Table Of ContentHistory, Philosophy and Theory of the Life Sciences
Marta Bertolaso
Silvia Caianiello
Emanuele Serrelli E ditors
Biological
Robustness
Emerging Perspectives from within the
Life Sciences
History, Philosophy and Theory of the Life
Sciences
Volume 23
Editors
Charles T. Wolfe, Ghent University, Belgium
Philippe Huneman, IHPST (CNRS/Université Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne), France
Thomas A. C. Reydon, Leibniz Universität Hannover, Germany
Editorial Board
Marshall Abrams, University of Alabama at Birmingham
Andre Ariew Missouri
Minus van Baalen UPMC, Paris
Domenico Bertoloni Meli Indiana
Richard Burian Virginia Tech
Pietro Corsi EHESS, Paris
François Duchesneau Université de Montréal
John Dupré Exeter
Paul Farber Oregon State
Lisa Gannett Saint Mary’s University, Halifax
Andy Gardner Oxford
Paul Griffiths Sydney
Jean Gayon IHPST Paris
Guido Giglioni Warburg Institute, London
Thomas Heams INRA, AgroParisTech, Paris
James Lennox Pittsburgh
Annick Lesne CNRS, UPMC, Paris
Tim Lewens Cambridge
Edouard Machery Pittsburgh
Alexandre Métraux Archives Poincaré, Nancy
Hans Metz Leiden
Roberta Millstein Davis
Staffan Müller-Wille Exeter
Dominic Murphy Sydney
François Munoz Université Montpellier 2
Stuart Newman New York Medical College
Frederik Nijhout Duke
Samir Okasha Bristol
Susan Oyama CUNY
Kevin Padian Berkeley
David Queller Washington University, St Louis
Stéphane Schmitt SPHERE, CNRS, Paris
Phillip Sloan Notre Dame
Jacqueline Sullivan Western University, London, ON
Giuseppe Testa IFOM-IEA, Milano
J. Scott Turner Syracuse
Denis Walsh Toronto
Marcel Weber Geneva
More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/8916
Marta Bertolaso • Silvia Caianiello
Emanuele Serrelli
Editors
Biological Robustness
Emerging Perspectives from within the Life
Sciences
Editors
Marta Bertolaso Silvia Caianiello
FAST Institute of Philosophy of Scientific Institute for the History of Philosophy and
Practice and Faculty of Engineering Science in Modern Age (ISPF)
University Campus Bio-Medico of Rome Italian National Research Council
Rome, Italy Naples, Italy
Emanuele Serrelli
CISEPS - Center for Interdisciplinary
Studies in Economics, Psychology and
Social Sciences
University of Milano Bicocca CISEPS
Brescia, Italy
ISSN 2211-1948 ISSN 2211-1956 (electronic)
History, Philosophy and Theory of the Life Sciences
ISBN 978-3-030-01197-0 ISBN 978-3-030-01198-7 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-01198-7
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Foreword
The papers collected in this volume are the outcome of a series of workshops orga-
nized by the Bio-Techno-Practice group on the different ways in which philoso-
phers, biologists, neuroscientists, and engineers employ the concept of “robustness.”
The goal, which was successfully realized, was to stimulate an interactive interdis-
ciplinary engagement that would highlight differences and commonalities across
disciplines and perspectives. The hope was that, by this type of engagement, confu-
sions would be evaporated and insights from one part of the intellectual landscape
could aid those exploring robustness in another part. This volume is evidence of the
success of that methodology, as the individual papers reveal the benefits of interac-
tive engagement. Even more important is the reframing of future work by the par-
ticipants in light of the refraction of individual disciplinary commitments in the
context of cross-disciplinary connections.
Robustness is a perfect subject for this type of engagement. It marks the system
level property of maintaining system function in response to internal and external
perturbations. We see it in evolved systems like organisms in the way body tempera-
tures are maintained, or neurons are reassigned after head trauma. We see it in engi-
neered systems like bridges and buildings or software algorithms whose design
aims to preserve performance under a range of expected conditions. But how robust-
ness is achieved varies both within and between types of systems. There is clearly
intellectual traffic between disciplines studying robustness. Systems biology
employs notions of control networks, feedback, and modularity and reverse engi-
neering. Top down and bottom up approaches converge on how a complex system
not only does what it does but continues to do it when there are changes in the
external environment and loss or change in internal components.
Philosophy of science can abstract away from the details of any one mechanism
for achieving robustness to characterize what it is for a system to be robust.
Robustness is always relative, robust with respect to this function, or that equilib-
rium. Indeed, by evolving or engineering robustness for a particular function in a
range of values for internal and external variables, fragility will be introduced for
other functional stabilities in other conditions. Redundancy, modularity, and multi-
ple pathways are features that promote robustness.
v
vi Foreword
Biological Robustness: Emerging Perspectives from Within the Life Sciences
combines the detailed explorations of robustness by engineers, biologists, neurosci-
entists, and philosophers, inviting the reader into reflective engagement that the
workshops promoted. I have learned much from participating in the project that
gave rise to this volume. By bringing together a plurality of perspectives, this vol-
ume extends the reach of interdisciplinary engagement.
