Christian Baron

Epistemic values in the Burgess Shale debate

Focusing primarily on papers and books discussing the evolutionary and systematic interpretation of the Cambrian animal fossils from the Burgess Shale fauna, this paper explores the role of epistemic values in the context of a discipline (paleontology) striving to establish scientific authority within a larger domain of epistemic problems and issues (evolutionary biology). The focal point of this analysis is the repeated claims by paleontologists that the study of fossils gives their discipline a unique historical dimension that makes it possible for them to unravel important aspects of evolution invisible to scientists who study the extant biosphere. The first part of the paper explores the shifting of emphasis in the writings of paleontologists between two strategies that employ opposing views on the classical positivist and physicalist ideal of science. The second part analyzes paleontologists claims of privileged access to lifes historical dimension in a situation where a theoretical upheaval occurring independent of the epistemical problem at hand completely shifts the standards for evaluating the legitimacy of various knowledge claims. Though the various strategies employed in defending the privileged historical perspective of paleontology have been disparate and, to an extent contradictory, each impinges on the acceptance of a specific epistemic ideal or set of values and success or failure of each depends on the compatibility of this ideal with the surrounding community of scientists.

A Web of Controversies: Complexity in the Burgess Shale Debate

Using the Burgess Shale controversies as a case-study, this paper argues that controversies within different domains may interact as to create a situation of “com- plicated intricacies,” where the practicing scientist has to navigate through a context of multiple thought collectives. To some extent each of these collectives has its own dynamic complete with fairly negotiated standards for investigation and explanation, theoretical background assumptions and certain peculiarities of practice. But the intellectual development in one of these collectives may “spill over” having far reaching consequences for the treatment of apparently independent epistemic problems that are subject of investigation in other thought collectives. For the practicing scientist it is necessary to take this complex web of interactions into account in order to be able to navigate in such a situation. So far most studies of academic science have had a tendency to treat the practicing scientist as members of a single (enclosed) thought collective that stands intellectually isolated from other similar entities unless the discipline was in a state of crisis of paradigmatic proportions. The richness and complexity of Burgess Shale debate shows that this encapsulated kind of analysis is not enough.

The Final Frontier: survival ethics in extreme living conditions as portrayed in Tom Godwin's The Cold Equations and Ridley Scott's Alien

“Space: The final frontier”. As any fan would know, this voice-over phrase begins each episode of the famous Star Trek television series. The concept of the frontier has a long history in both science fiction and American culture, where it has been associated with the conquest of the Western United States. The frontier is a place where new beginnings are possible. However, life at the frontier (so the myth tells us) can be harsh, without the protection of the law and the luxuries and commodities made available through industrialisation and urban living.

Science Fiction, Ethics and the Human Condition

This book explores what science fiction can tell us about the human condition in a technological world, with the ethical dilemmas and consequences that this entails. This book is the result of the joint efforts of scholars and scientists from various disciplines. This interdisciplinary approach sets an example for those who, like us, have been busy assessing the ways in which fictional attempts to fathom the possibilities of science and technology speak to central concerns about what it means to be human in a contemporary world of technology and which ethical dilemmas it brings along. One of the aims of this book is to demonstrate what can be achieved in approaching science fiction as a kind of imaginary laboratory for experimentation, where visions of human (or even post-human) life under various scientific, technological or natural conditions that differ from our own situation can be thought through and commented upon. Although a scholarly work, this book is also designed to be accessible to a general audience that has an interest in science fiction, as well as to a broader academic audience interested in ethical questions.

Introduction: Science Fiction at a Crossroad Between Ethics and Imagination

Somewhere between the sociological and anthropological study of the ethical dilemmas of technological practice and the insistence by certain philosophers and theologians of the universal nature of ethical claims, lies a liminal zone, a space that allows us to imagine the fictive or possible scenarios for future technological practices. These imaginary scenarios can have important bearings on our moral considerations of scientific endeavour, as they may help to clarify both the potential and the risks associated with technological development.

The Perfect Organism: the intruder of the Alien films as a bio-fictional construct

One of the many possible applications of science fiction is that it may be employed as a mean to discuss ethical dilemmas connected with (possible) scientific and technological developments. There are probably several imaginable ways that this can be done (see also Chap. 6 in this volume), but of course, the most direct approach impinges on the possibility of creating a credible empirical scenario that allows the story to unfold in such way that it may have a bearing on the ‘real’ ethical dilemma that is being treated. Given this, it is perhaps not surprising that discussions of the scientific credibility of various scenarios portrayed in science fiction has long been considered an important element in taking a critical approach to science fiction. As this chapter will illustrate, evaluating the credibility of the science behind science fiction is more complicated than might be expected.

The handicap principle and the argument of subversion from within.

This paper examines the very disparate positions that various actors have taken towards the argument of subversion from within (a classical argument against the evolution of altruism by group selection) in a set of related debates on group selection, altruism and the handicap principle. Using this set of debates as a case study, this paper argues that different applications of epistemic values were one of the factors behind the disagreements between John Maynard Smith and Amotz Zahavi over a number of important evolutionary issues. The paper also argues that these different applications were connected to important epistemological differences related in part (but not solely) to their disciplinary background. Apart from conflicting evolutionary views concerning the theoretical feasibility of the handicap effect, these antagonists both differed in the confidence they ascribed to mathematical modeling and over the hereditary basis for altruistic behavior.