Publications

Publications

Below is a list of publications (for the past 5 years) authored by Theory and Method in Biosciences staff and students (current at the time of publication). Not all listed publications relate to research conducted within the team. Publications by former members are also included where the research was conducted wholly or largely within the team.

Forthcoming

Griffiths, P. E. (n.d.). What are biological sexes?
Charbonneau, M., & Bourrat, P. (in press). Fidelity and the grain problem in cultural evolution. Synthese. Download

2024

Lehtonen, J., & Parker, G. A. (2024). The correlation between anisogamy and sexual selection intensity—the broad theoretical predictions. Evolution Letters, qrae029. https://doi.org/10.1093/evlett/qrae029
Fang, W. (2024). Design principles as minimal models. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 105, 50–58. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsa.2024.03.003
Griffiths, P. E., & Spencer, H. G. (2024). To explain biological sex, look to evolution. Nature, 631(8020), 275–275. https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-02248-1 Download
Brusse, C., & Sterelny, K. (Eds.). (2024). Religion and its Evolution: Signals, Norms and Secret Histories. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781032628042

2023

Griffiths, P. E., & Bourrat, P. (2023). Integrating evolutionary, developmental and physiological mismatch. Evolution, Medicine, and Public Health, 11(1), 277–286.
Lane, A. S., Lynch, K. E., Arnold, M., Dar-Nimrod, I., Morandini, J., Gawronski, S. A., & Griffiths, P. E. (2023). The undue influence of genetic information on senior medical students' treatment decisions. BMC Medical Education, 23(1), 938. Download
Lean, C., & Jones, C. (2023). The Evolution of Multispecies Populations: A Multilevel Perspective. Biology and Philosophy, 38(40).
Alimardani, A., McCay, A., & Lean, C. (2023). Big Data, Behavioral Genetics and Risk of Future Offending. Law, Technology and Humans.
Christie, J. R., Wilkinson, Z., Gawronski, S. A., & Griffiths, P. E. (2023). Concepts of function in biology and biomedicine. In K. Hens & A. Deblock, Advances in Experimental Philosophy of Medicine (p. 20). Bloomsbury Academic.
Rider, C. (2023, August 19). Closure of constraints as a theoretical model. Sydney Philosophy of Psychology Conference 2023, Pearl Beach. Download
Artificial wombs and animal sex — philosophers weigh in on brave new futures. (2023, September 20). [Broadcast]. In Big Ideas. ABC Radio National.
Serpico, D., Lynch, K. E., & Porter, T. M. (2023). New historical and philosophical perspectives on quantitative genetics. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 97, 29–33. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsa.2022.11.009
Nacko, S., Hall, M. A., Gloag, R., Lynch, K. E., Spooner-Hart, R. N., Cook, J. M., & Riegler, M. (2023). Heat stress survival and thermal tolerance of Australian stingless bees. Journal of Thermal Biology, 117, 103671. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jtherbio.2023.103671
Lynch, K. E., Brown, R. L., Strasser, J., & Yeo, S. L. (2023). A disanalogy with RCTs and its implications for second-generation causal knowledge. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 46, e194. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X22002242
Dooren, T. van, Price, C. J., Banks, P. B., Berger-Tal, O., Chrulew, M., Johnson, J., Lajeunesse, G., Lynch, K. E., McArthur, C., Parker, F. C. G., Oakey, M., Pitcher, B. J., Clair, C. C. S., Ward-Fear, G., Widin, S., Wong, B. B. M., & Blumstein, D. T. (2023). The ethics of intervening in animal behaviour for conservation. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 38(9), 822–830. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tree.2023.04.011
Griffiths, P. E., & Bourrat, P. (2023). Integrating evolutionary, developmental and physiological mismatch. Evolution, Medicine, and Public Health, 11(1), 277–286. https://doi.org/10.1093/emph/eoad023
Griffiths, P. E., & Bourrat, P. (2023). Integrating evolutionary, developmental and physiological mismatch. Evolution, Medicine and Public Health. Download
Brusse, C. (2023). Adaptive signaling in a lineage explanation, needs to be adaptive. Religion, Brain & Behavior, 0(0), 1–3.
Serpico, D., Lynch, K. E., & Porter, T. M. (2023). New historical and philosophical perspectives on quantitative genetics. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 97, 29–33. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsa.2022.11.009 Download
van Dooren, T., Price, C. J., Banks, P. B., Berger-Tal, O., Chrulew, M., Johnson, J., Lajeunesse, G., Lynch, K. E., McArthur, C., Parker, F. C. G., Oakey, M., Pitcher, B. J., St. Clair, C. C., Ward-Fear, G., Widin, S., Wong, B. B. M., & Blumstein, D. T. (2023). The ethics of intervening in animal behaviour for conservation. Trends in Ecology & Evolution. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tree.2023.04.011 Download

