Skip Navigation


The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science Advance Access originally published online on November 15, 2005
The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 2006 57(1):233-245; doi:10.1093/bjps/axi149
This Article
Right arrow Full Text
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow All Versions of this Article:
57/1/233    most recent
axi149v1
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in ISI Web of Science
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Morrison, M.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© The Author (2005). Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of British Society for the Philosophy of Science. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Unification, Explanation and Explaining Unity: The Fisher–Wright Controversy

Margaret Morrison

Department of Philosophy, University of Toronto, Canada mmorris{at}chass.utoronto.ca

In Morrison [2000] I argued that the frameworks and mechanisms that produce unification do not enable us to explain why the unified phenomena behave as they do. That is, we need to look beyond the unifying process for an explanation of these phenomena. Anya Plutynski ([2005]) has called into question my claim about the relationship between unification and explanation as well as my characterization of it in the context of the early synthesis of Mendelism with Darwinian natural selection. In this paper I argue that her methodological criticisms rest on a misinterpretation of my views on explanation and defend my historical interpretation of the work of Fisher and Wright.

  1. A statement of the problem
  2. Methodological differences: how to characterize explanation
  3. Historical matters: disagreements about details
  4. Explanation revisited: the possible versus the ‘merely actual’


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer:
Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.