Multilevel Selection and the Theory of Evolution

✍ Scribed by Ciprian Jeler

• Publisher: Springer International Publishing;Palgrave Pivot
• Year: 2018
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 156
• Edition: 1st ed.
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

This book puts multilevel selection theory into a much needed historical perspective. This is achieved by discussing multilevel selection in the first half of the twentieth century, the reasons for the energetic rejection of Wynne-Edwards’ group selectionist stance in the 1960s, Elisabeth Lloyd’s contribution to the units of selection debate, Price’s hierarchical equation and its possible interpretations and, finally, species selection in macroevolutionary contexts. Another idea also seems to emerge from these studies; namely, that perhaps a more sure-footed position for multilevel selection theory would be acquired if we were to show a renewed interest in 'old group selection', i.e. in scenarios in which the differential reproduction of the groups themselves affects the frequencies of either individual-level or group-level traits. This book will be of interest to philosophers and historians of biology, as well as to theoretically inclined biologists who have an interest in multilevel selection theory.

✦ Table of Contents

Front Matter ....Pages i-xi
Introduction (Ciprian Jeler)....Pages 1-9
Front Matter ....Pages 11-11
The Roots of Multilevel Selection Theory: Concepts of Biological Individuality in the Early Twentieth Century (Abraham H. Gibson, Christina L. Kwapich, Martha Lang)....Pages 13-45
Tales of a Failed Scientific Revolution. Wynne-Edwards’ Animal Dispersion (Mihail-Valentin Cernea)....Pages 47-69
Equivalence, Interactors, and Lloyd’s Challenge to Genic Pluralism (Ryan Ketcham)....Pages 71-98
Front Matter ....Pages 99-99
Price’s Hierarchical Equation and the Notion of Group Fitness (Ciprian Jeler)....Pages 101-121
A Backward Question About Multilevel Selection: Can Species Selection Help Disentangle the Notion of Group Selection? (Andreea Eşanu)....Pages 123-148
Back Matter ....Pages 149-151

✦ Subjects

Philosophy; Philosophy of Science; Evolutionary Biology