Indispensability and Effectiveness of Diagrams in Molecular Biology

Authors

  • Javier Anta Universitat de Barcelona

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.7203/qfia.6.1.14823

Abstract

Abstract: In this paper I aim to defend a twofold thesis. On one hand, I will support, against Perini (2005), the indispensability of diagrams when structurally complex biomolecules are concerned, since it is not possible to satisfactorily use linguistic-sentential representations at that domain. On the other hand, even when diagrams are dispensable I will defend than they will generally be more effective than other representations in encoding biomolecular knowledge, relying on Kulvicki-Shimojima’s diagrammatic effectiveness thesis. Finally, I will ground many epistemic virtues of biomolecular diagrams (understandability, explanatory power, prediction and hypothesis evaluation) on their cognitive-computational indispensability and their semantic-epistemic effectiveness.

Keywords: Molecular Biology, Diagrammatic Representation, Representational Indispensability.

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Published

2019-05-24

How to Cite

Anta, J. (2019). Indispensability and Effectiveness of Diagrams in Molecular Biology. Quaderns De Filosofia, 6(1), 29–46. https://doi.org/10.7203/qfia.6.1.14823
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Issue

Vol. 6 No. 1 (2019): Philosophy of Biology

Section

Research Papers

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