Dr ULRICH STEGMANN

Dr ULRICH STEGMANN The University of Aberdeen School of Divinity, History & Philosophy Lecturer work +44 (0)1224 273679 pref u.stegmann@abdn.ac.uk pref Room OBG13

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Biography

Ulrich Stegmann joined the department in 2009. Previously, he was a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Cambridge and King’s College London. He also was a Teaching Associate at the University of Bristol. Ulrich received both his MA and PhD (2006) in philosophy from King’s College London. Before coming to the UK, he completed a PhD and MSc in biology at the University of Würzburg and the University of Bremen, respectively.

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Research Interests

Philosophy of Biology

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Current Research

One of my main research interests in philosophy of biology is the nature, role and legitimacy of information concepts in the life sciences. Funded by the Wellcome Trust, I currently investigate actual usage of expressions like 'coding' by molecular biologists in the 1950s. The goal is to better understand the role such metaphors played during an important historical episode. Another ongoing project is editing a volume on informational and non-informational explanations of animal communication (Cambridge University Press).  

On 13 February 2012 I convened a one-day workshop on natural information. Speakers: Hilmi Demir (Bilkent), Aaron Meskin (Leeds), Ruth Millikan (Connecticut, per video-link), Karen Neander (Duke), Andrea Scarantino (Georgia State), and Nicholas Shea (Oxford, per video-link). The workshop was supported by the Centre of History and Philosophy of Science, Technology and Medicine, the British Society for the Philosophy of Science, the Scots Philosophical Association, and the Mind Association.

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Research Grants

Wellcome Trust: Historical case studies in 20th century biomedicine. 2012.

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Teaching Responsibilities

UG courses in 2012/13:

• Level 1: Knowledge and Mind (with Luca Moretti)
• Level 3: Philosophy of Biology
• Level 4: Experiments and Scientific Reasoning

PG course in 2012/13:

• The 'Book of Life' and the Rise of Molecular Biology

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Admin Responsibilities

Undergraduate Programme Coordinator for Philosophy

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Publications

Edited Book

Forthcoming: Animal Communication Theory: Information and Influence. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Articles and Chapters

Forthcoming: Causal control and genetic causation. Noûs. DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-0068.2012.00867.x [link]

Forthcoming: On the 'transmission sense of information'. Biology and Philosophy. DOI 10.1007/s10539-012-9310-x. [discussion note] [link] 

Forthcoming: A primer on information and influence in animal communication. In U. Stegmann (ed.), Animal Communication Theory. CUP.

2012: Varieties of parity. Biology and Philosophy, 27 (6): 903-918. [link]

2010: Reply to Bence Nanay's 'Natural selection and the limited nature of environmental resources'. Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, 41: 418-419. [discussion note] [link]

2010: What Can Natural Selection Explain? Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, 41: 61-66. [link]

2009: A Consumer-Based Teleosemantics for Animal Signals. Philosophy of Science, 76: 864-875. [link]

2009: DNA, Inference, and Information. British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 60: 1-17. [link]

2005: Genetic information as instructional content. Philosophy of Science, 72: 425-443. [link]

2005: John Maynard Smith's notion of animal signals. Biology and Philosophy, 20: 1011-1025. [link]

2005: Die Adaptationismus-Debatte. In: Krohs, U. & Toepfer, G. (eds.): Philosophie der Biologie: Eine Einführung. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, pp. 287-303.

2005: Der Begriff der genetischen Information. In: Krohs, U. & Toepfer, G. (eds.): Philosophie der Biologie: Eine Einführung. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, pp. 212-230.

2004: The arbitrariness of the genetic code. Biology and Philosophy, 19: 205-222. [link]

2004: Theorien und Verwendungsweisen des Informationsbegriffs in der Genetik. In: Bluhm, R. & Nimtz, C. (eds.): Ausgewählte Beiträge zu den Sektionen der GAP.5, 5. Internationaler Kongress der Gesellschaft für Analytische Philosophie, Bielefeld, 22.-26. September 2003. Paderborn: mentis.

 

Book Reviews

2010: Book review of Brian Garvey, Philosophy of Biology, Stocksfield: Acumen, 2007. British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 61: 235-236.

2007: Book review of Robert A. Wilson, Genes and the Agents of Life. The Individual in the Fragile Sciences, Cambridge: CUP, 2005. Mind, 116: 238-240.

2007: Book review of Alexander Rosenberg, Darwinian Reductionism – Or, How to Stop Worrying and Love Molecular Biology, University of Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006. Integrative and Comparative Biology, 47: 899-900.

2005: Book review of Jason Scott Robert, Embryology, Epigenesis, and Evolution: Taking Development Seriously, Cambridge: CUP, 2004. History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences, 27: 300-302.

2004: Book review of Graham Gordon, Genes. A Philosophical Inquiry, London: Routledge, 2002. History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences, 24: 451-452.

 

Biology (Selection)

Stegmann, U. E. and K. E. Linsenmair 2002: Assessing the semelparity hypothesis: Egg-guarding and fecundity in an iteroparous treehopper. Ethology, 108 (10): 857-869.

--  and K. E. Linsenmair 2002: Subsocial and aggregating behaviour in Southeast Asian treehoppers (Homoptera: Membracidae). European Journal of Entomology, 99: 29-34.

--  and M. D. Webb, K. E. Linsenmair 2002: New species, synonymies, and life-histories of the Southeast Asian treehopper genus Pyrgauchenia Breddin (Homoptera: Membracidae: Centrotinae).Journal of Natural History, 36: 279-303.

--  1998: An 'exaggerated' trait in insects: the prothoracic skeleton of Stictocephala bisonia (Homoptera: Membracidae). Journal of Morphology, 238: 157-178.

--  and P. J. A. Kessler, M. M. Sofian, M. Bin Lakim, K. E. Linsenmair 1998: Natural history of the treehopper Gigantorhabdus enderleini. Malayan Nature Journal, 52 (3&4): 241-249.

--  1997: Revaluation of the prothoracic pleuron of the Membracidae (Homoptera): the presence of an epimeron and a subdivided episternum in Stictocephala bisonia Kopp & Yonke, Oxyrhachis taranda (Fabr.), and Centrotus cornutus (L.). International Journal of Insect Morphology and Embryology, 26 (1): 35-42.
 

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