Sameness and Skepticism

The concept of identity is central to philosophy. Philosophers are characteristically concerned with whether A is identical to B. Is the mind identical to the brain, is knowledge true justified belief, is the good maximum utility, are numbers sets, is meaning reference, is the good life the intellectual life? Some philosophers favor identity, keeping things to a minimum, while others insist on difference, multiplying what there is. Naturally, then, they have been interested in identity as such: its logic, its metaphysics, and its epistemology. How is it related to indiscernibility, is it known a priori, is it absolute or relative, is it definable? Multiplicity is surely a basic fact about the world—it is presented to us as consisting of many distinct objects—and identity comes with multiplicity (this thing is not that thing but it is itself). It is natural to wonder how diverse the world really is: what is identical to what, and what is different? The very idea of conceptual analysis presupposes the concept of identity: is the concept of knowledge, say, identical to the concept of true justified belief? Synonymy is just the identity relation applied to words. Then too, there is identity through time, identity across worlds, and personal identity. Philosophers are constantly making judgments of identity and difference; you might suppose that it is their main occupation. Philosophers are identity hounds, sniffing out what is the same and what is different. That, we might say, is what philosophy is identical with.

            It would be nice if such judgments were skepticism-proof. Then philosophy would enjoy an epistemic privilege. It might even elevate philosophy above science, which is not skepticism-proof. But this seems like a forlorn hope: identity judgments are often wrong. As every philosopher knows, people used to think that the Morning Star is not the same as the Evening Star, but actually they are the same planet, as we have now discovered. Now is that judgment infallible? Sadly no, since we could have made an astronomical mistake: maybe there are really two planets after all—it just seems as if there is one. Perhaps there are doppelgangers everywhere, so that we are constantly meeting different people we think are the same. It might turn out that all of our identity beliefs are false: this seems like an epistemic possibility. Nor is this possibility limited to a posteriori identity beliefs: people used to think on analytic grounds that knowledge is identical to true justified belief, but then they discovered counterexamples to that claim. And maybe that judgment will turn out to be wrong—perhaps we misunderstand the concept of justification. Might it turn out that the meaning of “bachelor” is not identical with the meaning of “unmarried man”? These are not easy questions, and it would be wrong to dismiss them as absurd. Skepticism is nothing if not resourceful.

            However, it seems to me that there is one area in which skepticism about identity cannot gain a foothold—an area in which we can be certain that our identity and distinctness judgments are true. I don’t just mean with respect to the mind or numbers or meanings; I mean with respect to the external world, the skeptic’s go-to position. We may not be certain whether external objects exist or what their nature is, but we do infallibly know propositions about their identity and difference. For example, if I now judge that this cup is not identical to that computer, I cannot be wrong about that: it could not turn out that cup and computer are one and the same. Nor can I be wrong about the cup being identical to itself: this is a rock solid identity judgment. It is true that I might be wrong about whether the cup and the computer exist, or about whether I am dreaming, or about whether such objects are ideas in the mind of God; but none of that implies that I could be wrong about their identity and distinctness. Whatever the truth about the cup and computer is, I must be right in judging them non-identical. They might not have the shape and color they appear to have, but it is certain that they are not the same thing. And note that this is not a proposition about their appearance: it isn’t just that I know the appearances are non-identical. I know that whatever lies on the other side of the appearances, even if it is just non-existent intentional objects, these things are not identical.^[1] This is as certain as the proposition that each thing is identical to itself. Maybe both objects came into existence a second ago and are not identical to anything preceding them, despite the appearances, but still they are self-identical and other-distinct. Thus reality—whatever it is—is necessarily composed of distinct objects, a great many of them.^[2] Not metaphysically necessary, but epistemologically necessary: it could not turn out that our impression of multiplicity is incorrect, though there are possible worlds containing a single object. There are no illusions of multiplicity in which this cup is really identical to that computer. Maybe the cup is itself a computer, and the computer a cup, but still they are not identical. In the same way objects in dreams are not identical: it could not turn out that every object you dreamed about last night is really one and the same object. I can see that the cup and the computer are distinct, though I can’t see that they exist. It is not true to say that every question of identity is self-evident, but in some cases it is. So far as I can determine, this is the only fact about external objects that is proof against the skeptic: not existence, not materiality, not shape or color, not even being a cup or a computer. But whatever the real truth may be about these things, I at least know that they are not the same. Here appearance does entail reality. Presumably this is because identity and difference are such minimal conditions—they commit us to so little. Still, they are something: they form a roadblock to the outright victory of the skeptic. They are a counterexample to the claim that everything about our judgments concerning the external world is fallible.

