FRE 3211 - Institut de Recherche de l'Ecole de Biotechnologie de Strasbourg, CNRS/Université de Strasbourg, Boulevard Sebastien Brant, 67400 Illkirch, France.
Syst Appl Microbiol. 2010 Jan;33(1):1-6. doi: 10.1016/j.syapm.2009.11.001. Epub 2009 Dec 16.
In the past, biologists believed that species were stable and permanent entities and they viewed them as natural kinds which, like the chemical elements, exist in nature independently of any human conceptualization. After Darwin, biologists came to accept that species were the products of evolution and natural selection and were not immutable natural kinds. Different definitions of the species category are discussed, in particular the concept of cluster class as a family resemblance concept. In order to resolve what has become known as the species problem, it is necessary to distinguish between species as concrete entities and species as abstract entities. A species can be an abstract concept but the concept also refers to specific objects in space and time, namely the organisms studied by biologists. The nature of viruses is discussed and the difference between a virus and a virus particle is emphasized. The category "virus species" is defined as a cluster class and the task of defining a virus species is distinguished from the task of identifying the members of a species using diagnostic criteria. Such an identification is feasible only when the species taxon has been established beforehand on the basis of several genotypic and phenotypic characters. It is argued that viruses are genetic parasites rather than living organisms and that they have no place in the tree of life. This interpretation is based on an analysis of the properties of living agents and living organisms.
过去，生物学家认为物种是稳定且永久的实体，将其视为自然种类，就像化学元素一样，独立于任何人类概念而存在于自然界中。达尔文之后，生物学家开始接受物种是进化和自然选择的产物，而不是不变的自然种类。本文讨论了物种类别的不同定义，特别是聚类类作为家族相似性概念的概念。为了解决所谓的物种问题，有必要区分具体物种和抽象物种。物种可以是一个抽象的概念，但这个概念也指的是特定的空间和时间的具体对象，即生物学家研究的生物体。本文还讨论了病毒的性质，强调了病毒和病毒粒子之间的区别。定义“病毒种”作为聚类类，定义病毒种的任务与使用诊断标准识别物种成员的任务区分开来。只有在事先根据几个基因型和表型特征确定了物种分类群的基础上，这种识别才是可行的。本文认为病毒是遗传寄生虫，而不是生物体，它们在生命之树中没有位置。这种解释是基于对生命实体和生物体属性的分析。
