Abstract
This chapter describes the character concepts in biology. Characters were used to identify organisms, to document the relationships and similarities among organisms, and as the canonical units in functional explanations. This widespread usage was accompanied by crucial variation in meaning. Aside from imprecise diction, this variation in usage manifested unresolved methodological issues in biology. Characters also formed the axes for comparative studies of historical relationships among organisms. However, adaptation or function has been dismissed as irrelevant by some comparative biologists; the sole purpose of their character analyses was to infer patterns of common ancestry among species. Species were identified and circumscribed in terms of characters, even though they were often recognized as biological individuals because of reproductive isolation.
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