            I think we can generalize this point beyond perceptually presented objects. We know with certainty that red is distinct from blue and triangles are distinct from rectangles. What these properties ultimately are, and whether they are ever instantiated, is as may be; but that they are distinct is indisputable. Nor is there any doubt that red is identical to itself (etc.).^[3] Again, appearance and reality cannot diverge. Likewise, I can be sure that 2 is not 3 and that pain is not belief and that democracy is not monarchy. These identity facts are infallibly known to me—and they are objective facts not facts about the mind. When they are known they are incorrigibly known. They are as certain as the Cogito. Indeed, the Cogito presupposes such facts, since we must accept that thinking is not identical to the self that thinks (or else it is a mere tautology). All our judgments presuppose conceptual distinctness, ruling out the possibility that our concepts are all identical. The skeptic may convince us that meanings don’t exist, or that we don’t know what they are, but he can’t convince us that the meaning of “plus” is the same as the meaning of “minus”. If he could, we could turn round and ask him whether “ignorance” means the same as “knowledge”. Both skeptic and anti-skeptic presuppose that they know that words and concepts are distinct from other words and concepts. Did Quine ever argue that “rabbit” might mean the same as “table”, or Kripke’s Wittgenstein contend that “plus” might mean “pain”? As with external objects, such judgments are invulnerable to skeptical challenge, which puts them in a very special class. And don’t I also know with complete certainty that I am not you? Descartes could have proposed the “distinct-self Cogito”: I think, therefore I am not you. That is, my knowledge of myself rules out the possibility that I am (so to speak) someone else—I cannot suppose that this self might actually not be distinct from another self. It could not turn out that I am you. That is not a real epistemic possibility. Maybe you don’t exist at all, but if you do I know with certainty that I am not identical to you. There may not be any other minds, but I know that my mind is not the same as yours if there are other minds. I know that I am identical to myself and that I am distinct from you: no skeptical scenario could convince me otherwise. I also know with certainty that I am not identical to this cup, so my distinctness from other things is guaranteed. No evil demon can persuade me that I am merely dreaming that I am different from other selves and from the objects around me. This is why I never dream such things: the very idea is preposterous verging on nonsensical.

            Given this, the philosopher’s interest in identities and differences is not vulnerable to the skeptic’s corrosive doubts. Such knowledge is uniquely positioned to avoid these doubts because beliefs about identity and difference are so epistemologically undemanding. It is not like inductive knowledge or inference to the best explanation, which are exercises in epistemological adventure and full of risk. This doesn’t mean it is easy to acquire, but once acquired it is hard to dislodge: we really do know that knowledge is not identical to true justified belief, that use and mention are distinct, that goodness is not the same as pleasure. There are no skeptical scenarios like the brain in a vat that can persuade us that these are spurious distinctions; we couldn’t be just dreaming that use is not mention. The scientist must face the possibility that nature is not uniform, but the philosopher needn’t worry that everything may be one.^[4] We know perfectly well that the world (whatever it is) contains a multitude and that each of its elements is identical to itself. This may not be much, but it is something. It curbs the skeptic’s enthusiasm.

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^[1] Non-existent objects can be the same or different: Hamlet is not identical to Macbeth, though he is identical to himself (and to the Prince of Denmark).

^[2] In Berkeley’s system distinct objects are distinct ideas in the mind of God; there is no suggestion that object distinctness might be an illusion—that there might really be just one Big Idea. Nor have I ever heard of a skeptic who contends that multiplicity might be a perceptual illusion, as external existence might be an illusion. Even the brain in a vat is confronted by multiplicity—all those fake tables and chairs. Illusions of existence don’t entail illusions of identity. 

