William C. Wimsatt

5.2k total citations · 1 hit paper
33 papers, 1.4k citations indexed

About

William C. Wimsatt is a scholar working on History and Philosophy of Science, Sociology and Political Science and Genetics. According to data from OpenAlex, William C. Wimsatt has authored 33 papers receiving a total of 1.4k indexed citations (citations by other indexed papers that have themselves been cited), including 15 papers in History and Philosophy of Science, 10 papers in Sociology and Political Science and 7 papers in Genetics. Recurrent topics in William C. Wimsatt's work include Philosophy and History of Science (14 papers), Evolutionary Game Theory and Cooperation (9 papers) and Evolution and Genetic Dynamics (7 papers). William C. Wimsatt is often cited by papers focused on Philosophy and History of Science (14 papers), Evolutionary Game Theory and Cooperation (9 papers) and Evolution and Genetic Dynamics (7 papers). William C. Wimsatt collaborates with scholars based in United States, Australia and Netherlands. William C. Wimsatt's co-authors include Jeffrey C. Schank, Scott L. Greer, Marcel Weber, Peter M. Todd, Gerd Gigerenzer, Marie I. Kaiser, Thomas A. C. Reydon, Alan C. Love, Marc Ereshefsky and Lauren N. Ross and has published in prestigious journals such as American Sociological Review, Behavioral and Brain Sciences and Philosophy of Science.

In The Last Decade

William C. Wimsatt

33 papers receiving 1.2k citations

Hit Papers

Re-Engineering Philosophy for Limited Beings 2007 2026 2013 2019 2007 100 200 300 400 500
What are hit papers?

Hit papers significantly outperform the citation benchmark for their cohort. A paper qualifies if it has ≥500 total citations, achieves ≥1.5× the top-1% citation threshold for papers in the same subfield and year (this is the minimum needed to enter the top 1%, not the average within it), or reaches the top citation threshold in at least one of its specific research topics.

  1. Re-Engineering Philosophy for Limited Beings
    2007 527 citations William C. Wimsatt Harvard University Press eBooks profile →

Peers — A (Enhanced Table)

Peers by citation overlap · career bar shows stage (early→late) cites · hero ref

Name h Career Trend Papers Cites
William C. Wimsatt United States 15 584 378 216 192 157 33 1.4k
Sandra D. Mitchell United States 19 570 1.0× 376 1.0× 206 1.0× 146 0.8× 283 1.8× 37 1.5k
Richard Dawkins United States 11 348 0.6× 557 1.5× 198 0.9× 248 1.3× 206 1.3× 51 2.2k
Peter Machamer United States 13 1.2k 2.0× 339 0.9× 405 1.9× 339 1.8× 102 0.6× 51 2.2k
Margaret Morrison Canada 15 843 1.4× 187 0.5× 170 0.8× 81 0.4× 78 0.5× 47 1.6k
Michael Weisberg United States 20 1.2k 2.0× 505 1.3× 328 1.5× 212 1.1× 202 1.3× 52 2.4k
Charbel Niño El-Hani Brazil 23 311 0.5× 361 1.0× 246 1.1× 97 0.5× 166 1.1× 183 1.9k
C. Kenneth Waters United States 15 548 0.9× 253 0.7× 209 1.0× 77 0.4× 185 1.2× 28 898
Stuart Glennan United States 12 736 1.3× 177 0.5× 287 1.3× 139 0.7× 68 0.4× 27 1.2k
Paul Humphreys United States 18 670 1.1× 239 0.6× 86 0.4× 123 0.6× 37 0.2× 52 1.4k
John Beatty United States 19 757 1.3× 595 1.6× 130 0.6× 64 0.3× 409 2.6× 36 1.6k

Countries citing papers authored by William C. Wimsatt

Since Specialization
Citations

This map shows the geographic impact of William C. Wimsatt's research. It shows the number of citations coming from papers published by authors working in each country. You can also color the map by specialization and compare the number of citations received by William C. Wimsatt with the expected number of citations based on a country's size and research output (numbers larger than one mean the country cites William C. Wimsatt more than expected).

Fields of papers citing papers by William C. Wimsatt

Since Specialization
Physical SciencesHealth SciencesLife SciencesSocial Sciences

This network shows the impact of papers produced by William C. Wimsatt. Nodes represent research fields, and links connect fields that are likely to share authors. Colored nodes show fields that tend to cite the papers produced by William C. Wimsatt. The network helps show where William C. Wimsatt may publish in the future.

