Explanation, Description, and the Meaning of ‛Transformation ’ in Taxonomic Evidence

The nature of description and its role in scientific procedure is examined. Observation is theory laden, but not necessarily with explanatory theory. Darwin attempted, in the Origin, to absorb all the known facts of current morphology in his notion of homology. His insistence on literal “transformation ” between forms, however, forced a confusion between explanation and description that he did not notice. Recent papers have attacked the “transformation approach”, arguing that the hierarchy of forms is essentially static rather than successive. While this rejection of Darwin’s literalism appears correct, the emphasis on stasis may be misplaced. Pattern reconstruction must take logical precedence over process explanation, but topological relations can be dynamic without reference to succession. What I have termed “literalism ” understands the dynamic as the temporal, and this confusion between the realms of law and event continually leads to a substitution of explanation for description