2022

Christie, J. R., Brusse, C., Bourrat, P., Takacs, P., & Griffiths, P. E. (2022). Are Biological Traits Explained by Their 'Selected Effect' Functions? Australasian Philosophical Review, 6(4), 335–359. Download
Christie, J. R., Brusse, C., Bourrat, P., Takacs, P., & Griffiths, P. E. (2022). Let's Get to Work: A Response to Our Commentators. Australasian Philosophical Review, 6(4), 429–439. Download
Christie, J. R., Brusse, C., Bourrat, P., Takacs, P., & Griffiths, P. E. (2022). Target Article: Do Proper Functions Explain the Existence of Traits? Australasian Philosophical Review, 6(4), 335–339. Download
Fang, W. (2022). Design principles and mechanistic explanation. History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences, 44(4), 55.
Griffiths, P. E. (2022). What are biological sexes?
Bourrat, P. (2022). Unifying Heritability in Evolutionary Theory. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 91, 201–210.
Takacs, P., & Bourrat, P. (2022). The arithmetic mean of what? A Cautionary Tale about the Use of the Geometric Mean as a Measure of Fitness. Biology & Philosophy, 37(2), 12. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10539-022-09843-4
Bourrat, P., & Charbonneau, M. (2022). Grains of description in biological and cultural transmission. Journal of Cognition and Culture.
Lu, Q., & Bourrat, P. (2022). On the causal interpretation of heritability from a structural causal modeling perspective. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 94, 87–98. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsa.2022.05.005
Brusse, C. (2022). From the inside looking out. Metascience.
Brusse, C., Handfield, T., & Zollman, K. J. S. (2022). Explaining costly religious practices: credibility enhancing displays and signaling theories. Synthese, 200(3), 249.
Kemp, D., Lynch, K., Jean, S. S., Kemp, D., Lynch, K., & Jean, S. S. (2022). Variation in boldness behaviour across individuals, sexes, and strains of the guppy (Poecilia reticulata). Marine and Freshwater Research.
Veit, W., & Browning, H. (2022). Has the Socio-Political Role of Neuroethics Been Neglected? AJOB Neuroscience, 13(1), 23–25. https://doi.org/10.1080/21507740.2021.2001079
Browning, H., & Veit, W. (2022). On the Relevance of Experimental Philosophy to Neuroethics. AJOB Neuroscience, 13(1), 55–57. https://doi.org/10.1080/21507740.2021.2001080

