In recent years, there has been a notable resurgence in studies labeled as “natural histories,” indicating a growing interest in using this approach to address fundamental questions about human constitution. Yet, what are natural histories in the 21st century? To what extent is the past intelligible through natural histories? Why fusing the concepts of nature and history into a single framework? What are the philosophical implications of this synthesis?
UNH is an interdisciplinary research initiative spanning philosophy of biology, critical theory, social and political philosophy. Our goal is to investigate and establish a comprehensive philosophical framework for unraveling the nature and scope of natural histories. We approach this goal through three distinct perspectives: evolutionary, critical, and normative.
1. evolutionary natural histories
1.1 Conceptual foundations
This line of research within UNH explores the definition and scope of “natural history” within evolutionary biology. It investigates the nature and implications of key concepts in evolutionary natural history, such as contingency, adaptationism, and biological function. Furthermore, it investigates the causal structure inherent in evolutionary natural histories, analyzing how these concepts shape the narratives of species and trait evolution.
1.2 Methodology and epistemology
This line explores how to account for the epistemic power of evolutionary and narrative explanations. Similarly, it investigates the inferential and evidential analyses that scientists use to generate evolutionary reconstructions despite limited evidence. Finally, this line explores how cross-disciplinary knowledge from fields such as paleontology, ecology, climate science, and comparative psychology, is integrated to weave comprehensive evolutionary scenarios for the emergence of specific human traits.
2. critical natural histories
In recent debates, many critical theorists have devoted considerable philosophical effort to critically analyzing the modern notion of “nature” in order to develop a dialectical paradigm capable of integrating it with the notion of “history”. Notably, in this context, the potential of the notion of “natural history” has been recently rediscovered. To be sure, this concept has been integral to critical theory since its early years, with figures such as Adorno and Benjamin putting put the idea of natural history at the center of their reflections.
This line of research explores conceptions of “history”, “historicity” and “nature” elaborated in that context, illuminating their philosophical implications. We will investigate the consequences of adopting a historical perspective on nature and a natural perspective on history, while establishing a dialogue with the conceptions of historicity and nature emerging from evolutionary natural histories. Moreover, this line of research analyzes how this conceptual framework shapes our understanding of the historical development of human practices.
3. the normative implications of natural histories: case studies
This line explores the conceptual issues involved in constructing specific natural histories. Our focus is on recent attempts to engage a natural history of “gender” and on the role human reproduction, reproductive differences, and recent developments in reproductive technologies can play within them. We intend to identify the normative implications and will develop a critical perspective by exploring this case study.
More broadly, this line of inquiry investigates how natural histories can contribute to studies of reproduction, reproductive technologies, and contemporary debates on gender.