From Gaia To Selfish Genes

Author : Connie Barlow
Publisher : MIT Press
Page : 294 pages
File Size : 50,5 Mb
Release : 1992-07-08
Category : Science
ISBN : 0262521784

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From Gaia to Selfish Genes by Connie Barlow Pdf

From Gaia to Selfish Genes is a different kind of anthology. Lively excerpts from the popular writings of leading theorists in the life sciences blend in a seamless presentation of the controversies and bold ideas driving contemporary biological research. Selections span scales from the biosphere to the cell and DNA, and disciplines from global ecology to behavior and genetics, and also reveals the links between biology and philosophy. They plunge the reader into debates about heredity and environment, competition and cooperation, randomness and determinism, and the meaning of individuality. From Gaia to Selfish Genes conveys the technical and conceptual roots of current scientific theories beginning with the planetary perspective of James Lovelock and Lynn Margulis and concluding with the reductionist views of Richard Dawkins and E. 0. Wilson. The contrasting worldviews, coupled with excerpts drawn from critics of each theory, encourage readers to examine their own presuppositions. In addition to the scientists' portrayal of the Gaia hypothesis, symbiosis in cell evolution, hierarchy theory, systems theory, game theory, sociobiology, and the selfish gene, the text is rich in autobiographical passages and biographies. By presenting the human side of research, From Gaia to Selfish Genes reveals the social context and interactions, the motivations and range of cognitive styles that comprise the scientific endeavor. Concluding essays written expressly for this book by Lynn Margulis, John Maynard Smith, W. Ford Doolittle, and others underscore the importance of such diversity. Connie Barlow is a science writer currently living in New York City. The scientists include: Robert Axelrod. Richard D. Alexander. Ludwig von Bertalanffy. Leo W. Buss. Francis Crick. Richard Dawkins. W. Ford Doolittle. Douglas Hofstadter. Julian Huxley. Leon J. Kamin. Philip Kitcher. Richard C. Lewontin. James Lovelock. Lynn Margulis. Ashley Montagu. Leslie Orgel. Steven Rose. Carmen Sapienza. John Maynard Smith. Lewis Thomas. Gerald Weinberg. E. 0. Wilson. Robert Wright. The science writers include: Lawrence Joseph. Arthur Koestler. Francesca Lyman. Jeanne McDermott. Richard Monastersky. Dorion Sagan.

Author : Richard Dawkins
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 497 pages
File Size : 51,7 Mb
Release : 2016
Category : Science
ISBN : 9780198788607

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The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins Pdf

With a new epilogue to the 40th anniversary edition.

Author : Richard Dawkins
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
Page : 372 pages
File Size : 42,9 Mb
Release : 1989
Category : Medical
ISBN : 0192860925

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The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins Pdf

Science need not be dull and bogged down by jargon, as Richard Dawkins proves in this entertaining look at evolution. The themes he takes up are the concepts of altruistic and selfish behaviour; the genetical definition of selfish interest; the evolution of aggressive behaviour; kinshiptheory; sex ratio theory; reciprocal altruism; deceit; and the natural selection of sex differences. 'Should be read, can be read by almost anyone. It describes with great skill a new face of the theory of evolution.' W.D. Hamilton, Science

Author : Richard Dawkins
Publisher : OUP Oxford
Page : 551 pages
File Size : 51,8 Mb
Release : 2006-03-16
Category : Science
ISBN : 9780191574061

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The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins Pdf

The million copy international bestseller, critically acclaimed and translated into over 25 languages. This 30th anniversary edition includes a new introduction from the author as well as the original prefaces and foreword, and extracts from early reviews. As relevant and influential today as when it was first published, The Selfish Gene has become a classic exposition of evolutionary thought. Professor Dawkins articulates a gene's eye view of evolution - a view giving centre stage to these persistent units of information, and in which organisms can be seen as vehicles for their replication. This imaginative, powerful, and stylistically brilliant work not only brought the insights of Neo-Darwinism to a wide audience, but galvanized the biology community, generating much debate and stimulating whole new areas of research.

Author : Richard Dawkins
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 544 pages
File Size : 49,5 Mb
Release : 2016-05-26
Category : Science
ISBN : 9780191093067

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The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins Pdf

The million copy international bestseller, critically acclaimed and translated into over 25 languages. As influential today as when it was first published, The Selfish Gene has become a classic exposition of evolutionary thought. Professor Dawkins articulates a gene's eye view of evolution - a view giving centre stage to these persistent units of information, and in which organisms can be seen as vehicles for their replication. This imaginative, powerful, and stylistically brilliant work not only brought the insights of Neo-Darwinism to a wide audience, but galvanized the biology community, generating much debate and stimulating whole new areas of research. Forty years later, its insights remain as relevant today as on the day it was published. This 40th anniversary edition includes a new epilogue from the author discussing the continuing relevance of these ideas in evolutionary biology today, as well as the original prefaces and foreword, and extracts from early reviews. Oxford Landmark Science books are 'must-read' classics of modern science writing which have crystallized big ideas, and shaped the way we think.

