Abstract
The 1981 Dahlem conference was a catalyst for contemporary evolutionary developmental biology (Evo-devo). This introductory chapter rehearses some of the details of the history surrounding the original conference and its associated edited volume, explicates the philosophical problem of conceptual change that provided the rationale for a workshop devoted to evaluating the epistemic revisions and transformations that occurred in the interim, explores conceptual change with respect to the concept of evolutionary novelty, and highlights some of the themes and patterns in the different contributions to the present volume, Conceptual Change in Biology: Scientific and Philosophical Perspectives on Evolution and Development.
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Notes
- 1.
Some philosophers have turned their attention to “integration” as an important relation between scientific concepts, explanations, and theories that is distinct from the traditionally discussed relation of “reduction” (Brigandt and Love 2012b). For a representative sample of articles, including integrative relationships between concepts relevant to Evo-devo, see Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, Vol. 44, December 2013 (Brigandt 2013).
- 2.
“We wanted to assemble as large a variety of different kinds of biologists as possible. We had molecular biologists, especially molecular geneticists, developmental geneticists, developmental biologists of different skills including neurobiology, development of invertebrates in general, of insects, and even of slime molds. We had invertebrate zoologists, including a specialist in their bioengineering, and population biologists who are concerned with the strategies of life history. We had vertebrate comparative anatomists with deep interests in evolution and development shared by a group of paleontologists, both vertebrate and invertebrate. As icing on this rather remarkable mixture we had a group of theoretical and mathematical biologists interested in these subjects at all levels” (Bonner 1982, 4–5). But not everyone was included; Bonner acknowledges that the planning committee intentionally left out botanists and behavioral biologists (14).
- 3.
Stuart Kauffmann’s self-description sounds like he was doing work similar to Antonio Garcia-Bellido or Peter Lawrence (both developmental geneticists working on Drosophila). But the differences are striking. For example, a special issue of American Zoologist from 1977 on Gene Regulation and Development in Drosophila contains a contribution from Kauffmann that summarizes his model for a binary epigenetic code specifying wing discs as compartments or modules (Kauffman 1977; cf. Kauffman 1973). Instead of a genetic or molecular analysis anchored in experimental methods, which characterized the other papers, Kauffmann provided a mathematical analysis of how standing chemical waves form recurrent patterns, very much in the conceptual lineage of Turing reaction-diffusion mechanisms (Turing 1952).
- 4.
A vigorous discussion of the idea of a “developmental program” occurred at the workshop, which is briefly recapitulated in the Cellular Level Group Report and was covered in a news story about the conference (Lewin 1981). The broad conclusion was that ontogeny is not described accurately as a programmatic phenomenon.
- 5.
“The reviews should be written in a style that is mutually intelligible to students of many academic fields. For example, developmental biology and paleontological morphology share little common language, but both must communicate their studies of shells and skeletons before one can fully understand the evolution of “novelties” that actually appear in the fossil record.”
- 6.
Not everyone noticed: Nature received the book but did not review it.
- 7.
Recall that John Bonner acknowledged some absences explicitly (see footnote 2).
- 8.
Several participants did not contribute a chapter to the volume but their presence was critical to the stimulating discussions at the workshop: Richard Burian, Eric Davidson, Manfred Laubichler, and Gerd Müller.
- 9.
“Research on conceptual change investigates how concepts change with learning and development in different subject matter areas with a focus on explaining students’ difficulties in learning the more advanced and counterintuitive concepts in these areas” (Vosniadou 2013, 1).
- 10.
Another distinct area where conceptual change is relevant pertains to linguistic changes over time, especially scrutinizing particular semantic patterns found in scientific English through lexical and grammatical analysis (Halliday 2004).
- 11.
There is an additional source of inspiration for some philosophers in the work of Feyerabend (Feyerabend 1965), although much less so for educational researchers and psychologists.
- 12.
A primarily molecular perspective is observable in Eric Davidson’s individual paper from the 1982 Dahlem volume: “If we understood the genomic organization underlying these specific ontogenic regulatory patterns, we might be in an excellent position to construct a useful theory of evolutionary invention at the DNA level” (Bonner 1982, 65).
- 13.
“Novelty always represents a qualitative departure from the ancestral condition, not merely a quantitative one” (Müller and Wagner 2003, 221).
- 14.
“In order to achieve a modification in adult form, evolution must modify the embryological processes responsible for that form. Therefore an understanding of evolution requires an understanding of development” (Amundson 2005).
- 15.
Dahlem participants did not miss the need for a phylogenetic framework completely: Freeman acknowledges it in his individual paper (see also, Freeman, Chap. 10, this volume) and David Wake claims that it operated implicitly as a background condition at the conference (personal communication).
- 16.
“Were a single mutation to increase the size of a limb, the excess motor neurons already present in the spinal cord could immediately form larger functional neuromuscular populations. Such a limb mutation need not wait for other fortuitous concordant mutations in the nervous system. … Those particular mutations that can be absorbed into a well-integrated phenotype are the evolutionarily favorable mutations, and thus evolution will tend to be channelled in their direction” (Bonner 1982, 210).