2021

Fang, W. (2021). The Explanatory Autonomy of the Biological Sciences. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003148029
Fang, W. (2021). Towards Mechanism 2.1: A Dynamic Causal Approach. Philosophy of Science, 88(5), 796–809. PhilSci-Archive.
Bourrat, P., & Griffiths, P. E. (2021). The idea of mismatch in evolutionary medicine. The British Journal For The Philosophy of Science.
Veit, W. (2021). Biological normativity: a new hope for naturalism? Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy, 24(2), 291–301. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11019-020-09993-w Download
Charbonneau, M., & Bourrat, P. (2021). Fidelity and the grain problem in cultural evolution. Synthese, 199(3), 5815–5836.
Takacs, P., & Bourrat, P. (2021). Fitness: static or dynamic? European Journal for Philosophy of Science, 11(4), 112.
Dar-Nimrod, I., Kuntzman, R., MacNevin, G., Lynch, K., Woods, M., & Morandini, J. (2021). Genetic essentialism: The mediating role of essentialist biases on the relationship between genetic knowledge and the interpretations of genetic information. European Journal of Medical Genetics, 64(1), 104119. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejmg.2020.104119
Lynch, K. E. (2021). The Meaning of "Cause" in Genetics. Cold Spring Harbor Perspectives in Medicine, 11(9), a040519. https://doi.org/10.1101/cshperspect.a040519
Veit, W., & Browning, H. (2021). Developmental Programming, Evolution, and Animal Welfare: A Case for Evolutionary Veterinary Science. Journal of Applied Animal Welfare Science, 1–13. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888705.2021.2014838
Veit, W. (2021). Experimental philosophy of medicine and the concepts of health and disease. Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11017-021-09550-3
Browning, H., & Veit, W. (2021). Utilitarian Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic for Non-Pandemic Diseases. The American Journal of Bioethics, 21(12), 39–42. https://doi.org/10.1080/15265161.2021.1991035
Veit, W. (2021). Scaffolding Natural Selection. Biological Theory. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13752-021-00387-6
Veit, W., Earp, B. D., Browning, H., & Savulescu, J. (2021). Evaluating Tradeoffs between Autonomy and Wellbeing in Supported Decision Making. The American Journal of Bioethics, 21(11), 21–24. https://doi.org/10.1080/15265161.2021.1980134
Veit, W., & Browning, H. (2021). Ethics of mixed martial arts. In J. Holt & M. Ramsay, The Philosophy of Mixed Martial Arts (1st ed., pp. 134–149). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003122395-12
Veit, W., & Browning, H. (2021). Ethics of mixed martial arts. In J. Holt & M. Ramsay, The Philosophy of Mixed Martial Arts (1st ed., pp. 134–149). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003122395-12
Veit, W. (2021). Samir Okasha's Philosophy. Lato Sensu: Revue de La Société de Philosophie Des Sciences, 8(3), 1–8. https://doi.org/10.20416/LSRSPS.V8I3.1
Veit, W. (2021). Agential thinking. Synthese. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-021-03380-5
Veit, W., & Browning, H. (2021). Extending animal welfare science to include wild animals. Animal Sentience, 1(7). https://doi.org/10.51291/2377-7478.1675
Veit, W., & Ney, M. (2021). Metaphors in arts and science. European Journal for Philosophy of Science, 11(2), 44. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13194-021-00351-y
Veit, W., Anomaly, J., Agar, N., Singer, P., Fleischman, D. S., & Minerva, F. (2021). Can 'eugenics' be defended? Monash Bioethics Review, 39(1), 60–67. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40592-021-00129-1
Browning, H., & Veit, W. (2021). Freedom and Animal Welfare. Animals, 11(4), 1148. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani11041148
Veit, W. (2021). Model diversity and the embarrassment of riches. Journal of Economic Methodology, 28(3), 291–303. https://doi.org/10.1080/1350178X.2021.1898660
Veit, W., & Browning, H. (2021). Phenomenology Applied to Animal Health and Suffering. In S. Ferrarello (Ed.), Phenomenology of Bioethics: Technoethics and Lived-Experience (Vol. 84, pp. 73–88). Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-65613-3_6
