THE AUTONOMY OF BIOLOGY - THE POSITION OF BIOLOGY AMONG THE SCIENCES

Philosophers of science have claimed that the position of biology amon g the sciences is the most prominent and controversial issue of the ph ilosophy of biology. Some authors consider biology merely a ''province '' of physics and reducible to physics, others uphold the autonomy of biology, while still others have decided that biology lacks the rigor to justify being considered a genuine science. In my own analysis of t his problem, I have concluded that the science of biology has all the attributes of a genuine science, as well as a number of other characte ristics restricted to biology. These characteristics are listed and di scussed. They justify ranking biology as an autonomous science, just a s autonomous as physics and many other sciences.