Abstract
B. C. Goodwin’s comments provided an appropriate preamble to the raison d’etre and format of our group’s discussions and report. All scientific theories incorporate both contingencies (particulars) and laws (universals) in their explanatory structure. In biology, the emphasis on one or the other has shifted dramatically over the past two centuries depending upon whether the biological realm is perceived as one of systematic order and regularity, or as one which is dominated by historical and environmental contingencies. Before Darwin, the focus of attention was on laws of biological form and morphological transformations (as expressed in the research program of rational morphology), whereas Darwin’s emphasis on inheritance and adaptation brought historical and environmental factors into prominence.
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