Veit, W. (2021). Does birth matter? Journal of Medical Ethics, medethics-2020-107034. https://doi.org/10.1136/medethics-2020-107034
Browning, H., & Veit, W. (2021). Evolutionary biology meets consciousness: essay review of Simona Ginsburg and Eva Jablonka's The Evolution of the Sensitive Soul. Biology & Philosophy, 36(1), 5. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10539-021-09781-7
Veit, W. (2021). Biological normativity: a new hope for naturalism? Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy, 24(2), 291–301. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11019-020-09993-w
Veit, W., Brown, R., & Earp, B. D. (2021). In Science We Trust? Being Honest About the Limits of Medical Research During COVID-19. The American Journal of Bioethics, 21(1), 22–24. https://doi.org/10.1080/15265161.2020.1845861
Chapman, R., & Veit, W. (2021). "The essence of autism: fact or artefact?" Molecular Psychiatry, 26(5), 1440–1441. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41380-020-00959-1
Veit, W., & Browning, H. (2021). Perspectival pluralism for animal welfare. European Journal for Philosophy of Science, 11(1), 9. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13194-020-00322-9
Bourrat, P. (2021). Transitions in evolution: a formal analysis. Synthese, 198(4), 3699–3731.
Doulcier, G., Hammerschmidt, K., & Bourrat, P. (2021). Life history tradeoffs, division of labor and evolutionary transitions in individuality. 2020.10.23.352948. https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.10.23.352948
Bourrat, P., Doulcier, G., Rose, C. J., Rainey, P. B., & Hammerschmidt, K. (2021). Beyond Fitness Decoupling: Tradeoff-breaking during Evolutionary Transitions in Individuality (p. 2021.09.01.458526). https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.09.01.458526
Bourrat, P. (2021). Review of Inheritance Systems and the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis by Eva Jablonka and Marion Lamb. BJPS Review of Books.
Bourrat, P. (2021). Function, persistence, and selection: Generalizing the selected-effect account of function adequately. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A, 90, 61–67. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsa.2021.09.007
Bourrat, P. (2021). Measuring Causal Invariance Formally. Entropy (Basel, Switzerland), 23(6), 690. https://doi.org/10.3390/e23060690
Bourrat, P. (2021). Facts, Conventions, and the Levels of Selection (Cambridge University Press).
Killin, A., Brusse, C., Currie, A., & Planer, R. J. (2021). Not by signalling alone: Music's mosaicism undermines the search for a proper function. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 44. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X20001107
Brusse, C. (2021). The Archaeology and Philosophy of Health: Navigating the New Normal Problem. In A. Killin & S. Allen-Hermanson (Eds.), Explorations in Archaeology and Philosophy (pp. 101–122). Springer International Publishing.
Veit, W., Anomaly, J., Singer, P., Agar, N., Minerva, F., & Fleischman, D. (2021). Can “Eugenics” Be Defended? In Monash Bioethics Review.
Veit, W., Brown, R., & Earp, B. D. (2021). In Science We Trust? Being Honest About the Limits of Medical Research During COVID-19. American Journal of Bioethics, 21(1), 22–24. https://doi.org/10.1080/15265161.2020.1845861
Browning, H., & Veit, W. (2021). Freedom and Animal Welfare. Animals, 11(4), 1148. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani11041148
Doulcier, G., Takacs, P., & Bourrat, P. (2021). Taming fitness: Organism-environment interdependencies preclude long-term fitness forecasting. BioEssays, 43(1), 2000157. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1002/bies.202000157
Browning, H., & Veit, W. (2021). Evolutionary biology meets consciousness: essay review of Simona Ginsburg and Eva Jablonka's The Evolution of the Sensitive Soul. Biology & Philosophy, 36(1), 5. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10539-021-09781-7
Constant, A., Clark, A., & Friston, K. (2021). Representation Wars: Enacting an Armistice Through Active Inference. Frontiers in Psychology. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.598733