^[3] Let this point not be underestimated: with respect to any object or property X I know with certainty that X is identical to itself. The skeptic can never take this away from me: it is a piece of substantive knowledge concerning any object that comes to my attention. Such identity knowledge is invulnerable to skepticism (and it is not trivially tautological). When Frege said, “Identity is that relation a thing has to itself and to no other thing” he was stating a profound truth—and one that places a limit on the scope of skepticism.

^[4] I am not here talking about philosophical monism in any of its varieties; I am talking about commonsense judgments of distinctness, as that my two cats are distinct or that Tuesday isn’t Wednesday. The world might be composed of one type of thing or stuff, but we can rule out the possibility that all our ordinary objects are really identical (e.g. Mount Everest is identical to London, Queen Elizabeth is identical to Mars, everything is identical to Brad Pitt). Even if the world is one giant particular, it has numerically distinct parts. We can be certain that the world is Many (though not necessarily existent).  

Is Instantiation a Relation?

I propose to address a question of high obscurity, hoping at least to make some clear points. As philosophers we are accustomed to using the word “instantiate” to describe what is involved when an object has a property—say, a ball is red. We say that the ball instantiates the property of being red (or the quality redness or the universal RED). We thereby speak of a relation between objects and properties (qualities, universals). We may even refer to something called “the instantiation relation”. But is this really a relation? Are objects related to properties in the way they are related to other objects when they stand in relations to them? Is a ball being red a relational matter? One object being to the left of another is a relational fact, but is an object being red a relational fact?

            In the case of objects and their relations we can say that the objects have a nature that is independent of their relations to other objects: if x is to the left of y, x and y both have intrinsic properties in addition to their relational properties, typically predating the obtaining of the latter. The objects don’t have only relational properties. They are constituted as the objects they are by their intrinsic properties, and they are only subsequently able to enter into relations with other objects. The relations are metaphysically dependent on the properties: x can’t be R to y unless it is already possessed of a relation-independent nature constituted by properties. For what would it be that stands in these relations if there were nothing but the relations? There would be no well-defined object to stand in relations to other objects. There would just be some sort of bare substance that is related thus and so to other bare substances. Relations alone cannot add up to well-defined objects. Thus we find that objects in spatial relations have non-relational properties too, such as size, shape, material composition, and color. Traditionally these are referred to as primary qualities (I will include color here, assuming it not to be a relation to other objects). The relations are added to the qualities and cannot obtain without them. But in the case of the instantiation relation this basic principle is violated: for the primary qualities themselves are taken to be possessed relationally. The object stands in that relation to the qualities conceived as extrinsic entities (we picture them as occupying their own realm). Objects have no nature independently of standing in the instantiation relation, since that is what it is to have any nature at all. Logically, the object has a nature only by standing in the instantiation relation to properties extrinsic to it, so it has no relation-independent being. The situation is precisely not like relations between objects and objects, so that model fails at a crucial point. At best we picture the objects as bare particulars awaiting the possession of properties in virtue of standing in the instantiation relation to them, but this notion is metaphysically incoherent—it is the bogus notion of the property-less particular. The relational conception converts objects into bare particulars, but there are no such things; and anyway they are not what we signed up for when we entertained the idea of the instantiation relation.

