What Functions Explain: Functional Explanation and Self-Reproducing Systems

by Peter McLaughlin

Book Overview

This 2001 book offers an examination of functional explanation as it is used in biology and the social sciences, and focuses on the kinds of philosophical presuppositions that such explanations carry with them. It tackles such questions as: why are some things explained functionally while others are not? What do the functional explanations tell us about how these objects are conceptualized? What do we commit ourselves to when we give and take functional...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0521038855
• ISBN13: 9780521038850
• Release Date: August 2007
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 0.89 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 6.0" x 9.0"