12/2024

Georgius Forster

(1754–1794)

LIMITES HISTORIAE NATURALIS ORATIO QUA LECTIONES SUAS IN ACADEMIA VILNENSI AUSPICATUS EST

https://doi.10.37240/FiN.2024.12.1.2

ABSTRACT

The author presents his panoramic (and comprehensive) vision of natural history, including—in addition to botany, zoology and mineralogy—also issues in the field of sciences that only later emerged and became independent, such as general biology, geology and paleontology. He refers to his own experiences gained during numerous journeys, including the longest, three-year trip around the world3 (which resulted in, among others, the description of 75 new genera and 265 species of tropical flora). The philosophical foundation of his narrative is an original concept of nature (inorganic and organic) perceived in a holistic and evolutionary way.

Keywords: (materialistic) philosophy of nature of the 18th century, the idea of pre-biological and biological evolution.

 

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Richard Krzymowski

(1875–1960)

THE APPEARANCE OF LIFE

https://doi.10.37240/FiN.2024.12.1.3

ABSTRACT

The article presents the hypothesis of the origin of life. All the basic ideas of the 20th century research program in this area can be found there: the extrapolation of Darwinism into the area of chemical evolution, the influence of solar energy, the large “chemical possibilities” of carbon compounds, early heterotrophy, the gradual increase of organic purpose as a result of natural selection.

Keywords: Biogenesis, chemical evolution, pre-biological natural selection.

 

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Vladimir V. Zemnukhov

Institute of Marine Biology of the Far Eastern Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Vladivostok 690059.

Email: zemnukhov1@ya.ru

THE ORIGIN OF LIFE: ATMOSPHERIC HYPOTHESIS

https://doi.10.37240/FiN.2024.12.1.4

ABSTRACT

An original hypothesis of the origin of life in an atmosphere of ancient Earth is proposed. It is shown that the atmospheric conditions of ancient Earth had been beneficial not only for initial abiogenic synthesis of organic monomers, but also for their polymerization and decomposition of protobiopolymers. Protobionts are particles of water aerosol the size of 1–10 microns. The proposed hypothesis can tie together all relevant facts on the early Earth’s history, antiquity and ecology features of methanogenic Achaea, the small size of prokaryotes, the discovery of fossilized prokaryotes in meteorites and others. The hypothesis provides an opportunity to consider the evolution of all principal components of the cell in a continuous relationship with each other and with the environment, from the earliest stages of the origin of life. According to the proposed hypothesis, the origin of life can be considered in conjunction with the development of formation of biogeochemical cycles as a natural process, which is an integral part of the birth of planets.

Keywords: Origin of life, non-equilibrium, chirality, ancient Earth, atmosphere, protobionts, Venus.

 

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Alicja Kubica

Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences.

Email: alicewanderer@gmail.com

THE PROTOBIOLOGICAL THEORY OF CEILINGS AND FLOORS, OR CHEMICAL EVOLUTION AS A PLANETARY PROCESS

https://doi.10.37240/FiN.2024.12.1.5

 

ABSTRACT

The article presents a modern protobiological theory based on the classical archetype. It connects the issues of origins of life with the theory of the hierarchy of matter and recognizes that error correction occurs within hierarchical and dynamic living systems. The paper briefly reproduces Morowitz-Smith prebiotic scenario. It highlights the importance of rTCA for theory, and the observation that the transition from a planet “without life” to a planet “with life” is a thermodynamic problem. Reflections on the philosophical foundations and worldview consequences of the theory are presented. The book and articles by the authors are crafted in a holistic approach and are critical towards the premature (and excessive) extrapolation of Darwinian selection as a means of explaining the process of abiogenesis.

Keywords: Origins of Life, chemical evolution, phase transitions.

 

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Alexander Prokofievich Rudenko

(1925–2004)

ON THE THEORY OF PREBIOTIC EVOLUTION

https://doi.10.37240/FiN.2024.12.1.6

ABSTRACT

The main theorems of the theory of evolution of open catalytic systems are briefly presented. The difference between the “natural-historical” and “actualistic” approach to the problem of the origins of life was highlighted.

Keywords: biogenesis, theory of evolution of open catalytic systems.

