Topic description:
The trend toward a small number of model organisms for biological and biomedical research has yielded important insights, but also has biased our understanding of the variety of animal form and function. The Darwinian Ark Project is founded on the principle that more, not less, is better. At present, neuroscientists, physiologists, and behaviorists do not study enough different kinds of animals to understand what disparate species actually share in common. Moreover, we do not conduct enough biologically informed comparative studies that might help us to understand the diversity of organisms, including human organisms. The Darwinian Ark Project iscommitted to reversing contemporary trends in biology and biomedicine, and to providing resources for a more adequate science of human and non-human nature.

Biographical note:
Jason Scott Robert is Associate Professor of Life Sciences in the School of Life Sciences at Arizona State University. He teaches in the Bioethics Program within the Center for Biology and Society. His PhD is in philosophy (McMaster University, 2000), and prior to joining the faculty at ASU, he was a Canadian Institutes of Health Research New Investigator and Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy at Dalhousie University. He has published many articles in the philosophy of biology and bioethics, and his first book, Embryology, Epigenesis, and Evolution: Taking Development Seriously, was published by Cambridge University Press in 2004. Dr. Robert was a Visiting Fellow at the KLI in July 2003.