Alexandra Watkins
Biographic Data
| ID | 83699 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Alexandra Watkins |
| GIVEN NAMES | Alexandra |
| FAMILY NAME | Watkins |
| SIGNATURE | WATKINS A |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Wisconsin–Madison |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-0171-8738 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 12 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 19 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 12 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2016 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Trial by Fire: Uncertainty and Adaptive Management in Forest Ecology
Scientists studying fire-prone ecosystems have to contend with uncertainty stemming from causal complexity and conflicting aims, but they manage different types of uncertainty differently. I recommend that they instead adopt a common approach to uncertainty involving context-sensitivity and adaptive learning. Such an approach is consonant with insights from pragmatism and pluralism in philosophy of science and may even suggest a productive way to…
Are We in a Sixth Mass Extinction? The Challenges of Answering and Value of Asking
In both scientific and popular circles, it is often said that we are in the midst of a sixth mass ex-tinction. Although the urgency of our present environmental crises is not in doubt, such claims ofa present mass extinction are highly controversial scientifically. Our aims are, first, to get to thebottom of this scientific debate by shedding philosophical light on the many conceptual andmethodological challenges involved in answering this scient…
Androcentrism in Biological Typing
Biological types, including holotypes and reference genomes, are particular biological entities that represent an entire class of biological entities. This paper presents a feminist analysis of biological typing by asking whether we have reason to criticize the practices of selecting holotypes and reference genomes for being androcentric. I offer three distinct reasons why androcentrism can be objectionable: androcentric practices may inadequatel…
The Adequacy of purposes for data: A paleoecological case study
Paleoclimate Proxies and the Benefits of Disunity
Measuring the climates of the deep past requires the use of paleoclimate proxies. I describe two proxy data and measurement practices, regarding proxy calibration and proxy data infrastructure. I document how at least some data and measurement practices in paleoclimatology are disunified: these practices do not involve intercalibration or otherwise statistical combination of multiple proxy records, and metadata necessary for proxy data to be reus…
What is Philosophy of the Geosciences
The philosophy of the geosciences is an emerging subfield in philosophy of science. Although past and present geoscientific disciplines differ substantially, we argue that they frequently face common epistemological and ethical problems. We survey several of these problems that have already attracted sustained philosophical interest, related to the use of measurements, data, and models to study relatively inaccessible target phenomena, responses …
Scaling procedures in climate science: Using temporal scaling to identify a paleoclimate analogue
Reevaluating the grandmother hypothesis
Multi-model approaches to phylogenetics: Implications for idealization
The Epistemic Value of the Living Fossils Concept
Living fossils, taxa with similar members now and in the deep past, have recently come under scrutiny. Those who think the concept should be retained have argued for its epistemic and normative utility. This article extends the epistemic utility of the living fossils concept to include ways in which a taxon’s living fossil status can serve as evidence for other claims about that taxon. I will use insights from developmental biology to refine thes…
The diasporic slide: Representations of second-generation diasporas in Yasmine Gooneratne'sA Change of Skies(1991) and in Chandani Lokugé'sIf the Moon Smiled(2000) andSoftly as I Leave You(2011)
The novels by Yasmine Gooneratne, A Change of Skies (1991), and Chandani Lokugé, If the Moon Smiled (2000) and Softly as I Leave You (2011), show the challenge of diaspora as sliding from parents to children. These fictions portray second-generation immigrants as "caught between two cultures": the Sri Lankan culture of their parents and the Australian culture with which they engage at school and university. In Gooneratne's comedy this cultural ne…
Tourists, travellers, refugees: An interview with Michelle De Kretser
Michelle De Kretser was born in Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) and moved to Australia in 1972. From 1989 to 1992 she was a founding editor of the Australian Women’s Book Review. She is the author of several novels, including The Rose Grower (1999), The Hamilton Case (2003 – winner of the Tasmania Pacific Prize, the Encore Award [UK] and the Commonwealth Writers Prize [Southeast Asia and Pacific]) and The Lost Dog (2007). Her most recent novel, Questions…
Scaling procedures in climate science: Using temporal scaling to identify a paleoclimate analogue
Are We in a Sixth Mass Extinction? The Challenges of Answering and Value of Asking
In both scientific and popular circles, it is often said that we are in the midst of a sixth mass ex-tinction. Although the urgency of our present environmental crises is not in doubt, such claims ofa present mass extinction are highly controversial scientifically. Our aims are, first, to get to thebottom of this scientific debate by shedding philosophical light on the many conceptual andmethodological challenges involved in answering this scient…
The diasporic slide: Representations of second-generation diasporas in Yasmine Gooneratne'sA Change of Skies(1991) and in Chandani Lokugé'sIf the Moon Smiled(2000) andSoftly as I Leave You(2011)
The novels by Yasmine Gooneratne, A Change of Skies (1991), and Chandani Lokugé, If the Moon Smiled (2000) and Softly as I Leave You (2011), show the challenge of diaspora as sliding from parents to children. These fictions portray second-generation immigrants as "caught between two cultures": the Sri Lankan culture of their parents and the Australian culture with which they engage at school and university. In Gooneratne's comedy this cultural ne…
Paleoclimate Proxies and the Benefits of Disunity