Author : Toby Tyrrell
Publisher : Princeton University Press
Page : 325 pages
File Size : 53,6 Mb
Release : 2013-07-21
Category : Science
ISBN : 9781400847914

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On Gaia by Toby Tyrrell Pdf

A critical examination of James Lovelock's controversial Gaia hypothesis One of the enduring questions about our planet is how it has remained continuously habitable over vast stretches of geological time despite the fact that its atmosphere and climate are potentially unstable. James Lovelock's Gaia hypothesis posits that life itself has intervened in the regulation of the planetary environment in order to keep it stable and favorable for life. First proposed in the 1970s, Lovelock's hypothesis remains highly controversial and continues to provoke fierce debate. On Gaia undertakes the first in-depth investigation of the arguments put forward by Lovelock and others—and concludes that the evidence doesn't stack up in support of Gaia. Toby Tyrrell draws on the latest findings in fields as diverse as climate science, oceanography, atmospheric science, geology, ecology, and evolutionary biology. He takes readers to obscure corners of the natural world, from southern Africa where ancient rocks reveal that icebergs were once present near the equator, to mimics of cleaner fish on Indonesian reefs, to blind fish deep in Mexican caves. Tyrrell weaves these and many other intriguing observations into a comprehensive analysis of the major assertions and lines of argument underpinning Gaia, and finds that it is not a credible picture of how life and Earth interact. On Gaia reflects on the scientific evidence indicating that life and environment mutually affect each other, and proposes that feedbacks on Earth do not provide robust protection against the environment becoming uninhabitable—or against poor stewardship by us.

Author : David Haig
Publisher : MIT Press
Page : 509 pages
File Size : 54,9 Mb
Release : 2020-03-31
Category : Technology & Engineering
ISBN : 9780262358033

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From Darwin to Derrida by David Haig Pdf

How the meaningless process of natural selection produces purposeful beings who find meaning in the world. In From Darwin to Derrida, evolutionary biologist David Haig explains how a physical world of matter in motion gave rise to a living world of purpose and meaning. Natural selection, a process without purpose, gives rise to purposeful beings who find meaning in the world. The key to this, Haig proposes, is the origin of mutable “texts”—genes—that preserve a record of what has worked in the world. These texts become the specifications for the intricate mechanisms of living beings. Haig draws on a wide range of sources—from Laurence Sterne's Tristram Shandy to Immanuel Kant's Critique of the Power of Judgment to the work of Jacques Derrida to the latest findings on gene transmission, duplication, and expression—to make his argument. Genes and their effects, he explains, are like eggs and chickens. Eggs exist for the sake of becoming chickens and chickens for the sake of laying eggs. A gene's effects have a causal role in determining which genes are copied. A gene (considered as a lineage of material copies) persists if its lineage has been consistently associated with survival and reproduction. Organisms can be understood as interpreters that link information from the environment to meaningful action in the environment. Meaning, Haig argues, is the output of a process of interpretation; there is a continuum from the very simplest forms of interpretation, instantiated in single RNA molecules near the origins of life, to the most sophisticated. Life is interpretation—the use of information in choice.

Author : Richard Dawkins
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 49,6 Mb
Release : 2004
Category : Electronic
ISBN : OCLC:1336201317

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The Selfish Gene (summary) by Richard Dawkins Pdf

Author : John Halstead
Publisher : Lulu.com
Page : 422 pages
File Size : 55,6 Mb
Release : 2016-03-18
Category : Neopaganism
ISBN : 9781329943575

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Godless Paganism: Voices of Non-Theistic Pagans by John Halstead Pdf

Even in pagan antiquity, there were those who, while participating in the community's religious life, did not believe in literal gods. In the centuries that followed the Christian domination of the West, the epithet "godless pagan" was leveled at a wide variety of people. In the 1960s, there emerged a community of people who sought to reclaim the name "pagan" from its history of opprobrium. These Neo-Pagans were interested in nature spirituality and polytheism, and identified with the misunderstood and persecuted pagans of antiquity. While many Pagans today believe in literal gods, there are a growing number of Pagans who are "godless." Today, the diverse assemblage of spiritual paths known as Paganism includes atheist Pagans or Atheopagans, Humanistic and Naturalistic Pagans, Buddho-Pagans, animists, pantheists, Gaians, and other non-theistic Pagans. Here, their voices are gathered together to share what it means to be Pagan and godless.