            Second, there is surely something very odd in the idea that objects stand in no other relation to properties. When objects stand in relations to each other they stand in many such relations: if x is to the left of y, it will also be (say) larger than y or of a different shape or color or heavier than y. But when an object instantiates a property it doesn’t also stand in other relations to that property such as being heavier than the property or to the left of it or a different color from it. The only relation objects ever have to properties is that of instantiating them (or failing to); there isn’t the usual panoply of other relations. What kind of relation is it that precludes the holding of other relations? It seems like a very jealous sort of relation! Properties have relations among themselves, such as inclusion or incompatibility, but they only relate to objects via the instantiation relation—otherwise they have nothing to do with them. Is it perhaps that there is no relation there to begin with and hence no concomitant package of other relations? That suspicion turns to conviction when we note another peculiarity of the so-called instantiation relation: when the ball instantiates redness we can re-state this fact by saying simply that the ball is red. The relation drops out under paraphrase, as if a mere redundant flourish (or device of generalization). But no such thing is true of relations in general: if x is to the left of y, we can’t re-state this fact by dropping the relational term—if we try, we get the nonsensical “x y’s” (“Fred Albert’s”). Relation words are not redundant at all; we need them in order to capture all the facts. But the word “instantiates” (like the word “true”) vanishes under paraphrase: we can truly say, “x instantiates P if and only if x is P”. There is no relation here that cries out for inclusion in our list of Indispensable Terms. And indeed who has ever witnessed the instantiation relation holding? Do objects look like they enter into relations with properties extrinsic to them? The idea is a philosopher’s invention not a piece of robust common sense. We talk that way sometimes, but to harden this into a theory of objects and their properties seems like metaphysical fancy.

            Do objects have properties? Not in the way you have a bicycle or a coin in your pocket. True, objects are red, square, heavy, etc., but this is not like ownership: you don’t possess your properties as you possess your books or furniture (you can give away your books but not your properties). So there is no support here for the relational picture of objects and properties. Why do we even talk this way? Why do we invoke such relational language when trying to understand what it is for a ball to be red? Because we really don’t understand what is going on when a ball is red: the metaphysics is obscure to us. So we reach for the first available analogy—objects standing in relations. Once we see that this analogy fails we are stymied—stuck, skewered. We find we have no real understanding of the most primitive fact of reality—objects being a certain way. We don’t want to say that objects are nothing but properties (“bundles of qualities”), but we also don’t want to think of them as removed from properties in the manner of the bare particular. We impose the relational model on them, but it quickly collapses, leaving nothing to put in its place. Balls are red but their being so strikes us as impenetrably obscure (as philosophers). Plato proposed a two-tier theory with particulars down here and universals up there, under which the relational conception seems inescapable: but we really have no idea of objects independently of properties and properties independently of objects. The two seem clearly distinct, but how they combine baffles the intellect. We thus have no positive idea what is going on when a ball is red (round, heavy, etc.), but resorting to something called the instantiation relation looks like the wrong way to go. It is trying to force one thing into a mold suitable only for another.^[1]

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^[1] To put the matter intuitively, objects and their properties form a natural unity, but the instantiation relation imposes a duality that is false to the facts. Genuine relations between objects involve dualities (or more), so the relational view imposes this picture on simple monadic facts—with the object and its properties on opposite sides of a metaphysical divide. Recoiling from this, we start to blabber about “organic wholes” and suchlike things—no real theory offers itself. We thus fail to grasp what it is for an object to be a certain way, i.e. the most basic structure of reality.

 

Real Appearance

 

Philosophers are apt to speak of appearance and reality as if the two are opposed. But this is too simple: appearances are necessarily real and realities necessarily appear. The dichotomy no doubt has its origin in cases of perceptual illusion—the stick in water appears bent but in reality is not.  Here is the appearance and there is the reality, the two running on separate tracks. Then the philosopher converts this distinction into a general thesis about the world, dividing it into Reality and Appearance (capitalized). Reality may be said to be the totality of appearances (idealism) or to transcend appearances (realism). The concepts are clear, and clearly distinct, now we just have to make use of them to formulate grand theories. But let’s look at them more closely, in particular, their alleged mutual exclusiveness. Is this really a good way to carve things up? How exactly are the two concepts related?

