Ontology of Biology

About

Ontology of biology studies the entities, processes, and mechanisms countenanced by the principal theories within the life sciences. On the one hand, the ontology of biology intersects scientific knowledge and metaphysical inquiry, aiming to put forward or refine theoretical conceptions of life, species, natural kinds, sexes, evolution, cultural evolution, natural selection, development, and their possible “ultimate nature”. On the other hand, the ontology of biology purports to explore the interaction between such theoretical conceptions and society, seeking to frame debates concerning issues such as the biodiversity crisis, genetically modified organisms, food diversity, genetic determinism, the relation between sex and gender.

Collaborations

Center for the Philosophy of Science, University of Lisbon
Department of Philosophy, Statale University of Milan
Centre of Natural and Human Sciences, Federal University of ABC, São Paulo
Culinary Mind, International Research Center for the Philosophy of Food, Statale University of Milan
Käte Hamburger Kolleg: Cultures of Research (c:o/re), RWTH Aachen University, Aachen

Ongoing Projects

[Team member, Lara Barbara] 2021-2023, Title: Resilience in social-ecological systems. From conceptaul defectiveness analysis to a re-framing proposal, PhD project, FINO Doctoral Program, PON “Ricerca e Innovazione” 2014-2020, Asse IV “Istruzione e ricerca per il recupero”, Azione IV.5 “Dottorati su tematiche green”.
[Team member, Elena Casetta] October 2018 –, Scientific Research and Technological Development Project funded by UE and MEC – Project reference: PTDC/FER-HFC/30665/2017. Title: Emergence in the natural sciences: towards a new paradigm [PI, David Yates].
[Team member, Lorenzo Baravalle], Title: Emergence and Causation in a Digital Universe, Research Fellowship from FCT (Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology; DL57/2016/CP1479/CT0064)

Past Projects

[PI, Erica Onnis] 2021 October 1^st– 2022 September 30^th, Käte Hamburger Kolleg: Cultures of Research (c:o/re) International Fellowship founded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research. Title: Emergence between Biology and Metaphysics. Complexity, Distributed Causation, and Qualitative Novelty. Funding: 48000 euros
[Team member, Lorenzo Baravalle] 2017-2020. Title: The Manipulation of the Living: A Pragmatic Approach to the Epistemology of Biology, funded by the Chilean National Council for Scientific and Technological Development – FONDECYT [PI, Maurizio Esposito].
[PI, Elena Casetta] 2016 April 1^st – 2019 January 1^st, Scientific Research and Technological Development Project funded by UE and MEC – Project reference: PTDC/IVC-HFC/1817/2014. Title: Which Biodiversity Definition for Biodiversity Conservation? Team members: 12. Funding: 121502 euros.

Relevant Publications

Books

Journal Articles

2022, Borghini A., Piras N., Serini B., “Eating Local: A Philosophical Toolbox”, Philosophical Quarterly 72(3): 527-551. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/pq/pqab039
2022, Borghini A., Piras N., Serini B., Zara G., Bianco A., Budroni M., “A Deliberative Model for Preserving the Diversity of Lebanese Traditional Fermented Food and Beverages”, Human Ecology 50: 589-600. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10745-022-00317-5
2021, Luque, V. & Baravalle, L., “The mirror of physics: on how the Price equation can unify evolutionary biology”, Synthese, 199(5), p. 12439-12462
2021, Baravalle, L. & Luque, V., “Towards a Pricean foundation for cultural evolutionary theory”, Theoria, https://dx.doi.org/10.1387/theoria.21940.
2021, Borghini A., N. Piras, Serini B., “Defective Food Concepts” , Synthese 199: 12225-12249. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-021-03330-1
2021, Borghini A., N. Piras, “On Interpreting Something as Food”, Food Ethics 6.1. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s41055-020-00082-5
2020, Borghini A., Piras N., Serini B., “A Gradient Framework for Wild Foods”, Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 84. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsc.2020.101293
2020, Casetta E., “Preformism vs. Epigenesis: inspiration and haunting within and outside contemporary philosophy of biology”, Rivista di Estetica 74: 119-139.
2020, Casetta E., “Making sense of nature conservation after the end of nature”, History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences, 42:18, https://doi.org/10.1007/s40656-020-00312-3.
2020, Vecchi D., “Organismality grounds species collective responsibility”, Rivista di
Estetica 75:52-71, https://doi.org/10.4000/estetica.7259
2020, Santos G. Vallejos G., Vecchi, D. “A relational‐constructionist account of
protein macrostructure and function”, Foundations of Chemistry 22:363–382, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10698-020-09373-5
2020, Vecchi D., “Entrenchment implies that physiological and developmental processes
are not organism-bound but still organism-centric”, Adaptive Behavior, 28(1):33-34, doi.org/10.1177/1059712319838801
2020, Vecchi D., “DNA is not an ontologically distinctive developmental cause”, Studies
in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of
Biological and Biomedical Sciences, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsc.2019.101245
2019, Borghini A., “Ordinary Biodiversity: The Case of Food”, in E. Casetta, J. Marques da Silva, and D. Vecchi (eds.) From Assessing to Conserving Biodiversity: Conceptual and Practical Challenges, New York: Springer, 2019: 415-433
2019, Casetta, E., Vecchi, D. “Species are, at the same time, kinds and individuals. A causal argument based on an empirical approach to species identity”, Synthese. Online first, DOI 10.1007/s11229-019-02199-5.
2019, Baravalle, L. “Cultural Evolutionary Theory as a Theory of Forces”, Synthese. Online first, DOI 10.1007/ s11229-019-02247-0.
2019, Hernández I.,Vecchi D., “The interactive construction of biological
individuality through biotic entrenchment”, Frontiers in Psychology, 10:02578, https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02578/full
2019, Vecchi D., Miquel P.A.,Hernandez I., “From biological determination to
entangled causation”, Acta Biotheoretica, 67(1):19-46, https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10441-018-9339-6
2018, Casetta, E., “Il quasi-concetto di biodiversità. Decostruzione e linee per una ricostruzione”, Giornale di metafisica, 2/2018, pp. 532-545.
2017, Beraldo-de-Araújo, A. & Baravalle, L., “The Ontology of Digital Physics”, Erkenntnis 82: 1211-1231.
2017, Casetta, E., Borghini, A., “Exploring Darwinian Worlds: From Darwin to the Extended Synthesis”, Acta Biotheoretica 65, 1: 87–94.
2017, Razeto-Barry P., Vecchi D., “Mutational randomness as conditional independence and the experimental vindication of mutational Lamarckism”, Biological Reviews, 92(2):673-683, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/brv.12249
2016, Baravalle L., Vecchi D., “Beyond blindness: on the role of organism and
environment in trial generation”, Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C:
Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, 60:25-34, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1369848616300693?via%3Dihu
b
2015, Casetta, E, Marques da Silva, J., “Biodiversity Surgery. Some Epistemological Challenges in Facing Extinction”, Axiomathes 25, 3: 239–251.
2015, Vecchi D., Baravalle L., “A soul of truth in things erroneous: Popper’s
‘amateurish’ evolutionary philosophy in light of contemporary biology”. History and
Philosophy of the Life Sciences 36(4):525-545, https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40656-014-0047-5
2014, Borghini, A., Nathan, M., “Development and Natural Kinds: Some Lessons from Biology”, Synthese 191: 539-556.