 

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Marceli Nencki

(1847–1901)

ON THE BIOLOGICAL RELATION OF LEAF DYE TO BLOOD DYE

https://doi.10.37240/FiN.2024.12.1.7

ABSTRACT

The author formulates conclusions for biological sciences from the discovery resulting from his cooperation with Leon Marchlewski. It is about the similarity of hematoporphyrin (a derivative of haemoglobin) isolated by Marceli Nencki and phylloporphyrin (a derivative of chlorophyll) obtained by Marchlewski, which suggests their genetic relationship, and thus a common origin of the world of animals and plants.

Keywords: Chlorophyll, haemoglobin, origins of the living world.

 

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Czesław Nowiński

(1907–1981)

SELF-ORGANIZATION AND THE THEORY OF EVOLUTION

https://doi.10.37240/FiN.2024.12.1.8

ABSTRACT

The author distinguishes three types of evolutionary theories: 1) ahistorical theories, constructed according to the methodological patterns of classical physics (mechanics), 2) supra-historical theories, in which the historical nature of the evolutionary process is reflected in a more complete (than only in the sense of the chronology of events) and richer, but its mechanism remains unchanged—“taken out of history,” 3) fully historical theories, recognizing that the factors and mechanisms of evolution themselves are entangled in history: are subject to changes in the course of historical development. A prominent representative of the third type is the theory of Ivan I. Schmalhauzen. Some peculiarities of its methodological structure are analyzed. This analysis allowed to reveal the premises of the process of evolution understood as a process of self-organization and to determine the basis on which it can be concluded that the general theory of evolution is nothing else than a theory of biological organization.

Keywords: Synthetic theory of evolution, driving (and other) factors of evolution, theory of stabilizing selection, historical variability of factors and mechanisms of evolution.

 

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Krzysztof Łastowski

Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, Szamarzewskiego 89, 60–568 Poznań, Poland.

E-mail: krzysztof.lastowski@amu.edu.pl

THE MAIN EVOLUTIONARY IDEAS OF MODERN BIOLOGICAL KNOWLEDGE
An outline of the historical and methodological analysis

https://doi.10.37240/FiN.2024.12.1.9

ABSTRACT

The aim of this article is to show the methodological principles that govern the interrelationship of the main ideas, concepts, and theories of modern biology. In recent years, several prominent biological researchers attempted to offer insights into the development of biological knowledge. However, a critical examination of these attempts indicates that a methodological analysis is a more fitting approach for achieving this goal. Indeed, the challenge of establishing inter-theoretical connections between biological theories and discoveries falls not within the purview of biology itself but rather within the methodology of biology. This paper explores the key research findings that determine the vertical order of biological knowledge, thereby deepening our cognitive understanding of this field. It also explores the theoretical advancements that expand the horizontal scope of this knowledge. The conceptual framework is illustrated through two diagrams Map I and Map II, which illustrate the methodological structure of biological ideas, concepts, and theories from the era of Linnaeus to the early 21st century. Map II further demonstrates how complex explanatory narratives can be constructed based on contemporary biological and evolutionary knowledge.

Keywords: Aggregation, evolutionary biology, disaggregation, history and levels of biological knowledge, map of biological ideas and theories, methodological relationships.

 

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Paweł Grieb

Mossakowski Institute of Experimental and Clinical Medicine of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw.

E-mail: pgrieb@op.pl

THE ORGANIZATION OF BIOLOGICAL MATTER AND THE PROCESS OF EVOLUTION

https://doi.10.37240/FiN.2024.12.1.10

ABSTRACT

The theory of biological evolution by natural selection and the theory of levels of biological organization are general concepts intended to enable understanding of the existence of biological matter defined as living organisms that reproduce sexually. These two theories were formulated independently of each other, but later their integration was postulated. This study is an attempt to implement such a postulate. The starting point is the statement that both theories concern the way in which biological matter composed of individuals constituting populations exists. The theory of biological organization is intended to explain the functioning of organisms by maintaining homeostasis (relative independence from the environment) during the life cycle, while the theory of evolution concerns the changes that populations undergo in response to a changing environment.

Keywords: Theory of biological evolution, biological organization, biological matter, living organisms.

 

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Adrianna Grabizna

Institute of Psychology at the University of Zielona Góra, Poland.

