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Evolution: like any other science it is predictable

Evolutionary biology rejoices in the diversity of life, but this comes at a cost: other than working in the common framework of neo-Darwinian evolution, specialists in, for example, diatoms and mammals have little to say to each other. Accordingly, their research tends to track the particularities a...

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Autor principal: Conway Morris, Simon
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: The Royal Society 2010
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2842699/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20008391
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2009.0154
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author Conway Morris, Simon
author_facet Conway Morris, Simon
author_sort Conway Morris, Simon
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description Evolutionary biology rejoices in the diversity of life, but this comes at a cost: other than working in the common framework of neo-Darwinian evolution, specialists in, for example, diatoms and mammals have little to say to each other. Accordingly, their research tends to track the particularities and peculiarities of a given group and seldom enquires whether there are any wider or deeper sets of explanations. Here, I present evidence in support of the heterodox idea that evolution might look to a general theory that does more than serve as a tautology (‘evolution explains evolution’). Specifically, I argue that far from its myriad of products being fortuitous and accidental, evolution is remarkably predictable. Thus, I urge a move away from the continuing obsession with Darwinian mechanisms, which are entirely uncontroversial. Rather, I emphasize why we should seek explanations for ubiquitous evolutionary convergence, as well as the emergence of complex integrated systems. At present, evolutionary theory seems to be akin to nineteenth-century physics, blissfully unaware of the imminent arrival of quantum mechanics and general relativity. Physics had its Newton, biology its Darwin: evolutionary biology now awaits its Einstein.
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spelling pubmed-28426992010-03-23 Evolution: like any other science it is predictable Conway Morris, Simon Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci Articles Evolutionary biology rejoices in the diversity of life, but this comes at a cost: other than working in the common framework of neo-Darwinian evolution, specialists in, for example, diatoms and mammals have little to say to each other. Accordingly, their research tends to track the particularities and peculiarities of a given group and seldom enquires whether there are any wider or deeper sets of explanations. Here, I present evidence in support of the heterodox idea that evolution might look to a general theory that does more than serve as a tautology (‘evolution explains evolution’). Specifically, I argue that far from its myriad of products being fortuitous and accidental, evolution is remarkably predictable. Thus, I urge a move away from the continuing obsession with Darwinian mechanisms, which are entirely uncontroversial. Rather, I emphasize why we should seek explanations for ubiquitous evolutionary convergence, as well as the emergence of complex integrated systems. At present, evolutionary theory seems to be akin to nineteenth-century physics, blissfully unaware of the imminent arrival of quantum mechanics and general relativity. Physics had its Newton, biology its Darwin: evolutionary biology now awaits its Einstein. The Royal Society 2010-01-12 /pmc/articles/PMC2842699/ /pubmed/20008391 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2009.0154 Text en © 2010 The Royal Society http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Articles
Conway Morris, Simon
Evolution: like any other science it is predictable
title Evolution: like any other science it is predictable
title_full Evolution: like any other science it is predictable
title_fullStr Evolution: like any other science it is predictable
title_full_unstemmed Evolution: like any other science it is predictable
title_short Evolution: like any other science it is predictable
title_sort evolution: like any other science it is predictable
topic Articles
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2842699/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20008391
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2009.0154
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