The second talk in the PhilPaleo “Roadshow” series is tomorrow, June 4, at 11 am EDT. The speaker is Daniel Swaim of Kansas State University, and his talk is called “The Pervasive Appeal of Natural Laws: Orthogenetic Evolution in the Age of Progress.” Abstract and link to follow…
It’s well known by now that Darwin’s Natural Selection theory experienced an “eclipse” at the turn of the century. The main alternatives to Darwin and his selection theory were to be found in Mendelism and neo-Lamarckism; that is, these alternatives are the best explored among non-Darwinian theories in the context of history and philosophy of science. Orthogenetic theories of evolution have, by comparison, been given very little attention. Orthogenesis seems, in some sense, strange on its face. This, I suspect, partly accounts for its neglect in the history and philosophy of the life sciences. Because of its seeming strangeness, my aim here is to provide an account of the conceptual background of the theory, rooted in some of the cultural moorings of the time, that can serve to show why, in context, it seemed plausible to consider orthogenesis as a legitimate rival to Darwinism and other theories.
There are two kinds of motivations: the first has to do with a certain reading of prevailing conceptions of “vera causae” and their centrality to sound scientific reasoning, and the second has to do with the a certain way of thinking about social organization and progress as a kind of mirror image of natural law. The aim, then, is to provide a kind of externalist account of orthogenesis in approximately the same way that scholars have done for the development of Darwin’s theory, casting it as an outgrowth of Victorian cultural mores and an emergent industrial capitalism. Closer attention to similar factors can aid us in understanding why orthogenesis was favored by certain paleontologists and other natural historians.
Here is the link to the Zoom meeting:
https://Universityofexeter.zoom.us/j/96275346728?pwd=OUV3N3o5Z1dhV2xBQ0kzU011ZCszdz09