Email: a.grabizna@wns.uz.zgora.pl

 

THE EVO-DEVO AND ITS EPIGENETICS—
“A NEW BIOLOGY FOR PSYCHOLOGY”? THE CASE OF INHERITANCE OF THE ATTACHMENT STYLE

https://doi.10.37240/FiN.2024.12.1.11

ABSTRACT

The Evolutionary Developmental Biology (in abbreviation Evo-Devo) gains in popularity among psychologists. It would be a “synthesis of development and evolution” which would finally allow a rapprochement of psychology and biology. The Evo-Devo redefines epigenetics and opposes it to the (alleged) genetic determinism, genetic reductionism and preformationism of the Modern Synthesis (MS), proposes the concept of the extended inheritance and a mechanism of inheritance of acquired characters, which are claimed to be (neo-) Lamarckian, fuses the three questions separated by the MS: the origin of variation, fate of variation and inheritance of variation. These points of the Evo-Devo’s programme particularly resonate with psychologists’ expectations: genes alone do not explain the question of transgenerationality, the ontogeny of the attachment, e.g. early experience with caregivers (e.g. separation and loss) have a long-term effects on adult development can span a person’s lifetime, can even span generations. However, in the paper I show that the inheritance of acquired characters is indeed impossible, that Lamarck never proposed a theory of the inheritance of acquired characters and that it is a confusion rather than fusion to link the question of the origin of variation, the question of development and the one of inheritance. If the Evo-Devo is so appealing to psychologists, it is not because there is “a new biology for psychology.” I show that psychologists’ attitude towards monism was ambivalent and such was the relationship between psychology and biology. The paper is a standpoint of a philosopher of biology interested in psychology.

Keywords: Evo-Devo; epigenetics, extended inheritance, transgenerationality, attachment style, dualism, mind-body problem.

 

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Andrzej Elżanowski

Department Artes Liberales, The University of Warsaw.

Email: elzanowski@al.uw.edu.pl

ON THE EVOLUTIONARY ORIGIN OF VALUES

https://doi.10.37240/FiN.2024.12.1.12

 

Values drive not only human history, but our entire world, i.e. the biosphere. It would seem, therefore, that nothing can be more important for the future of the world than the theory or understanding of values. But in fact, scientific axiology is in a pre-paradigmatic stage of fragmented conceptualizations, i.e. there is no coherent theory of values as causal factors in the living world. Philosophers have reached a relative consensus only in distinguishing intrinsic values as resulting from states of mind or experiences (Narveson, 1967, p. 75; Frankena, 1973, pp. 81–82) from instrumental values, but beyond that there is no coherent conceptualization of other types of value (Nagel, 1979), whose relationship to immanent value usually remains undefined. Therefore, the question arises where do immanent values come from and how they relate to other categories of values.

 

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Adrianna Grabizna

Institute of Psychology at the University of Zielona Góra.

Email: a.grabizna@wns.uz.zgora.pl

FROM NAMES TO OBJECTS—PHILOSOPHICALLY ABOUT PSYCHIATRIC CLASSIFICATIONS

https://doi.10.37240/FiN.2024.12.1.13

ABSTRACT

At each introduction of a new edition of psychiatric classifications, a vivid debate resurfaces and concerns their very validity: should classifications be based on etiology or should they be descriptive, based on observation, and not on some or other theories of etiopathogenesis? I shift the attention to the philosophical aspect of the debate. Psychiatric classifications employ (and have always employed) taxonomic methodology but in fact are not (and never were) based on biological mechanisms leading to mental disorders. Therefore I tried to catch the moment where certain observable features, recognized as symptoms, begins to be perceived as an ontologically independent entities and we start to think that nosological units must have a specific cause (e.g. a neuropathogenesis), which is simply reflected in the diagnostic picture. I tried to catch the moment, when by naming, classifying and diagnosing, we, in a sense, create objects. Then I show how from there we can slide into objectification: we can stop to see a person and start to an illness.

Keywords: psychiatric classifications, DSM, ICD, essentialism, nosography, abstraction.

 

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Alicja Kubica

Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences.

Email: alicewanderer@gmail.com

ON THE STRUGGLE OF SCIENTISTS WITH
THE EFFECTS OF POSITIVIST MYTHS FUNCTIONING IN THE LIFE SCIENCES

https://doi.10.37240/FiN.2024.12.1.14

ABSTRACT

The aim of this article is to examine whether the “seven myths” identified and presented by Uroboros in “In venenoso Dracone …,” more than thirty years ago still function in the academic community. It also aims to address whether there are indications that this state has undergone a change. It seems that naturalists found that excessive adherence to a physicalist style of doing science severely limits research work. At the same time, scientists often grapple with the consequences of implementing physicalism and stumble while addressing philosophical issues.

Keywords: Positivist mythology, meta-scientific and meta-philosophical mythology, philosophy of biology, philosophy of protobiology, research on the origins of life.