"What is the Status of the Hardy-Weinberg Law within Population Genetics?"

LORENZANO, PABLO

Viena

Congreso; International Conference Philosophy of Science in Europe - European Philosophy of Science and the Viennese Heritage; 2011

Institut Wiener Kreis. Universität Wien.

The aim of this communication is to develop further van Fraassen’s diagnosis according to which the Hardy-Weinberg law: 1) cannot be considered as axiom (or fundamental law) for classical population genetics, since it is a law that describes an equilibrium that 2) holds only under certain special conditions, and 3) only determines a subclass of models, 4) whose generalized form (and fundamental law) being shading off into logical vacuity, and 5) more complex variants of the fundamental law (and of the Hardy-Weinberg law) can be “deduced” for more realistic assumptions.I will try to show, having as a background a structuralist reconstruction of (classical) population genetics–just informally sketched in this communication–, that the Hardy-Weinberg law should not be in fact considered the fundamental law of such a theory, but a special law (and not even a “terminal” specialization, i.e. a “non-terminal” specialization).