2020

Calcott, B., Pocheville, A., & Griffiths, P. (2020). Signals That Make a Difference. The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 71(1), 233–258. https://doi.org/10.1093/bjps/axx022
Veit, W., & Spurrett, D. (2020). Evolving Resolve [Preprint]. PsyArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/v3645
Veit, W. (2020). Dennett and Spinoza. Australasian Philosophical Review, 4(3), 259–265. https://doi.org/10.1080/24740500.2021.1962653
Veit, W., & Browning, H. (2020). Why Socio-Political Beliefs Trump Individual Morality: An Evolutionary Perspective. AJOB Neuroscience, 11(4), 290–292. https://doi.org/10.1080/21507740.2020.1830879
Veit, W., Earp, B. D., Faber, N., Bostrom, N., Caouette, J., Mannino, A., Caviola, L., Sandberg, A., & Savulescu, J. (2020). Recognizing the Diversity of Cognitive Enhancements. AJOB Neuroscience, 11(4), 250–253. https://doi.org/10.1080/21507740.2020.1830878
Browning, H., & Veit, W. (2020). Is Humane Slaughter Possible? Animals, 10(5), 799. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani10050799
Veit, W., Savulescu, J., Hunter, D., Earp, B. D., & Wilkinson, D. (2020). Are Generational Welfare Trades Always Unjust? The American Journal of Bioethics, 20(9), 70–72. https://doi.org/10.1080/15265161.2020.1795532
Veit, W., & Huebner, B. (2020). Drawing the boundaries of animal sentience. Animal Sentience, 5(29). https://doi.org/10.51291/2377-7478.1595
Browning, H., & Veit, W. (2020). Improving invertebrate welfare. Animal Sentience, 5(29). https://doi.org/10.51291/2377-7478.1585
Chapman, R., & Veit, W. (2020). Representing the Autism Spectrum. The American Journal of Bioethics, 20(4), 46–48. https://doi.org/10.1080/15265161.2020.1730495
Browning, H., Veit, W., & University of Arkansas Press. (2020). The Measurement Problem of Consciousness. Philosophical Topics, 48(1), 85–108. https://doi.org/10.5840/philtopics20204815
Browning, H., & Veit, W. (2020). Improving invertebrate welfare. 5.
Bourrat, P. (2020). Natural selection and the reference grain problem. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A, 80, 1–8. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsa.2019.03.003
Black, A. J., Bourrat, P., & Rainey, P. B. (2020). Ecological scaffolding and the evolution of individuality. Nature Ecology & Evolution, 4, 426–436. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-019-1086-9
Veit, W. (2020). Model Pluralism. Philosophy of the Social Sciences.
Veit, W., & Huebner, B. (2020). Drawing the Boundaries of Animal Sentience. Animal Sentience, 13(29).
Browning, H., & Veit, W. (2020). Is Humane Slaughter Possible? Animals, 10(5), 799. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani10050799
Chapman, R., & Veit, W. (2020). "The essence of autism: face or artefact?" Molecular Psychiatry. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41380-020-00959-1
Browning, H., Mather, J., Pungor, J., Godfrey-Smith, P., Franks, B., Jacquet, J., New England Anti-Vivisection Society, American Anti-Vivisection Society, Physicians Committee For Responsible Medicine, Humane Society Of The United States, Humane Society Legislative Fund, & Veit, W. (2020). Petition to Include Cephalopods as "Animals" Deserving of Humane Treatment under the Public Health Service Policy on Humane Care and Use of Laboratory Animals. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.27522.30401
Ramstead, M., Hesp, C., Tschantz, A., Smith, R., Constant, A., & Friston, K. (2020). Neural and phenotypic representation under the free-energy principle. Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2020.11.024
Constant, A., Clark, A., Kirchhoff, M., & Friston, K. (2020). Extended active inference: Constructing predictive cognition beyond skulls. Mind & Language. https://doi.org/DOI: 10.1111/mila.12330
Vasil, J., Badcock, P., Constant, A., Friston, K., & Ramstead, M. (2020). A World Unto Itself: Human Communication as Active Inference. Frontiers in Psychology. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00417
Hipólito, I., Ramstead, M., Constant, A., & Friston, K. (2020). Cognition coming about: Self-organisation and free-energy: Commentary on Wright, J.J. and Bourke, P.D. (2020) "The growth of cognition: Free energy minimization and the embryogenesis of cortical computation." https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.plrev.2020.08.001
Bourrat, P. (2020). Causation and SNP Heritability. Philosophy of Science, 710517. https://doi.org/10.1086/710517
Lynch, K. E., & Blumstein, D. T. (2020). Hidden ethical costs of conservation. Science, 370(6513), 179–180. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abe2505
Griffiths, P. E. (2020, September 21). The existence of biological sex is no constraint on human diversity. Aeon Essays.
Fang, W. (2020). Multilevel Modeling and the Explanatory Autonomy of Psychology. Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 50(3), 175–194.
Fang, W. (2020). Multiple realization in systems biology. Philosophy of Science, 87(4), 663–684.
Murphy, D., Donovan, C., & Smart, G. L. (2020). Mental Health and Well-Being in Philosophy. In Explaining Health Across the Sciences (pp. 97–114). Springer.
Griffiths, P. E., & Matthewson, J. (2020). Diseases are Not Adaptations and Neither are Their Causes. Biological Theory, 15(3), 136–142.
Lynch, K. E., & Blumstein, D. T. (2020). Effective Conservation. Trends in Ecology & Evolution. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tree.2020.07.011
Brusse, C. (2020). Manipulation and Dishonest Signals. In T. K. Shackelford & V. A. Weekes-Shackelford (Eds.), Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science (pp. 1–4). Springer International Publishing.
Brusse, C. (2020). Animal Signalling. In T. K. Shackelford & V. A. Weekes-Shackelford (Eds.), Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science (pp. 1–4). Springer International Publishing.
Brown, R. L., Brusse, C., Huebner, B., & Pain, R. (2020). Unification at the cost of realism and precision. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 43. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X19002760
Brusse, C. (2020). Signaling theories of religion: models and explanation. Religion, Brain & Behavior, 10(3), 272–291.
Brusse, C., & Sterelny, K. (2020). Religion and its evolution: signals, norms, and secret histories. Religion, Brain & Behavior, 10(3), 217–222. https://doi.org/
Lynch, K. E., Parke, E. C., & O'Malley, M. A. (2020). Microbiome causality: further reflections (a response to our commentators). Biology & Philosophy, 35(2), 29.
Chapman, R., & Veit, W. (2020). Representing the Autism Spectrum. The American Journal of Bioethics, 20(4), 46–48.
Donovan, C., & Murphy, D. (2020). De Haan on Sense-Making and Psychopathology. Philosophy, Psychiatry, & Psychology, 27(1), 29–30. https://doi.org/10.1353/ppp.2020.0003
Lynch, K., & Blumstein, D. (2020). Conflicts and triage. Animal Sentience, 4(27).
Blumstein, D., & Lynch, K. (2020). Innovative, yes: But is it rewilding? Animal Sentience, 5(28).