Evolutionary Explanations and the Role of Mechanisms

Abstract

In the first section I outline the three basic theoretical assumptions of a generalized theory of evolution: the Darwinian modules of reproduction, variation, and selection. The analysis of functional traits of evolutionary systems which I give in Sect. 7.2 is grounded on these assumptions. The evolutionary explanation of the emergence of functions leads me to an abstract schema of evolutionary explanations that is based on iterations of variation and selection processes. In the final Sect. 7.3, it is shown, at hand of the problem of explaining evolutionary macrotransformation, that abstract evolutionary explanations are considered as inadequate by evolutionary scientists as long as not at least some plausible mechanism can be given, both for the production of complex variations and for their selection.