Preserving the Tree of Life Abstract Biodiversity is a key concept in the biological sciences. While it has its origin in conservation biology, it has become useful across multiple biological disciplines as a means to describe biological variation. It remains, however, unclear what particular biological units the concept refers to. There are currently multiple accounts of which biological features constitute biodiversity and how these are to be measured. In this paper, I draw from the species concept debate to argue for a set of desiderata for the concept of that is both “biodiversity” principled and coheres with the concept’s use. Given these desiderata, this concept should be understood as referring to difference quantified in terms of the phylogenetic structure of lineages, also known as the of ‘tree life’. Keywords: Biodiversity, Phylogeny, Conservation Science, Taxonomy, Phylogenetic Diversity Introduction is an indispensable concept for conservation biology. Since conservation biology “Biodiversity” emerged in the 1980s it has been often described as a discipline’. Often compared to medical practice, it ‘crisis applies biological science to the preservation of biological systems (Soule, 1985). For conservation to be a science, a rigorous concept was needed to describe the features biologists want to preserve. This can be viewed as analogous to establishing medical concepts like or Previous notions of 'wilderness' and ‘health’ ‘disease’. vague demarcations between the natural world and humanity could not provide clear targets for conservation. In 1985, the same year that the journal started, a key term for the discipline emerged: Conservation Biology This concept, a truncation of diversity”, characterises the features that conservation biodiversity. “biological biology aims to preserve. These include biological features whose preservation or cultivation does not provide an immediate or obvious financial benefit. The use of in conservation biology has become near ubiquitous but there remains little biodiversity consensus on the biological features it refers to (Maclaurin 2016). Current philosophical attempts to explicate biodiversity have converged on what I refer to as the assumption’: biodiversity necessarily measures ‘taxonomic taxonomy (Lean and Maclaurin 2016; Maclaurin and Sterelny 2008; Rolston III 2001; Sarkar 2005). This is a natural assumption because taxonomy describes the basic ingredients that compose the biological and ecological systems that conservation looks to preserve. Given the role that we want biodiversity to play, taxonomy appears
Preserving the Tree of Life Abstract Biodiversity is a key concept in the biological sciences. While it has its origin in conservation biology, it has become useful across multiple biological disciplines as a means to describe biological variation. It remains, however, unclear what particular biological units the concept refers to. There are currently multiple accounts of which biological features constitute biodiversity and how these are to be measured. In this paper, I draw from the species concept debate to argue for a set of desiderata for the concept of “biodiversity” that is both principled and coheres with the concept’s use. Given these desiderata, this concept should be understood as referring to difference quantified in terms of the phylogenetic structure of lineages, also known as the ‘tree of life’. Keywords: Biodiversity, Phylogeny, Conservation Science, Taxonomy, Phylogenetic Diversity Introduction “Biodiversity” is an indispensable concept for conservation biology. Since conservation biology emerged in the 1980s it has been often described as a ‘crisis discipline’. Often compared to medical practice, it applies biological science to the preservation of biological systems (Soule, 1985). For conservation to be a science, a rigorous concept was needed to describe the features biologists want to preserve. This can be viewed as analogous to establishing medical concepts like ‘health’ or ‘disease’. Previous notions of 'wilderness' and vague demarcations between the natural world and humanity could not provide clear targets for conservation. In 1985, the same year that the journal Conservation Biology started, a key term for the discipline emerged: biodiversity. This concept, a truncation of “biological diversity”, characterises the features that conservation biology aims to preserve. These include biological features whose preservation or cultivation does not provide an immediate or obvious financial benefit. The use of biodiversity in conservation biology has become near ubiquitous but there remains little consensus on the biological features it refers to (Maclaurin 2016). Current philosophical attempts to explicate biodiversity have converged on what I refer to as the ‘taxonomic assumption’: biodiversity necessarily measures taxonomy (Lean and Maclaurin 2016; Maclaurin and Sterelny 2008; Rolston III 2001; Sarkar 2005). This is a natural assumption because taxonomy describes the basic ingredients that compose the biological and ecological systems that conservation looks to preserve. Given the role that we want biodiversity to play, taxonomy appears