TY - JOUR
T1 - “Replaying Life's Tape”
T2 - Simulations, metaphors, and historicity in Stephen Jay Gould's view of life
AU - Sepkoski, David
N1 - Funding Information:
I would like to thank Peter Harrison and Ian Hesketh for their invitation to participate in this collection, as well as for hosting me at a conference in Oxford where an earlier version of the paper was presented. Thanks also to Ian and Peter for helpful comments on the manuscript. I have benefitted greatly from conversations about Gould and contingency with John Beatty, Chris Haufe, Derek Turner, John Huss, Michael Ruse, and Mark Borrello. Initial funding for this research was provided by NSF Scholars Award grants SES 0523123 and SES 0715259 .
Publisher Copyright:
© 2015 Elsevier Ltd
Copyright:
Copyright 2016 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 2016/8/1
Y1 - 2016/8/1
N2 - In a famous thought experiment, Stephen Jay Gould asked whether, if one could somehow rewind the history of life back to its initial starting point, the same results would obtain when the “tape” was run forward again. This hypothetical experiment is generally understood as a metaphor supporting Gould's philosophy of evolutionary contingency, which he developed and promoted from the late 1980s until his death in 2002. However, there was a very literal, non-metaphorical inspiration for Gould's thought experiment: since the early 1970s, Gould, along with a group of other paleontologists, was actively engaged in attempts to model and reconstruct the history of life using computer simulations and database analysis. These simulation projects not only demonstrate the impact that computers had on data analysis in paleontology, but also shed light on the close relationship between models and empirical data in data-oriented science. In a sense, I will argue, the models developed by paleontologists through simulation and quantitative analysis of the empirical fossil record in the 1970s and beyond were literal attempts to “replay life's tape” by reconstructing the history of life as data.
AB - In a famous thought experiment, Stephen Jay Gould asked whether, if one could somehow rewind the history of life back to its initial starting point, the same results would obtain when the “tape” was run forward again. This hypothetical experiment is generally understood as a metaphor supporting Gould's philosophy of evolutionary contingency, which he developed and promoted from the late 1980s until his death in 2002. However, there was a very literal, non-metaphorical inspiration for Gould's thought experiment: since the early 1970s, Gould, along with a group of other paleontologists, was actively engaged in attempts to model and reconstruct the history of life using computer simulations and database analysis. These simulation projects not only demonstrate the impact that computers had on data analysis in paleontology, but also shed light on the close relationship between models and empirical data in data-oriented science. In a sense, I will argue, the models developed by paleontologists through simulation and quantitative analysis of the empirical fossil record in the 1970s and beyond were literal attempts to “replay life's tape” by reconstructing the history of life as data.
KW - Contingency
KW - Evolutionary biology
KW - Simulations
KW - Stephen Jay Gould
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U2 - 10.1016/j.shpsc.2015.12.009
DO - 10.1016/j.shpsc.2015.12.009
M3 - Article
C2 - 26790344
AN - SCOPUS:84953776344
SN - 1369-8486
VL - 58
SP - 73
EP - 81
JO - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C :Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences
JF - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C :Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences
ER -