Organism and environment : inheritance and subjectivity in the life sciences / Russell Winslow.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Winslow, Russell (Russell E.), author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Genetics--Philosophy.

Genetics.

Evolution (Biology)--Philosophy.

Evolution (Biology).

Microbiology--Philosophy.

Microbiology.

Philosophy.

Physical Description:

xxiv, 222 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Lanham : Lexington Books, [2017]

Summary:

Organism and Environment examines the way the contemporary life sciences are heralding a revolution of the most basic philosophical concepts of the Western world. Analyzing recent research in microbiology and evolution theory, Russell Winslow argues that these discourses are adding their voices to a growing chorus that is announcing a disruption, if not an end, to the understanding of the order of the world articulated in humanism. What does it mean to be a living substance? Are there such things as living individuals? How are living beings free? The discourses of microbiology, the medical sciences, and evolution theory are revealing a living organism that escapes the limited frame that Enlightenment humanism has traditionally used to answer these (and other) ontological questions. Appealing to the theoretical lenses provided by Michel Foucault, Hans Georg Gadamer, and Gilles Deleuze, Organism and Environment offers an interpretation of the way the contemporary life sciences are giving articulation to a posthuman ontological order. Book jacket.

Contents:

Part I Theoretical Inheritances 1

1 Toward a Hermeneutic Approach to Biological Discourses 3

2 The Structure of Sight: Foucault's Early Analysis of the Life Sciences 41

Part II Ecological Inheritances 59

3 Subjectivity in the Extended Inheritance Theory of Evolution 67

4 Genetic Transformation into Structure 93

5 The Space of Life: Reflections on the Ontological Consequences of the Secondary Inheritance Theory of Evolution 115

Part III Microbial Inheritances 131

6 Microbes Colonizing Humanism 137

7 Horizontal Gene Transfer: On the Ontological Consequences of the Horizontal Inheritance of DNA 153

8 Being One and Many: Microbial Symbiosis and Inheritance 169

9 A Concrescence of Inheritances vs. the Metaphysically Present Individual 193.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 203-213) and index.

ISBN:

1498552781

9781498552783

OCLC:

992224182