How Biological, Cultural, and Intended Functions Combine 67
housewives, its selection will not, according to a strict version of SEL, provide grounds for a peeling function
but rather for an aesthetic function. In my opinion, this is one more reason for fi nding a SEL account of cultural
functions to be too restrictive. One might try to resolve the problem by adopting a weaker version of SEL, but
it is jumping out of the frying pan into the fi re. It is better to directly adopt the broader notion of a “propagation
function.”
- A gray zone for almost every function involves much more than simply the existence of some borderline
cases; this is why it cannot be reconciled with the hypothesis of two distinct categories.
References
Bigelow, J., and Pargetter, R. (1987). Functions. The Journal of Philosophy, 86: 181–196.
Darwin, C. (1859). On the Origin of Species. London: John Murray.
Griffi th, P. E. (1993). Functional analysis and proper functions. British Journal for the Philosophy of Science,
44: 409–422.
Hilpinen, R. (1999). Artifact. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Zalta, E. N., ed.). http://plato.stanford.
edu/archives/spr1999/entries/artifact/.
Houkes, W., and Vermaas, P. E. (2003). Ascribing functions to technical artifacts: A challenge to etiological
accounts of function. British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 54: 261–89.
Lewens, T. 2004. Organisms and artifacts. Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press.
Longy, F. (In press). Artifacts and organisms: A case for a new etiological theory of functions. In: Functions:
Selection and Mechanisms (Huneman, P., ed.). Boston: Synthese Library.
McLaughlin, P. (2001). What Functions Explain. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Neander, K. (1991). Functions as selected effects: The conceptual analyst’s defense. Philosophy of Science, 58:
168–184.
Millikan, R. (1984). Language, Thought and Other Biological Categories. Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press.
Sperber, D. (2007). Seedless grapes: Nature and culture. In: Creations of the Mind: Theories of Artifacts and
Their Representation (Laurence, S., Margolis, E., eds.), 124–137. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Wright, L. (1973). Functions. The Philosophical Review, 82: 139–168.