Philosophy 3334: Philosophy of Biology
Summer, 2020
Professor Joel Velasco
Virtual Office
Hours: M-F 12:00-1:00 or by appointment
Class meets virtually 10:00-11:50 Monday-Friday (June 2nd-July 1st)
All of the boilerplate information such as course policies and the grading scheme can be found on the syllabus. The readings for the course are below.
Syllabus
Required Books:
The Selfish Gene (40th anniversary edition) by Richard Dawkins. Oxford Landmark Science, 2016. (Any edition after and including the second edition of this book is fine).
All class assignments and any other readings will be found on this website. You should check this website reguarly for updates and bring copies of the assigned readings to class. All readings should be done before the date they are listed here. Come to class on that day prepared to discuss them. Reading questions and other homework assignments are due at the beginning of class on the date they are listed.
This is a tentative schedule/reading list:
Week 1 -
- Tue, 6/2
- Introduction, Dawkins ch 1 (and you should always be reading the endnotes - marked with *)
- pdf of Dawkins available on blackboard
- Wed
- Thur
- Fri
- Extras
- Concepcion, How to read philosophy (the appendix especially)
- Szathmary and Maynard Smith, The Major Evolutionary Transitions
- Szathmary, The First Replicators
- First life: The search for the first replicator (New Scientist magazine)
- The end of the RNA world is near (Quanta Magazine)
- Skyrms, Chapter 4 from Signals (the basics of ESS and evolutionary game thoery)
- Evolutionary Game Theory (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
- Maynard Smith and Price, The Logic of Animal Conflict
- Maynard Smith, The Theory of Games and the Evolution of Animal Conflicts
- Maynard Smith and Parker, The Logic of Asymmetric Contests
- Hamilton, W.D. (1963). The evolution of altruistic behavior (short, 'popular' piece)
- Hamilton, W.D. (1964). The genetical evolution of social behaviour I (these two are more formal and complete)
- Hamilton, W.D. (1964). The genetical evolution of social behaviour II
- Maynard Smith, John (1964). Group selection and kin selection
- Dawkins, Replicator selection and the extended phenotype
- Dawkins, 12 Misunderstandings of kin selection
Week 2 -
- Monday, 6/8
- Tue,
- Wed,
- Thu,
- Fri, Dawkins, ch 13
- Extras:
Week 3 -
- Mon, 6/15
- Tue
- Wed
- Thur
- Fri
- Class canceled for Juneteenth holiday
Paper assignment on Evolution and Ethics (now due Tues 6/23 - to be uploaded into Blackboard)
- Extras
- Wade, Scientist finds the beginnings of Morality in Primate Behavior
- Sober, Prospects for an Evolutionary Ethics
- Sober, Did evolution make us psychological egoists?
- Horn, Evolution and the Epistemological Challenge to Moral Realism
- Sterelny and Fraser, Evolution and Moral Realism
- Slides for summary of all papers on evolution and ethics from spring 2020 (my discussion on youtube)
- Youtube interviews with Elliott Sober and Justin Horn as well as me talking with the slides below on my youtube page here: http://youtube.com/user/jdvelasc
- D.S. Wilson, Relationship of Biological and Psychological Altruism
- Stich, Evolution, Altruism and Cognitive Architecture: A Critique of Sober and Wilson’s Argument for Psychological Altruism
- Schulz, Sober & Wilson’s Evolutionary Arguments for Psychological Altruism: A Reassessment
- Kitcher, Four Ways of Biologicizing Ethics
- Rosenberg, Ch 5+6 from An Atheist's Guide to Reality (he argues for Moral Nihilism - the view that there are no moral facts at all)
Week 4 -
- Monday, 6/22
- Tue,
- Wed,
- Thu,
- Fri,
Youtube interviews with David Livingston Smith and Robin Andreasen can be found on my youtube page here: http://youtube.com/user/jdvelasc
Slides for race and biology (my discussion on youtube)
Paper assignment on Biology and Race: (due Mon 6/29 to be uploaded into Blackboard)
- Extras:
- Glasgow, On the new biology of race
- Interview with Richard Lewontin about race and genetics
- Rosenberg et al., Genetic Structure of Human Populations
- Rosenberg, A Population-Genetic Perspective on the Similarities and Differences among Worldwide Human Populations
- Bolnick, Individual Ancestry Inference and the reification of race as a biological phenomenon
- Feldman and Lewontin, Race, Ancestry, and Medicine (from Revisiting Race in a Genomic Age - 2008).
- Spencer, A Radical Solution to the Race Problem
- Spencer, A racial classification for medical genetics
- Klein on race and IQ
- Klein and Harris on race and IQ
- How not to talk about race and genetics (open letter)
- Sullivan, Denying race isn't shutting down racism, its fueling it
Week 5 -
Slides for sex differences (my discussion on youtube)
- Tue
- Wed, 7/1 (Final day of class)
- Extras
- Is the brain gendered (video): Debate between Baron-Cohen and Rippon
- reading questions
- Debate from 2005 between Steven Pinker and Elizabeth Spelke about sex differences and scientific aptitude: text (background, transcript, and slides) and video (low quality)
- Symons, Sexual Choice (ch 6 of The Evolution of Human Sexuality - book from 1979)
- Fine, from Delusions of Gender: How our Minds, Society, and Neurosexism Create Differences
- Rippon, Sexing the Brain: How Neuro Nonsense joined Psychobabble to 'Keep Women in their Place'
- Fine, Neuroscience, Gender, and “Development To” and “From”: The Example of Toy Preferences
- Pinker, Gender, ch18 of The Blank Slate
- Fausto-Sterling, How many sexes are there? (NY Times editorial from 1993)
- Fausto-Sterling, Why sex is not binary (NY Times editorial from 2018)
- Byrne, Is sex binary?
- Clarke, response to Byrne
- Byrne's reply to Clarke
- Gender Revolution: a journey with Katie Couric -- documentary on gender issues
- Fausto-Sterling, Sexing the body (book with chapters about history of gender, intersex, etc.)
Final paper on sex and gender due noon on Friday, 7/3