Karola Stotz

Karola Stotz (September 8, 1963 – October 14, 2019) was a German scholar of philosophy of biology, cognitive science, and philosophy of science. With Paul E. Griffiths, she pioneered the use of experimental philosophy methods in the field of philosophy of science. Stotz was born in Neumünster in Schleswig-Holstein. She received her Magister Artium in Biology and Social Sciences (Anthropology) in 1993 (University of Mainz) and her PhD in Philosophy from the University of Ghent, Belgium, in 1999 under the supervision of Gertrudis Van de Vijver and Werner Callebaut. In the period between 1999 and 2007 she worked at different universities of Australia and the United States of America. From 2008 until 2013, Stotz was Australian Research Fellow and, later, Bridging Support Fellow at the Department of Philosophy, University of Sydney. In 2014 she received the position of Senior Lecturer at the Department of Philosophy, Macquarie University, Australia. From 2014 to 2017, with her partner Paul Griffiths, Stotz worked on a Templeton World Charity Foundation project entitled: "Causal Foundations of Biological Information". Stotz argues for an Extended Evolutionary Synthesis through the inclusion of non-genetic (extended, exogenetic) inheritance mechanisms and processes in the explanation of evolution. According to Stotz, the Modern Evolutionary Synthesis should go beyond the antinomy of biological vs cultural and revise more inclusive theories of gene-culture coevolution and niche construction. Such a revised theory of evolution should take into account genetic, epigenetic (molecular and cellular), behavioral, ecological, socio-cultural and cognitive-symbolic legacies. Stotz introduced the concept of Developmental Niche Construction as an integrative framework for the study of various non-genetic (exogenetic) inheritance mechanisms and for an explanation of how the environment (physical, biological or social) can construct new heritable variations during individual development. She proposes an Extended Evolutionary Psychology based on ideas of an Extended Evolutionary synthesis, Developmental Systems Theory, and embodied, embedded, enacted and extended models of cognition.