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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2009 Sep 4.
Published in final edited form as: Bioessays. 2007 Aug;29(8):819–830. doi: 10.1002/bies.20608

Figure 1.

Figure 1

Trends and schools in biological philosophy from 19th century Vienna until today. 19th century science philosophy in Vienna centered on questions of heredity and empiricism and their interpretation in relationship to classic concepts of Kant and Aristotle. The resulting opposition between reductionism and vitalism also impacted the interpretation of evolutionary theory. 19th century debate over the influence of genes and environment on heredity is somewhat mirrored today in the discussion between genetic determinism and developmental plasticity albeit the terminology of genes and our understanding of environmental influences has changed.