Measuring the climates of the deep past requires the use of paleoclimate proxies. I describe two proxy data and measurement practices, regarding proxy calibration and proxy data infrastructure. I document how at least some data and measurement practices in paleoclimatology are disunified: these practices do not involve intercalibration or otherwise statistical combination of multiple proxy records, and metadata necessary for proxy data to be reus…
What is Philosophy of the Geosciences
The philosophy of the geosciences is an emerging subfield in philosophy of science. Although past and present geoscientific disciplines differ substantially, we argue that they frequently face common epistemological and ethical problems. We survey several of these problems that have already attracted sustained philosophical interest, related to the use of measurements, data, and models to study relatively inaccessible target phenomena, responses …
The Adequacy of purposes for data: A paleoecological case study
Reevaluating the grandmother hypothesis
The Epistemic Value of the Living Fossils Concept
Living fossils, taxa with similar members now and in the deep past, have recently come under scrutiny. Those who think the concept should be retained have argued for its epistemic and normative utility. This article extends the epistemic utility of the living fossils concept to include ways in which a taxon’s living fossil status can serve as evidence for other claims about that taxon. I will use insights from developmental biology to refine thes…
Tourists, travellers, refugees: An interview with Michelle De Kretser
Michelle De Kretser was born in Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) and moved to Australia in 1972. From 1989 to 1992 she was a founding editor of the Australian Women’s Book Review. She is the author of several novels, including The Rose Grower (1999), The Hamilton Case (2003 – winner of the Tasmania Pacific Prize, the Encore Award [UK] and the Commonwealth Writers Prize [Southeast Asia and Pacific]) and The Lost Dog (2007). Her most recent novel, Questions…
The diasporic slide: Representations of second-generation diasporas in Yasmine Gooneratne'sA Change of Skies(1991) and in Chandani Lokugé'sIf the Moon Smiled(2000) andSoftly as I Leave You(2011)
The novels by Yasmine Gooneratne, A Change of Skies (1991), and Chandani Lokugé, If the Moon Smiled (2000) and Softly as I Leave You (2011), show the challenge of diaspora as sliding from parents to children. These fictions portray second-generation immigrants as "caught between two cultures": the Sri Lankan culture of their parents and the Australian culture with which they engage at school and university. In Gooneratne's comedy this cultural ne…
Tourists, travellers, refugees: An interview with Michelle De Kretser
Michelle De Kretser was born in Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) and moved to Australia in 1972. From 1989 to 1992 she was a founding editor of the Australian Women’s Book Review. She is the author of several novels, including The Rose Grower (1999), The Hamilton Case (2003 – winner of the Tasmania Pacific Prize, the Encore Award [UK] and the Commonwealth Writers Prize [Southeast Asia and Pacific]) and The Lost Dog (2007). Her most recent novel, Questions…
Reevaluating the grandmother hypothesis
Multi-model approaches to phylogenetics: Implications for idealization
The Epistemic Value of the Living Fossils Concept
Living fossils, taxa with similar members now and in the deep past, have recently come under scrutiny. Those who think the concept should be retained have argued for its epistemic and normative utility. This article extends the epistemic utility of the living fossils concept to include ways in which a taxon’s living fossil status can serve as evidence for other claims about that taxon. I will use insights from developmental biology to refine thes…
Scaling procedures in climate science: Using temporal scaling to identify a paleoclimate analogue
Androcentrism in Biological Typing
Biological types, including holotypes and reference genomes, are particular biological entities that represent an entire class of biological entities. This paper presents a feminist analysis of biological typing by asking whether we have reason to criticize the practices of selecting holotypes and reference genomes for being androcentric. I offer three distinct reasons why androcentrism can be objectionable: androcentric practices may inadequatel…
The Adequacy of purposes for data: A paleoecological case study
Paleoclimate Proxies and the Benefits of Disunity
Measuring the climates of the deep past requires the use of paleoclimate proxies. I describe two proxy data and measurement practices, regarding proxy calibration and proxy data infrastructure. I document how at least some data and measurement practices in paleoclimatology are disunified: these practices do not involve intercalibration or otherwise statistical combination of multiple proxy records, and metadata necessary for proxy data to be reus…
What is Philosophy of the Geosciences
The philosophy of the geosciences is an emerging subfield in philosophy of science. Although past and present geoscientific disciplines differ substantially, we argue that they frequently face common epistemological and ethical problems. We survey several of these problems that have already attracted sustained philosophical interest, related to the use of measurements, data, and models to study relatively inaccessible target phenomena, responses …
Are We in a Sixth Mass Extinction? The Challenges of Answering and Value of Asking
In both scientific and popular circles, it is often said that we are in the midst of a sixth mass ex-tinction. Although the urgency of our present environmental crises is not in doubt, such claims ofa present mass extinction are highly controversial scientifically. Our aims are, first, to get to thebottom of this scientific debate by shedding philosophical light on the many conceptual andmethodological challenges involved in answering this scient…
Trial by Fire: Uncertainty and Adaptive Management in Forest Ecology
Scientists studying fire-prone ecosystems have to contend with uncertainty stemming from causal complexity and conflicting aims, but they manage different types of uncertainty differently. I recommend that they instead adopt a common approach to uncertainty involving context-sensitivity and adaptive learning. Such an approach is consonant with insights from pragmatism and pluralism in philosophy of science and may even suggest a productive way to…
Epistemology (5 works) · Philosophy and History of Science (5 works) · Biology (4 works) · Computer Science (4 works) · Philosophy (4 works) · Sociology (4 works) · Geology (3 works) · History (3 works) · Mathematics (3 works) · Philosophy (3 works)