Co-authorship network of co-authors of William C. Wimsatt

This figure shows the co-authorship network connecting the top 25 collaborators of William C. Wimsatt. A scholar is included among the top collaborators of William C. Wimsatt based on the total number of citations received by their joint publications. Widths of edges represent the number of papers authors have co-authored together. Node borders signify the number of papers an author published with William C. Wimsatt. William C. Wimsatt is excluded from the visualization to improve readability, since they are connected to all nodes in the network.

All Works

20 of 20 papers shown
1.
Creath, Richard, Marc Ereshefsky, Marie I. Kaiser, et al.. (2023). From Biological Practice to Scientific Metaphysics. 9 indexed citations
2.
Newman, Stuart A., Peter Godfrey‐Smith, Daniel L. Hartl, et al.. (2021). Remembering Richard Lewontin (1929–2021). Biological Theory. 16(4). 257–267. 4 indexed citations
3.
Wimsatt, William C.. (2014). Models and experiments? An exploration. Biology & Philosophy. 30(2). 293–298. 2 indexed citations
4.
Wimsatt, William C.. (2013). Articulating Babel: An approach to cultural evolution. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences. 44(4). 563–571. 12 indexed citations
5.
Wimsatt, William C.. (2012). The analytic geometry of genetics: part I: the structure, function, and early evolution of Punnett squares. Archive for History of Exact Sciences. 66(4). 359–396. 2 indexed citations
6.
Wimsatt, William C.. (2011). Robust re-engineering: a philosophical account?. Biology & Philosophy. 26(2). 295–303. 4 indexed citations
7.
Wimsatt, William C.. (2007). Aggregate, composed, and evolved systems: Reductionistic heuristics as means to more holistic theories. Biology & Philosophy. 21(5). 667–702. 35 indexed citations
8.
Wimsatt, William C.. (2007). Re-Engineering Philosophy for Limited Beings. Harvard University Press eBooks. 527 indexed citations breakdown →
9.
Wimsatt, William C.. (2006). Generative entrenchment and an evolutionary developmental biology for culture. Behavioral and Brain Sciences. 29(4). 364–366. 8 indexed citations
10.
Wimsatt, William C.. (2006). Reengineering the Darwinian Sciences in Social Context. Biological Theory. 1(4). 341–342. 1 indexed citations
11.
Wimsatt, William C. & Jeffrey C. Schank. (2004). Generative Entrenchment, Modularity and Evolvability: When Genic Selection meets the Whole Organism 1. 20 indexed citations
12.
Wimsatt, William C.. (2002). Using False Models to Elaborate Constraints on Processes: Blending Inheritance in Organic and Cultural Evolution. Philosophy of Science. 69(S3). S12–S24. 13 indexed citations
13.
Wimsatt, William C.. (2001). Richard Levins as Philosophical Revolutionary. Biology & Philosophy. 16(1). 103–108. 6 indexed citations
14.
Todd, Peter M., Gerd Gigerenzer, & William C. Wimsatt. (2000). Precis of Simple heuristics that make us smart-Open Peer Commentary-Heuristics refound. Behavioral and Brain Sciences. 23(5). 2 indexed citations
15.
Wimsatt, William C.. (1999). Genes, Memes, and Cultural Heredity. Biology & Philosophy. 14(2). 279–310. 59 indexed citations
16.
Wimsatt, William C.. (1994). The Ontology of Complex Systems: Levels of Organization, Perspectives, and Causal Thickets. Canadian Journal of Philosophy Supplementary Volume. 20. 207–274. 160 indexed citations
17.
Schank, Jeffrey C. & William C. Wimsatt. (1986). Generative Entrenchment and Evolution. Social and economic studies. 2. 33–60. 41 indexed citations
18.
Schank, Jeffrey C. & William C. Wimsatt. (1986). Generative Entrenchment and Evolution. PSA Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association. 1986(2). 33–60. 39 indexed citations
19.
Wimsatt, William C.. (1974). Reductive Explanation: A Functional Account. PSA Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association. 1974. 671–710. 15 indexed citations
20.
Wimsatt, William C.. (1970). Some Problems with the Concept of ‘Feedback’. PSA Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association. 1970. 241–256. 2 indexed citations

Rankless uses publication and citation data sourced from OpenAlex, an open and comprehensive bibliographic database. While OpenAlex provides broad and valuable coverage of the global research landscape, it—like all bibliographic datasets—has inherent limitations. These include incomplete records, variations in author disambiguation, differences in journal indexing, and delays in data updates. As a result, some metrics and network relationships displayed in Rankless may not fully capture the entirety of a scholar's output or impact.

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