First, appearances are real: when it seems to you that the stick is bent it really does appear bent. The stick is one thing–an element of reality–and the appearance of it is another–a distinct element of reality. Both are real, and equally real, but they are not the same. We might say that the appearance is not part of the reality of the stick, but neither is the stick part of the reality of the appearance (it could exist without the stick). The appearance is part of the real world of appearances: impressions, presentations, ways things seem.[1] We might say it is part of the world of psychology—the way things strike minds. So why are we opposing appearance and reality when appearances are constituents of reality? They are just not parts of that reality—the part that the stick exists in. They are not parts of physical reality, as we like to say, though they are parts of reality as a whole. Moreover, they are parts of objective reality: they objectively exist just like other aspects of the mind (the subjective is also objective in this sense). They are objective facts: it really did objectively seem to me that the stick was bent. Appearances exist at certain times and places, have causal powers, and can be measured—they are not phantasms or fictions.  If we say, for example, that colors belong to the realm of appearance, we in no way assert that they are not objectively real—they are just not included in the part of reality that (so-called) physical objects occupy. Being assigned to the realm of appearance is not a form of ontological demotion.

But now things are about to get murkier: do appearances have a reality that transcends their appearance, and do realities necessarily appear? I think the answer to both questions is yes, though the matter is hardly straightforward. Taking the second question first, is it true that every real thing has an appearance? Not a perceptual appearance, to be sure, because of numbers, moral values, thoughts, and appearances themselves. We don’t have visual impressions of these things. Still, they are presented to our minds in a certain way: we have (as Frege would say) modes of presentation of them. They don’t appear to us naked, just as they are in themselves, with no infusion from our minds; they appear to us in ways conditioned by our modes of sensibility and intelligibility. We grasp numbers, say, in the way human beings grasp them—as finite fallible embodied creatures. Not all conceivable beings grasp them this way: some may survey them far more extensively and intuitively. Animals may grasp numbers in a way different from the human way—more primitively, we suppose—and superior intelligences may grasp them differently from us (and we vary among ourselves according to our mathematical prowess).[2] Appearances are not always perceptual, yet they exist nonetheless. Similarly, unobservable entities like atoms have an appearance—how we represent them in thought. Maybe we use images to do so or maybe discursive symbols, but we grasp them somehow—under some mode of presentation. Conceivably, other beings might grasp them differently, according to their cognitive structure.[3] But what about unknown realities—do they have appearances? What about reality before minds came to exist? Here I think we can say that such unknown objects have conditional appearances: there is a way they would appear to minds of such and such a type. This is a determinate fact about them: every reality has a way (a set of ways) of possibly appearing to cognitive beings. The reality constrains the appearance, without exhausting it, and the appearance belongs to the reality as an objective fact. There is a fact of the matter about how unknown particles would appear to the human mind—or numbers not yet contemplated. There is no such thing as appearance-free reality: real things necessarily have appearances built into them (sometimes conditionally). The same is not true of fictions: they don’t always have a determinate way they would appear, because they don’t always have a determinate nature. How would Sherlock Holmes appear? But things with a determinate objective nature thereby have a determinate mode of appearance, which is relative to the being appeared to. Appearance is thus woven into reality not imposed on it arbitrarily from outside. There is no appearance-neutral reality.

As to the first question, I believe that appearances always transcend their appearance. There is always more to them than there seems. This is because they are themselves realities. For example, the stick seeming bent to me at time t is an experience with a nature—a visual experience occurring at a certain time with certain causes and effects. Not everything about it is apparent to my mind. Maybe we can say that it appeared to me a certain way—the appearance did—but it wasn’t exhausted by this second-order appearance. It is not easy to argue for this view, but I think it has intuitive plausibility: why should the part of reality consisting of appearances be different from the rest of reality? Appearances are real too, so they should have a nature that transcends their appearance—this is part of realism about appearances. Appearances are natural occurrences or states with a basis in the brain, a history, and a science proper to them: why should they lack a nature that goes beyond how they naively seem? An idealist about appearances would suppose that they are nothing but how they appear, but a realist will insist that nothing real reduces to its mode of presentation—even modes of presentation themselves. Senses, to use Frege’s terminology, have a nature of their own not exhausted by how they strike the mind (and the same is true of these events of striking the mind). In other words, real things are never just a matter of how they strike a mind, which includes appearances.