- 17.
“The failure of the current theory of evolution to deal with the problem of origination is the major obstacle to a scientific understanding of organismal form …a synthetic, causal understanding of both the development and the evolution of morphology can be achieved only by relinquishing a gene-centered view of these processes” (Müller and Newman 2003).
- 18.
The Donors Association for the Promotion of Sciences and Humanities.
- 19.
German Science Foundation.
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Acknowledgments
I am grateful to the participants at the 2010 Dahlem workshop “Conceptual Change in Biological Science: Evolutionary Developmental Biology, 1981–2011,” held at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin, the contributors to this volume, and especially the members of the workshop Steering Committee (Gerd Müller, Rudolf Raff and David Wake). All of you made it possible to better see and understand significant patterns of conceptual change over the past three and half decades. I owe a special thanks to David Wake for sharing the personal letter from Pere Alberch that opens this chapter.
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Appendices
Appendix 1.1
Stipulations of the Dahlem Conferences (taken from Bonner 1982, but present in all research reports associated with a Dahlem Conference)
1.1.1 The Dahlem Konferenzen
Director: Silke Bernhard, M.D.
Foundation: Dahlem Konferenzen was founded in 1974 and is supported by the Stifterverband für die Deutsche Wissenschaft,Footnote 18 in cooperation with the Deutsche ForschungsgemeinschaftFootnote 19 and the Senat of the City of Berlin.
Objectives: The task of the Dahlem Konferenzen is:
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To promote the interdisciplinary exchange of scientific information and ideas
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To stimulate international cooperation in research, and
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To develop and test different models conducive to more effective scientific meetings.
Aim: Each Dahlem Workshop is designed to provide a survey of the present state of the art of the topic at hand as seen by the various disciplines concerned, to review new concepts and techniques, and to recommend directions for future research.
Topics: The workshop topics (in the Life Sciences and the field of Physicochemistry) should be:
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Of contemporary international interest,
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Timely,
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Interdisciplinary in nature, and
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Problem-oriented.
Procedure: Dahlem Konferenzen approaches internationally recognized scientists to suggest topics fulfilling these criteria and to propose members for a Program Advisory Committee, which is responsible for the workshop’s scientific program. Once a year, the topic suggestions are submitted to a scientific board for approval.
Participants: The number of participants is limited to 48 for each workshop. They are selected exclusively by a Program Advisory Committee. Selection is based on international scientific reputation alone and is independent of national considerations, although a balance between Europeans and Americans is desirable. Exception is made for younger German scientists for whom 10 % of the places are reserved.
The Dahlem Workshop Model: A special workshop model has been developed by Dahlem Konferenzen, the Dahlem Workshop Model. The main work of the workshop is done in four small, interdisciplinary discussion groups, each with 12 members. Lectures are not given.
Some participants are asked to write background papers providing a review of the field rather than report on individual work. These are circulated to all participants 4 weeks before the meeting with the request that the paper be read and questions on them formulated before the workshop, thus providing the basis for discussions.
During the workshop, each group prepares a report reflecting the essential points of its discussions, including suggestions for future research needs. These reports are distributed to all participants at the end of the workshop and are discussed in plenum.
Publication: The Dahlem Workshop Reports contain:
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The Chairperson’s introduction,
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The Background Papers, and
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The Group Reports.
The Dahlem Workshop Reports are available in two series:
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1.
Life Sciences Research Reports (LS)
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2.
Physical and Chemical Sciences Research Reports (PC)
Appendix 1.2
Group membership for the four sections of the 1981 Dahlem conference
1.1.1 The Molecular Level
I. Dawid, Rapporteur
R.J. Britten, E.H. Davidson, G.A. Dover, D.F. Gallwitz, A. Garcia-Bellido, F.C. Kafatos, S.A. Kauffman, K. Moritz, S. Ohno, J. Schmidtke, G. Schütz
1.1.2 The Cellular Level
J.C. Gerhart, Rapporteur
S. Berking, J. Cooke, G.L. Freeman, A. Hildebrandt, H. Jokush, P.A. Lawrence, C. Nüsslein-Volhard, G.F. Oster, K. Sander, H.W. Sauer, G.S. Stent, N.K. Wessells, L. Wolpert
1.1.3 The Level of the Life Cycle
H.S. Horn, Rapporteur
J.T. Bonner, W. Dohle, M.J. Katz, M.A.R. Koehl, H. Meinhardt, R.A. Raff, W.-E. Reif, S.C. Stearns, R. Strathmann
1.1.4 The Level of Evolution
P.F.A. Maderson, Rapporteur
P. Alberch, B.C. Goodwin, S.J. Gould, A. Hoffman, J.D. Murray, D.M. Raup, A de Ricqlès, A. Seilacher, G.P. Wagner, D.B. Wake
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Love, A.C. (2015). Conceptual Change and Evolutionary Developmental Biology. In: Love, A. (eds) Conceptual Change in Biology. Boston Studies in the Philosophy and History of Science, vol 307. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9412-1_1
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