ABSTRACT
Most philosophers have learned of the adaptationism disputes from Gould and Lewontin (1979). While this article has attracted much discussion, for various reasons it does not focus philosophical attention on the issue of developmental constraints. It proposes a variety of grounds for distrusting adaptationism, including general methodological tlaws. Developmental constraints are among the topics, but are not dealt with in particular depth. Philosophers are familiar with the methodological topics (e.g., falsifiability) and many are familiar with the topics from mainstream population genetics (e.g., genetic drift and pleiotropy) cited by Gould and Lewontin. Their article has been interpreted to claim that adaptationism is unfalsifiable. Various responses both by pro-and anti-
adaptationists point out that unfalsifiability is an inappropriate criticism of a research program, and that individual adaptationist hypotheses are indeed frequently falsified. (Actually Gould and Lewontin have accused neither adaptationism-qua-research program nor individual adaptationist hypotheses of unfalsifiability. They rather claim that when such hypotheses are falsified, other adaptationist hypotheses take their place. What seems never to be falsified is the belief that the trait is an adaptation of some kind.)
The philosophical discussions of falsification and drift were of unquestionable value, but left the core of the developmental constraint/adaptation conflict virtually unnoticed. Many people question why this conflict exists since, on many descriptions, the processes of natural selection and the processes of embryological development are perfectly compatible, indeed complementary.
