Our research group specializes on issues relating to the philosophy of Life Sciences, and in particular Philosophy of Biology and Global Bioethics.
Research Area: Philosophy of Biology
What are the causal processes driving evolution? How to account for the apparent match between form and function in biological organisms? How do we explain the diversity of life forms?
1. Evolutionary Change
We are interested in the biological and philosophical significance of processes of evolutionary change, focusing in particular on those approaches that expand the central tenets of the modern evolutionary synthesis. More specifically, we are exploring non-selectionist proposals challenging the explanatory centrality of natural selection and “neo-lamarckian” proposals challenging the hypothesis that heritable variation is random with respect to adaptation.
2. Biological Diversity
A second topic we are working on is biological and ecological diversity. The diversity of life forms has always been a subject for both biological and philosophical reflection. In recent times, such a reflection has been enriched by the appearance in the scientific landscape of the concept of “biodiversity”. In particular, we are interested on the way in which the units of biodiversity interact among them within and across levels of biological organisation, on how this interaction gives rise to novel diversity, and on how biodiversity conservation relates to the different units.
Research Area: Global Bioethics
Can we develop an epistemology of risk that accounts for the environment we live in, our behaviors, and our genetic makeup? How to deal with the ethical challenges posed by the increasingly fast development of (bio)technologies?
We develop multidisciplinary research on global bioethics, encompassing environmental ethics – with a focus on the ethics of biodiversity–, animal ethics and the ethics of biotechnologies, in particular on its applications to agricultural production. Departing from the analysis of the philosophical foundations of these issues, the main goal is to explore the multiple dimensions of their ethical debate, with a perspective on applied ethics, bringing ethical insights into political and legislative processes. We are engaged in both theoretical research and advanced training, offered in particular by the Bioethics area of the Doctoral Program on Philosophy of Science, Technology, Art and Society.
Head: Luís Vicente | lmvicente@fc.ul.pt
Assistant Head: Davide Vecchi | davide.s.vecchi@gmail.com
Evolução e Conhecimento Científico. Tradução de André Levy do excerto de D. J. Futuyma, "Scientific Knowledge", in Science on Trial, pp. 163-172, Sinauer, Sunderland, MA, EUA, 1995. In: Helena Abreu; Francisco Carrapiço; André Levy; Marco Pina (Eds.) (2009), Evolucão. Conceitos e Debates, Colecção Fundamentos e Desafios do Evolucionismo, Lisboa: Esfera do Caos, 219 pp.
O que é o Darwinismo? Tradução de André Levy e Helena Abreu do texto de E. Mayr, "What is Darwinism?", in Toward a New Philosophy of Biology: Observations of an Evolucionist, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1988. In: Helena Abreu; Francisco Carrapiço; André Levy; Marco Pina (Eds.) (2009), Evolucão. Conceitos e Debates, Colecção Fundamentos e Desafios do Evolucionismo, Lisboa: Esfera do Caos, 219 pp.