Something to think about (Part 1). Do "species" really exist in Nature or are they just necessary intellectual tools?

Abstract

The purpose of the present paper, the first of a set of four dealing with different, though closely interconnected, problems, is to prove that all realistic solutions advanced in order to settle the age-old problem whether "species" are real entities existing in Nature or are abstractions, though based on the observation of populations actually existing in Nature, may be falsified. The author first examines the logics of the concept of species and shows that a "species" is the kind of intellectual tool that medieval logicians called a "universal". Evolution actually occurs in natural populations and we may speak of the "evolution of species" only per translatum. The author thence proves that all the realistic concepts of "species" fail to account for a number of actual situations occurring in nature and must therefore be dismissed. Finally, the author points also to the difficulty of arriving also at a precise definition of the concept of "population". © 2014 © 2014 Unione Zoologica Italiana.