In debates between holism and reductionism in biology, from the early twentieth century to more recent re-enactments involving genetic reductionism, developmental systems theory or systems biology, the role of chance - the presence of theories invoking chance as a strong explanatory principle - is hardly ever acknowledged. Conversely, Darwinian models of chance and selection (Dennett, 1995; Kup...

In a brief passage, David Lewis derives from quantum-theory a dilemma regarding the explanation of chance events which he tries to solve by first distinguishing plain from contrastive why-questions, and then arguing that with respect to chance events, only plain why-questions have answers. His brevity warrants elaboration and critique. I endorse his derivation, but I make a structural objection...