Discover Community Create You

Loading publication...

Noodle always counts identifier-free feature events for service operation. With your permission, Google Analytics can also estimate audience and engagement. Search text, publication identifiers, cookies, IP addresses and browser fingerprints are never included in Noodle's first-party event counters.

Privacy details

Article

A case reopened: teleology and its consequences for the units of selection discussion.

Rivista di biologia - 1 Jan 2000

van Rossum Joris

Abstract excerpt

Darwinian explanations for teleology are often imprecise, and justify the occurrence of teleological features by referring to natural selection in a vague and unspecified sense. In this paper, the Darwinian account for teleology is further analyzed. It is argued that in theory only a specific form of teleology--teleology that is caused by and directed towards the preservation of the genetic program--can be...

Read the complete abstract on PubMed

Topics

Share this publication in a Topic to start or enrich a Post.

Share to Adaptation, Physiological
Share to Causality
Share to Genes

Methodology Data sources Editorial policy Privacy Delete account & data About Contact Helena Bioinformatics

Share to Genotype

Share to Mutation

Share to Selection, Genetic

Share to Species Specificity

Source

Identifiers

PMID: 12852177

Provenance

PubMed metadata and Literature Corpus relationships. Corpus snapshot updated 7 Sept 2026. Manifest publication-graph-cohort-2026-09-08.1.

Source receipt: pubmed, retrieved 7 Sept 2026.

Related research

Semantic proximity does not establish scientific evidence. Graph snapshot: 2026-09-29.

Research trail→

Click a neighbor to travelStep 1 · 12 closest

A case reopened: teleology and its consequences for the units of selection discussion.PMID 12852177Read ↗

On the unfitness of natural selection to explain sexual reproduction, and the difficulties that remain.Semantic proximity Read ↗

Ethics in Darwin's melancholy vision.Semantic proximity Read ↗

Individuality and adaptation across levels of selection: how shall we name and generalize the unit of Darwinism?Semantic proximity Read ↗

On the nature of evolutionary explanations: a critical appraisal of Walter Bock's approach with a new revised proposal.Semantic proximity Read ↗

Processes and patterns of interaction as units of selection: An introduction to ITSNTS thinking.Semantic proximity Read ↗

The evolution of replicators.Semantic proximity Read ↗

Darwin and inheritance: the influence of Prosper Lucas.Semantic proximity Read ↗

[Evolution as resistance to entropy. II. A conservative role of the sexual reproduction].Semantic proximity Read ↗

When is the spread of a cultural trait due to cultural group selection? The case of religious syncretism.Semantic proximity Read ↗

Populations and pigeons: prosaic pluralism about evolutionary causes.Semantic proximity Read ↗

On the asymptotic behaviour of the solutions to the replicator equation.Semantic proximity Read ↗

Behaviour and the concept of "heritability" axioms of an ethological refutation.Semantic proximity Read ↗

⌁Select a neighboring publication to make it the new centre.