Let me put it this way: objective reality always has subjective appearance built into it, and subjective appearance always has objective reality built into it. The two are intertwined not separate orders of being. This is not to say that appearance and reality collapse into each other, or that the concepts are not genuinely distinct. The matter is subtler than that—harder to comprehend. Let’s look at logical form. The concept of appearance is a three-place relation: x is an appearance of y to z. An appearance is always an appearance of something (cf. Brentano)—in the simplest case a perceptual appearance is an appearance of a physical object (or a merely intentional object in the case of hallucination). But it is also true that every appearance is an appearance to someone—a sentient being at a minimum. The word “appear” always goes along grammatically with the prepositions “of” and “to” (or some equivalent): that is its logical grammar, as Wittgenstein would say. But no such thing is true of the word “real”: when something is real it is not real of something or to someone. Realities are not relations between themselves and something else that they are of, and they are not inherently relations to conscious beings. So the two concepts are vastly different; they correspond to quite different aspects of the world. Yet they are necessarily joined at the hip, since everything real has an appearance (even if only conditionally) and every appearance has an underlying reality (if we are appearance realists). You can’t be an idealist who denies realities beyond appearances, and you can’t be a realist who denies the reality of appearances. For appearances are realities with an objective nature and realities are things that necessarily appear in a certain way. Reality is woven into appearance and appearance is woven into reality. To put it simply, appearances are real and realities appear. There is no possible conception of the world that denies these truths: we cannot conceive of reality without a determinate mode of appearance, and we cannot conceive of appearances without an underlying reality. There is no appearance-independent conception of reality, and there is no reality-independent conception of appearance. This basic truth stems from the recognition that appearances are not opposed to reality but part of it, and reality is not something that floats free of appearance like the Invisible Man (a Kantian point). We can thus understand why some philosophers maintain that reality is appearance and others maintain that appearances are somehow illusory or fictitious (there are really only brain states). But reality is always more than appearance, while never departing altogether from appearance. Idealism (in one form) is not true, necessarily so, but a realism that seeks to detach the world from all appearances is likewise doomed. The phenomenal has its noumenal aspect and the noumenal has its own (counterfactual) phenomenal aspect. Reality and appearance are indissolubly connected, though logically and metaphysically quite distinct. We would do well to reform our metaphysical language to speak of appearance-reality and reality-appearance: unities not dualities. Everything that exists is a hybrid of the two, or better a fusion.[4]

 

[1] If the world is everything that is the case, then appearances are part of what is the case—one type of fact among others. It is not that appearances lie outside the world; indeed, some philosophers have thought that appearances are the only thing that exists in the world. In any case, they are of the world—part of the totality of facts.

[2] We can thus say that every reality corresponds to many possible appearances, because appearance is a relation between an objective entity and a subjective viewpoint (this may be entirely intellectual). We might even agree that every finite reality has infinitely many possible appearances. Still the reality constrains the appearance, as reference constrains sense.

[3] This has a bearing on what is called the “absolute conception”, the way we grasp the subject matter of physics. This should not be taken to be completely appearance-neutral, since it depends on our specific cognitive and linguistic make-up, though not perhaps on our sensory make-up. Particles have their creature-relative modes of presentation.

[4] This is one of those cases in which trying to state the metaphysical truth taxes our language, no doubt because it was forged in conditions of metaphysical confusion.

 

 

Replicators

 

 

The concept of replication is central to biology. For instance, Richard Dawkins makes heavy and illuminating use of it in The Selfish Gene and elsewhere. Here I will offer some analytical remarks about the concept, with special reference to the question of what counts as replication: what is replication and how far does it extend? Let’s start with word “replica”: the OED gives us this, “an exact copy or model especially on a smaller scale than the original”. One thinks of model planes or effigies of famous people. Two elements stand out in this definition: the idea of an “exact copy” and the idea of an “original”. There must be (a) a close resemblance and (b) the replica must be derived from the original. Close resemblance alone is not sufficient to be a replica, or else random similarity would suffice; there has to be some sort of relation of dependence whereby the replica is derived from the original. Thus atoms are not replicas of each other, despite close resemblance, because there is no process of derivation leading from one to the other. The entry for “replicate” captures this nicely: “make an exact copy of; reproduce”. Replication is a process in which a copy is reproduced from an original: the original is part of the causal story about how the replica came into existence. Replication is a generative process that produces exact similarity. Finally the OED turns explicitly biological for “replicate itself”: “(of genetic material or a living organism) reproduce or give rise to a copy of itself”. Again, two elements stand out: (a) both organisms and genes are said to replicate themselves, and (b) the original “gives rise” to the copy—causes it, generates it, brings it into being. So self-replication is not the same as replication in general: some replication is driven by the original itself, while some derives from an external source, possibly a conscious agent. There is internally driven replication and externally driven replication: the former is performed by genes and organisms, while the latter requires an external agency, such as a photocopier or an artist or a modeler.[1]