Book Chapters and Encyclopedia Entries

2021, Baravalle L., “Darwinism without selection? A lesson from cultural evolutionary theory”, in Delisle, R.G. (Ed.) Natural Selection. Revisiting its Explanatory Role in Evolutionary Biology, p. 441-464 (Cham, Switzerland: Springer)
2021, Casetta E., “La biodiversité : construction social ou concept scientifique ?”, in E. Mermans & A.C. Dussault, dir., Protéger l’environnement. De la science à l’action, Paris, Les Edition Materiologiques, pp. 53-81.
2020, Baravalle, L., Vecchi, D. “Drift as a Force of Evolution: A Manipulationist Account”, In: Baravalle, L., Zaterka, L. (eds) Life and Evolution. History, Philosophy and Theory of the Life Sciences, vol 26. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/1
2019, Casetta, E., Marques da Silva, J., Vecchi, D. “Biodiversity Healing”, in Casetta, D. Vecchi, J. Marques da Silva (eds.), From Assessing to Conserving biodiversity – Conceptual and Practical Challenge, Springer International Publishing (series History, Philosophy and Theory of the Life Sciences), pp. 1-17.
2019, Marques da Silva, J., Casetta, E., “Why a Species-Based Approach to Biodiversity is not Enough. Lessons from Multispecies Biofilms”, in E. Casetta, D. Vecchi, J. Marques da Silva (eds.), From Assessing to Conserving biodiversity – Conceptual and Practical Challenge, Springer International Publishing (series History, Philosophy and Theory of the Life Sciences, pp. 195-217.
2019, Vecchi D., Mills R., “Probing the Process-Based Approach to Biodiversity: Can
Plasticity Lead to the Emergence of Novel Units of Biodiversity?”, in Casetta, E.; Marques da Silva, J.; Vecchi, D. (Eds.), From Assessing to Conserving biodiversity. Conceptual and
Practical Challenges, Springer series “History, Philosophy and Theory of the Life Sciences”, editors-in-chief: Wolfe, Charles T., Huneman, Philippe, Reydon, Thomas A.C., https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-10991-2_12
2015, Casetta, E., Marques da Silva, J., Facing the Big Sixth. From Prioritizing Species to Conserving Biodiversity, in E. Serrelli, & N. Gontier, eds., Macroevolution – Explanation, Interpretation, Evidence, Berlin, Springer: 377-403.
2014, Borghini, A., Metaphysics of Natural Food, in P.B. Thompson and D.M. Kaplan, eds., Encyclopedia of Food and Agricultural Ethics, Springer: 1378-1381.
2014, Borghini, A., Geographical Indications, Food, and Culture, in P.B. Thompson and D.M. Kaplan, eds., Encyclopedia of Food and Agricultural Ethics, Springer: 1115-1120.
2014, Vecchi D., Hernandez I., “The epistemological resilience of the concept of
morphogenetic field”, in T. Pradeu and A. Minelli (eds), Towards a Theory of Development, Oxford University Press, https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199671427.001.0001/acprof-9780199671427-chapter-5