Distinguished Professor Sandra D. Mitchell
Department of History and Philosophy of Science
University of Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, PA, USA
Contents
1 Introduction: Issues About Robustness in the Practice
of Biological Sciences ............................................................................. 1
Marta Bertolaso, Emanuele Serrelli, and Silvia Caianiello
1.1 Biological Robustness ..................................................................... 4
1.2 The Book ......................................................................................... 7
1.3 Emerging Epistemological Perspectives
from Within the Life Sciences ........................................................ 14
References ................................................................................................ 17
2 Prolegomena to a History of Robustness ............................................. 23
Silvia Caianiello
2.1 Origin of the Modern Meaning ....................................................... 25
2.2 Robustness and Control Theory ...................................................... 28
2.3 Early Inceptions of Robustness in Biology:
Organizing Vs Design Principles .................................................... 37
2.4 Robustness and Complexity ............................................................ 43
References ................................................................................................ 48
3 Robustness, Mechanism, and the Counterfactual
Attribution of Goals in Biology ............................................................. 55
Marco Buzzoni
3.1 Introduction ..................................................................................... 55
3.2 Robustness and Intersubjective Reproducibility ............................. 58
3.3 Robustness and the Counterfactual Attribution
of Goals in Biology ......................................................................... 63
3.4 Conclusion ...................................................................................... 71
References ................................................................................................ 72
vii
viii Contents
4 Multiple Realization and Robustness ................................................... 75
Worth (Trey) Boone
4.1 Introduction ..................................................................................... 75
4.2 Multiple Realization and Causal Explanation ................................. 76
4.3 Multiple Realization as Distributed Functional Robustness ........... 80
4.4 Kinds Reconsidered ........................................................................ 87
4.5 Conclusion ...................................................................................... 92
References ................................................................................................ 92
5 Robustness: The Explanatory Picture .................................................. 95
Philippe Huneman
5.1 Introduction ..................................................................................... 96
5.2 Characterizing and Situating Robustness ........................................ 97
5.3 Three Families of Explanations of Robustness ............................... 100
5.4 Robustness as Explanandum in Evolutionary
Biology, and the Explanatory Reversibility
Proper to Evolutionary Biology ...................................................... 107
5.5 Robustness and Other Reversible Explananda
of Evolutionary Biology.................................................................. 113
5.6 Conclusion ...................................................................................... 117
References ................................................................................................ 118
6 Robustness and Autonomy in Biological Systems:
How Regulatory Mechanisms Enable Functional Integration,
Complexity and Minimal Cognition Through the Action
of Second-Order Control Constraints .................................................. 123
Leonardo Bich
6.1 Introduction ..................................................................................... 124
6.2 Basic Concepts: Stability, Control and Signal
in Autonomous Systems .................................................................. 126
6.3 Biological Regulation ..................................................................... 132
6.4 Regulation at the Crossroads Between Identity,
Complexity, and Cognition ............................................................. 136
6.5 Final Remarks ................................................................................. 142
References ................................................................................................ 143
7 Robustness and Emergent Dynamics in Noisy
Biological Systems .................................................................................. 149
Christian Cherubini, Simonetta Filippi, and Alessandro Loppini
7.1 Introduction: Robustness and Stability
in Physics and Biology .................................................................... 149
7.2 Robustness: The Point of View of Biophysics ................................ 152
7.3 Modeling Robustness in Pancreatic β-Cells Populations ................ 152
7.4 Conclusion ...................................................................................... 159
References ................................................................................................ 161
Contents ix
8 The Robustness/Sensitivity Paradox:
An Essay on the Importance of Phase Separation .............................. 163
Alessandro Giuliani
8.1 Introduction ..................................................................................... 163
8.2 Biological Networks ....................................................................... 164
8.3 Conclusion ...................................................................................... 171
References ................................................................................................ 172
9 Can Engineering Principles Help Us Understand
Nervous System Robustness? ................................................................ 175
Timothy O’Leary
9.1 Feedback Control ............................................................................ 176
9.2 Feedback Control in Nervous Systems ........................................... 178
9.3 Robust Architectures: Degeneracy .................................................. 182
9.4 Conclusion ...................................................................................... 185
References ................................................................................................ 185
10 Robustness vs. Control in Distributed Systems ................................... 189
Marta Menci and Gabriele Oliva
10.1 Introduction ..................................................................................... 190
10.2 Control Theory Overview ............................................................... 191
10.3 Open-Loop vs. Closed-Loop Control ............................................. 192
10.4 Dynamical Distributed Systems ...................................................... 194
10.5 Robustness and Control .................................................................. 195
10.6 Control and Robustness in Distributed Systems ............................. 199
10.7 Conclusions ..................................................................................... 203
References ................................................................................................ 204
11 The Robustness of Musical Language:
A Perspective from Complex Systems Theory .................................... 207
Flavio Keller and Nicola Di Stefano
11.1 Introduction ..................................................................................... 207
11.2 Stability and Fragility in Auditory Perception ................................ 209
11.3 Fragility and Emotional Resonance of Musical Language ............. 212
11.4 Conclusion ...................................................................................... 214
References ................................................................................................ 215
12 Dynamical Rearrangement of Symmetry
and Robustness in Physics and Biology ................................................ 219
Giuseppe Vitiello
12.1 Introduction ..................................................................................... 219
12.2 A Two Level Description: Heisenberg Fields
and Physical Fields ......................................................................... 220
12.3 Spontaneous Breakdown of Symmetry
and Dynamical Rearrangement of Symmetry ................................. 221
12.4 Boson Condensation, Ordered Patterns
and Low Energy Theorem ............................................................... 222
