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Engineering and biology : counsel for a continued relationship
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Calcott, Brett, Levy, Arnon, Siegal, Mark L., Soyer, Orkun S. and Wagner, Andreas (2015) Engineering and biology : counsel for a continued relationship. Biological Theory, 10 (1). pp. 50-59. doi:10.1007/s13752-014-0198-3
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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s13752-014-0198-3
Abstract
Biologists frequently draw on ideas and terminology from engineering. Evolutionary systems biology—with its circuits, switches, and signal processing—is no exception. In parallel with the frequent links drawn between biology and engineering, there is ongoing criticism against this cross-fertilization, using the argument that over-simplistic metaphors from engineering are likely to mislead us as engineering is fundamentally different from biology. In this article, we clarify and reconfigure the link between biology and engineering, presenting it in a more favorable light. We do so by, first, arguing that critics operate with a narrow and incorrect notion of how engineering actually works, and of what the reliance on ideas from engineering entails. Second, we diagnose and diffuse one significant source of concern about appeals to engineering, namely that they are inherently and problematically metaphorical. We suggest that there is plenty of fertile ground left for a continued, healthy relationship between engineering and biology.
| Item Type: | Journal Article | ||||||||||
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| Subjects: | Q Science > QH Natural history | ||||||||||
| Divisions: | Faculty of Science > Life Sciences (2010- ) > Biological Sciences ( -2010) Faculty of Science > Life Sciences (2010- ) |
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| Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): | Systems biology, Evolution (Biology) | ||||||||||
| Journal or Publication Title: | Biological Theory | ||||||||||
| Publisher: | Springer Netherlands | ||||||||||
| ISSN: | 1555-5542 | ||||||||||
| Official Date: | March 2015 | ||||||||||
| Dates: |
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| Volume: | 10 | ||||||||||
| Number: | 1 | ||||||||||
| Number of Pages: | 10 | ||||||||||
| Page Range: | pp. 50-59 | ||||||||||
| DOI: | 10.1007/s13752-014-0198-3 | ||||||||||
| Status: | Peer Reviewed | ||||||||||
| Publication Status: | Published | ||||||||||
| Access rights to Published version: | Restricted or Subscription Access |
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