One might be tempted to suppose that replication constitutes the essence of the biological: it is necessary and sufficient to qualify something as biological. The world falls into two big categories, the biological and the non-biological, and replication is the feature that makes the difference. However, there appear to be counterexamples to such a criterion of the biological. First, it is not clear that replication can’t occur outside the biological realm, as with the formation of crystals. Here we have derivative duplication but the process is entirely chemical and inanimate. Perhaps it could be argued that this is not replication proper because of some further ingredient in the notion (it is not purposive, for example), but on the face of it this looks like non-biological reproduction—exact copies produced from an original. Second, it is not clear that everything biological is replicative: isn’t sex biological, but is sex a replicator? What about homeostasis or digestion or respiration? In what sense could these be described as replicators? They are not like organisms or genes, discrete entities that generate copies of themselves; they are more like processes in which such entities participate. They aren’t spatially bounded things, chunks of matter, lumps of stuff. So it looks like replication is not the very essence of the biological, just one of its chief features. There are replicating non-biological entities and there are biological non-replicating entities.

But let’s examine this more closely. Putting aside the crystals type of case, is it really true that only organisms and genes replicate, as the dictionary suggests? What about cells? Surely they replicate, using a mixture of internal and external machinery: they literally divide into exact copies. They self-replicate according to endogenous and exogenous factors. And don’t larger bits of tissue also sometimes replicate—such as the re-grown tails of lizards? In fact not much of this sort of macro-replication goes on, but it is logically possible that it should, and the result would be bona fide replication. Body parts could be replicas of earlier body parts generated by some sort of constructive process. What about organs of the body—can we say that they too are replicators? Well, they don’t produce copies of themselves by division, like cells, but isn’t there an indirect way that they work to produce copies of themselves? That is, an organ contributes to the success of an organism in such a way that an organ just like it crops up in the next generation. It does this because the body in which it lives contains genes that construct organs like it. An efficient heart in one animal leads to a similar heart in its offspring because that heart helps the organism reproduce and pass on its genes. We can thus say that the original heart plays a causal role in the process whereby a copy of it comes to exist in a later generation. It isn’t just a coincidence that the heart of an offspring animal resembles the heart of its parents; the latter heart “gives rise” to the former heart (with a little help from the genes). The whole organism replicates itself by exploiting the genes, and the organs that make it up do much the same. So the organs are replicators too—they engage in the process of producing copies of themselves. The same holds for height, weight, musculature, eye color, etc.—all these are things that get replicated.

It is no different for mind and behavior. Mental capacities and behavioral dispositions get passed on according to their contribution to an organism’s reproductive success: excellent memory, acute vision, sound reasoning, a tendency to strike while the iron is hot, etc. In so far as these are genetically encoded (i.e. very far), they get replicated in the usual way. This is not to say that genetic transmission is the only way to replicate: there is also behavioral contagion, learning, “osmosis”, meme transfer, etc. That is, mind and behavior can be replicated by several avenues and mechanisms not just by genetic transmission, so it is wrong to limit the concept of replication to the genes and whole organisms in the manner of the OED; we need to include much more under the concept.[2]The important point is that the concept is more elastic than the dictionary allows, at least so far as its entry for “self-replication” goes. In fact, replication is a common feature of a lot of biology: organisms, genes, cells, cell clusters, organs, mental traits, and behavioral dispositions. These items vary in mechanism and type of entity, but the concept of replication is common to all of them. The concept is abstract and inclusive (rather like the concept of natural selection).

