[Species] obey, and when they occur are post hoc explained by the biology of populations, interbreeding, selection, drift, and so on, but they are no… - John S. Wilkins

We imagine that the Creator at the actual time of creation made only one single species for each natural order of plants, this species being different in habit and fructification from all the rest. That he made these mutually fertile, whence out of their progeny, fructification having been somewhat changed, Genera of natural classes have arisen as many in number as the different parents, and since this is not carried further, we regard this also as having been done by His Omnipotent hand directly in the beginning; thus all Genera were primeval and constituted a single Species. That as many Genera having arisen as there were individuals in the beginning, these plants in course of time became fertilised by others of different sort and thus arose Species until so many were produced as now exist... these Species were sometimes fertilised out of congeners, that is other Species of the same Genus, whence have arisen Varieties.

Since philosophers are very often beholden to a particular biological writer or tradition (especially Mayr, who overcame his adversaries by the dual strategies of prolixity and longevity), they tend to see the issues in terms specified by those particular authorities.

A lot of people have thought of understanding as just knowledge of true causes, but then there is a problem of why we value knowledge - if not to understand things. And in effect understanding is what underwrites the desire for knowledge in the context of science.