Your search for: "natural selection"

Peter Munz's latest book examines knowledge in the light of biology and in particular, in the light of Darwin's theory of natural selection.It argues that the biological interpretation of the phenomenon of knowledge not only supersedes all varieties of traditional positivism but is also an ...

Peter Munz's latest book examines knowledge in the light of biology and in particular, in the light of Darwin's theory of natural selection.It argues that the biological interpretation of the phenomenon of knowledge not only supersedes all varieties of traditional positivism but is also an improvement on the sociology of knowledge as well as on the current vogue of cognitive science and makes postmodern relativism superfluous. The aquisition of knowledge, Munz argues, is continuous, right from the protozoa to the most advanced scientific theories. Organisms are best seen as embodied theories and scientific theories are best understood as disembodied organisms, the selection of which, though artificial, is controlled by the same principles as evolution itself.

Darwin's Spectre will be a lightning rod among books on the great naturalist. Rose's emphatic opinions will ensure that the book will not be ignored. Other trade books have also explored Darwinism and its modern meaning, but Rose's is unique in its combination of a frankly historical placing of ...

Darwin's Spectre will be a lightning rod among books on the great naturalist. Rose's emphatic opinions will ensure that the book will not be ignored. Other trade books have also explored Darwinism and its modern meaning, but Rose's is unique in its combination of a frankly historical placing of Darwin's ideas, its consideration of their many ramifications for modern life, and its grand conjectures about the future. DLSteven M. Austad, University of Idaho; author of Why We Age Extending the human life-span past 120 years. The green revolution. Evolution and human psychology. These subjects make today's newspaper headlines. Yet much of the science underlying these topics stems from a book published nearly 140 years agoDLCharles Darwin's On the Origin of Species. Far from an antique idea restricted to the nineteenth century, the theory of evolution is one of the most potent concepts in all of modern science. In Darwin's Spectre, Michael Rose provides the general reader with an introduction to the theory of evolution: its beginning with Darwin, its key concepts, and how it may affect us in the future. First comes a brief biographical sketch of Darwin. Next, Rose gives a primer on the three most important concepts in evolutionary theoryDLvariation, selection, and adaptation. With a firm grasp of these concepts, the reader is ready to look at modern applications of evolutionary theory. Discussing agriculture, Rose shows how even before Darwin farmers and ranchers unknowingly experimented with evolution. Medical research, however, has ignored Darwin's lessons until recently, with potentially grave consequences. Finally, evolution supplies important new vantage points on human nature. If humans weren't created by deities, then our nature may be determined more by evolution than we have understood. Or it may not be. In this question, as in many others, the Darwinian perspective is one of the most important for understanding human affairs in the modern world. Darwin's Spectre explains how evolutionary biology has been used to support both valuable applied research, particularly in agriculture, and truly frightening objectives, such as Nazi eugenics. Darwin's legacy has been a comfort and a scourge. But it has never been irrelevant.

In 1974, Richard Lewontin published The Genetic Basis of Evolutionary Change, focusing enormous attention on protein variation as both a model of underlying genetic variation and a level of selection itself. In the twenty years since, scientific research has been shifted by the power of molecular ...

In 1974, Richard Lewontin published The Genetic Basis of Evolutionary Change, focusing enormous attention on protein variation as both a model of underlying genetic variation and a level of selection itself. In the twenty years since, scientific research has been shifted by the power of molecular biological techniques to explore the nature of variation directly at the DNA and gene levels. The "protein chapter" is coming to a close. In this book, Jeff Mitton explains the questions that geneticists hoped to answer by studying protein variation. He reviews the extensive literature on protein variation, describes the successes and failures of the research program, and evaluates the results of a rich and controversial body of research. The laboratory and field studies using protein polymorphisms revealed dynamic interactions among genotypes, fitness differentials, and fluctuating environmental conditions, and inadvertently wedded the fields of physiological ecology and population biology. Mitton's book is a useful analysis for all scientists interested in the genetic structure and evolution of populations.