Gene identity

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The term gene identity was coined in 1922 by Kurt Lewin in his habilitation thesis “The Concept of Genesis in Physics, Biology and History of Development” and is today probably the last indication of Lewin's influence on the philosophical philosophy of science . However, the original term was hardly analyzed. Instead, philosophers such as Rudolf Carnap , Hans Hermes and Hans Reichenbach extracted it from its context and incorporated it into their own theories, such as: B. Reichenbach's theory on the topology of space-time or Hermes' axiomatization of mechanics .

Lewin's original idea was to compare the term gene identity within the various sciences in order to use it to uncover the characteristic structure of these sciences and thus reclassify them.

Classification of the natural sciences

In his habilitation thesis , Lewin compares physics (which he also includes chemistry) and biology (which he divides into organic biology and evolutionary history). A comparison of this kind assumes that it is possible to find equivalent terms in both sciences. According to Lewin, the concept of gene identity fulfills this requirement.

Lewin defines gene identity as the existential relationship that underlies the genesis of a body from one moment to the next. According to this interpretation, what we usually take to be a single object actually consists of a multitude of entities , the phases of an object at different points in time, as it were. Two things are therefore not identical because they have the same properties in common, but because one emerged from the other.

Lewin differentiates between partial and total gene identity (in the original wording: “partially” or “completely”). This is due to the conceptual difficulty that shared objects pose. For example, an object can fall apart in the course of its development. If we follow such an object in time, we may U. only a small part of this remains. Lewin formulates that two objects that exist at different points in time are partially gene-identical if at least part of the latter object was already contained in the earlier one. In contrast to this, two objects are completely gene-identical if and only if, at no arbitrary point in time, there is an object that is different from the two objects and that is partially gene-identical to one of the objects concerned.

In addition, Lewin developed the idea of ​​considering physical bodies as links in a development chain. According to this approach, between two totally gene-identical bodies there is at any point in time an object that is totally gene-identical to both. Thus, gene identity implies the existence of an infinite series of points in between. Lewin sees here an analogy between physical bodies and real numbers, or the so-called Dedekind cuts ( construction method named after Richard Dedekind to represent real numbers as Dedekind cuts of rational numbers).

Defined in this way, gene identity has various properties such as B. Symmetry , transitivity , density and continuity . If this is viewed in the light of modern logical standards, it quickly becomes clear that Lewin had the correct intuition, although he did not yet have the advantages of a highly developed terminology of definition theory and symbolic logic .

The term gene identity as such was not explicitly discussed in the experimental sciences, but rather formed a tacit background assumption. It is thanks to Lewin that this term was examined in more detail for the first time, which has since been forgotten in view of his much better known achievements in the field of gestalt psychology .

literature

  • Kurt Lewin: The concept of genesis in physics, biology and history of development , original: 1922; printed in: Kurt-Lewin-Werkausgabe, edited by Carl-Friedrich Graumann, Volume 2: Wissenschaftstheorie II, edited by Alexandre Métraux, Bern and Stuttgart 1983, pp. 47–304, ISBN 3-12-935120-5 .
  • Martin Becker: On the concept of gene identity - An investigation of the scientific theoretical writings of Kurt Lewin . Master's thesis submitted to the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University Frankfurt am Main, Department of Philosophy and History, 1998.