This relates to something I have argued elsewhere, namely that genes are not the end of the line when it comes to selfishness.[3] Without repeating what I have already said, the point is that the biosphere, or parts of it, acts as the beneficiary of genetic and organismic action: the biosphere persists in virtue of the genes and their host organisms, because these entities enable biological processes and traits to continue. The point I am making now is that we can extend the notion of replication to include such processes and traits. Take sex: it continues in the world by a process of replication—past sex gives rise to future sex. The future sex is just like the past sex (a replica or duplicate or copy of it), and it is the past sex that “gives rise” to the future sex. Why? Because sexual behavior leads to the survival of organisms that engage in it, along with genes that transmit it. The sexual behavior of an elephant, say, is a copy of previous elephant sexual behavior, where the earlier behavior is part of the causal story of how later sexual behavior in elephants came to be. Sex is replicated across the generations just like anatomy and physiology. And it is subject to competition and natural selection in the same way too: the better you are at it, the better you do in the reproduction races. So these biological phenomena act as replicators (aided by the genetic and organismic machinery)—they are repeated, reproduced, duplicated. Thus they are not just beneficiaries of the activities of genes and organisms; they function in a replicative manner. Sex survives because it does well in a biosphere governed by natural selection, and it is passed on by a process of replication. Homeostasis is the same: it is duplicated across the animal kingdom because it works well as an aid to survival and reproduction. So traits like sex and homeostasis manifest the attributes common to biological phenomena: they can be beneficiaries of other entities (genes and organisms), and they are subject to replication. They become increasingly numerous by a process of replication. In addition there can be variations in the traits that give natural selection something to play with: a random mutation in sexual anatomy or behavior can lead to greater reproductive success than rivals, as is also the case for homeostasis. So, to use my preferred terminology, the biosphere (or sections of it) constitutes biological bedrock—the ultimate self-replicating, selfish, naturally selected stuff of biology. Not genes and not organisms: they exist one or two levels up. In particular, the gene functions as a survival machine for the biosphere, an aid to its propagation. This is not to say that the gene is not unique and central in its own way—as indeed the organism is unique and central in its own way—but it is not the be-all and end-all, biologically speaking. If I were to coin a term for these ultimate realities, I would call them “biemes”: biemes are such relatively abstract things as sex, respiration, digestion, homeostasis, growth, locomotion, sensation, thought, and so on. These things stay in existence because genes and organisms keep them in existence, and they do so because they are useful to the survival of both genes and organisms. There are thus three pillars of biological reality: organisms, genes, and biemes—with cells and organs sandwiched in between. The organisms serve the genes and the genes serve the biemes (the biosphere in effect). The most visible things are therefore the least basic: from the conspicuous organism to the microscopic gene to the abstract bieme. All are equally real, and equally vital, but the third has a claim to being the most fundamental.[4]

 

Colin McGinn

 

 

[1] Strictly speaking, replication is a three-place relation: “x is a replica of y in respect z”. Nothing is ever a replica in every respect. In the case of genes there are three respects to consider: chemical composition, functional properties, and information content. In principle replication might preserve one of these but not the others: for example, same information but not the same chemical composition or functional profile. In practice the three go together, but conceptually they are quite distinct. We can imagine possible worlds in which genes shed their chemical features and yet preserve their functional and informational features as they get passed on. We also have the notion of partial replication as well as complete replication (itself inevitably partial).

[2] I would also apply the concept of replication to historical phenomena: sometimes a population copies another population and hence produces a common historical change, e.g. revolutions or wars. This is large-scale replicative behavioral contagion. Given this, I would be happy to rate history as a branch off biology (it is really psychology writ large).

[3] See “The Selfless Machine” and “The Selfish Biosphere”.

[4] I see no competition between this perspective and standard selfish gene theory, merely a shift of emphasis. The gene can retain its starring role, though it works for another level of reality (like shady money men lurking in the shadows of movie production). The organism benefits the gene, but the gene benefits the biosphere (including the process of natural selection itself).