201D have much in common and that they may reflect light upon each other by being treated together. This recommendation is here put into practice in a specific way, to wit, not by comparing the palaetiological sciences that Whewell distinguished himself but by comparing the general historical development of ...
On the origin of species : the story of Darwin's title Universiteit Gent
The genesis of Charles Darwin's book On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (1859) is well known, and the changes that it underwent in subsequent editions are well documented. However, less is known or has been published about the genesis of its original title and about the seven modifications that it subsequently underwent. That original title was much longer than ...
Intuitions in science education and the public understanding of science Universiteit Gent
Edinburgh and the birth of British evolutionism : a peek behind a veil of anonymity Universiteit Gent
WhatU+2019s wrong with the modern evolutionary synthesis? A critical reply to Welch (2017) Universiteit Gent
Welch (Biol Philos 32(2):263U+2013279, 2017) has recently proposed two possible explanations for why the field of evolutionary biology is plagued by a steady stream of claims that it needs urgent reform. It is either seriously deficientand incapable of incorporating ideas that are new, relevant and plausible or it is not seriously deficient at all but is prone to attracting discontent and to the championing of ideas that are not very relevant, ...
The sociobiology of genes : the gene's eye view as a unifying behavioural-ecological framework for biological evolution Universiteit Gent
Although classical evolutionary theory, i.e., population genetics and the Modern Synthesis, was already implicitly 'gene-centred', the organism was, in practice, still generally regarded as the individual unit of which a population is composed. The gene-centred approach to evolution only reached a logical conclusion with the advent of the gene-selectionist or gene's eye view in the 1960s and 1970s. Whereas classical evolutionary theory can only ...