Scientific explanation as ampliative, specialized embedding: the case of classical genetics

LORENZANO, PABLO; DÍEZ, JOSÉ

Synthese

Springer

Año: 2022 vol. 200

Explanations in genetics have intriguing aspects to both biologists and philosophers,and there is no account that satisfactorily elucidates such explanations. The aim of thisarticle is to analyze the kind of explanations usually given in Classical (Transmission)Genetics (CG) and to present in detail the application of an account of explanationas ampliative, specialized nomological embedding to elucidate the such explanations.First, we present explanations in CG in the classical format of inferences with theexplanans as the premises and the explanandum as the conclusion and compare themwith explanations in other paradigmatic explanatory fields such as Classical Mechan-ics. Second, we summarize the main aspects discussed in the literature with regardthe peculiarities of genetic explanations. Third, we introduce the account of scientificexplanation as ampliative, specialized nomological embedding making use of Snee-dian structuralism, in particular the notions of theory-net, fundamental law or guidingprinciple, specialization, and special laws. Finally, we apply this account to the caseof CG and show that this analysis sheds light to the intriguing aspects of geneticexplanations and remove most of their alleged oddities.