"Genes, Laws, and Explanations in Genetics"

LORENZANO, PABLO

Santiago de Compostela

Workshop; International Workshop "Scientific Contents: Fictions or Abstract Objects?"; 2017

EPISTEME Research Group. Facultad de Filosofía, Universidad de Santiago de Compostela

The aim of thispresentation is to analyze the kind of explanations usually given in classical genetics.The analysis will be first present in the traditional format of explanations assummarized by arguments. Later on, I will discuss the nature of theseexplanations by using explanations in another area of science, namely,classical mechanics, and will use the notions of the structuralist view oftheories, especially those of theory-net, of fundamental law (or guidingprinciple), of specialization, and of special law, to clarify the situation,and to carry out an analysis of explanations in classical genetics, having as abackground a rational reconstruction of classical genetics ? sketched in this presentation? made within the framework of such a metatheory, in which its fundamental law/guidingprinciple has been made explicit. In this way, I make a plea for a non narrowinductivism in metascience. And, finally, I conclude with some discussion ofthe proposed analysis.