Author : Glenys Livingstone
Publisher : iUniverse
Page : 357 pages
File Size : 42,7 Mb
Release : 2005
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9780595349906

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PaGaian Cosmology by Glenys Livingstone Pdf

PaGaian Cosmology brings together a religious practice of seasonal ritual based in a contemporary scientific sense of the cosmos and female imagery for the Sacred. The author situates this original synthesis in her context of being female and white European transplanted to the Southern Hemisphere. Her sense of alienation from her place, which is personal, cultural and cosmic, fires a cosmology that re-stories Goddess metaphor of Virgin-Mother-Crone as a pattern of Creativity, which unfolds the cosmos, manifests in Earth's life, and may be known intimately. PaGaian Cosmology is an ecospirituality grounded in indigenous Western religious celebration of the Earth-Sun annual cycle. By linking to story of the unfolding universe this practice can be deepened, and a sense of the Triple Goddess-central to the cycle and known in ancient cultures-developed as a dynamic innate to all being. The ritual scripts and the process of ritual events presented here, may be a journey into self-knowledge through personal, communal and ecological story: the self to be known is one that is integral with place. PaGaian Cosmology may be used as a resource for individuals or groups seeking new forms of devotional expression and an Earth-based pathway to wisdom within.

Author : Haydn Washington
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 232 pages
File Size : 43,5 Mb
Release : 2018-08-06
Category : Nature
ISBN : 9780429956324

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A Sense of Wonder Towards Nature by Haydn Washington Pdf

Environmental scientist and writer Haydn Washington argues that we will not solve the environmental crisis unless we change our worldview and ethics, and to do so we must rejuvenate our sense of wonder at nature. This book focuses on humanity’s relation with nature, and the sense of wonder and belonging common to indigenous cultures and children everywhere. Drawing on events in the author’s own five decades working to protect wild places, and the current literature on wonder, it examines what a sense of wonder is, what it has been called in different cultures and our high points of wonder at nature. It also looks at the ‘Great Divide’ in worldview between anthropocentrism and eco-centrism, and considers the problem of anthropocentric theory in academia, arguing that the focus should instead be on harmony with nature. The book concludes with an examination of why wonder has become buried in Western society and considers ways in which it can be revived, including rituals and education. It also considers how wonder helps humanity to become ‘whole’. The final chapter presents the road back to wonder and how wonder at nature can be restored in Western society. This book will be of great interest to environmental scientists, conservation biologists, environmental philosophers and ecological ethicists, as well as environmentalists, educators, eco-psychologists and students looking at sustainability, deep ecology and environmental philosophy and ethics.

Author : Nicola Davis
Publisher : CRC Press
Page : 81 pages
File Size : 44,9 Mb
Release : 2017-07-06
Category : Literary Criticism
ISBN : 9781351351621

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An Analysis of Richard Dawkins's The Selfish Gene by Nicola Davis Pdf

Richard Dawkins provides excellent examples of his reasoning and interpretation skills in The Selfish Gene. His 1976 book is not a work of original research, but instead a careful explanation of evolution, combined with an argument for a particular interpretation of several aspects of evolution. Since Dawkins is building on other researchers’ work and writing for a general audience, the central elements of good reasoning are vital to his book: producing a clear argument and presenting a persuasive case; organising an argument and supporting its conclusions. In doing this, Dawkins also employs the crucial skill of interpretation: understanding what evidence means; clarifying terms; questioning definitions; giving clear definitions on which to build arguments. The strength of his reasoning and interpretative skills played a key part in the widespread acceptance of his argument for a gene-centred interpretation of natural selection and evolution – and in its history as a bestselling classic of science writing.

Author : Richard Dawkins
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 352 pages
File Size : 48,8 Mb
Release : 1989
Category : Behavior genetics
ISBN : 1582881146

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The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins Pdf

Author : Neil Messer
Publisher : SCM Press
Page : 288 pages
File Size : 53,8 Mb
Release : 2007-03-30
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9780334029960

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Selfish Genes and Christian Ethics by Neil Messer Pdf

The evolutionary origins of human beings, and in particular the origins of human morality, have always attracted debate and speculation, not just in the academic community but in popular science and the wider general population as well. The arguments and explanations put forward over the years seem to thoroughly catch the popular imagination, but there is the danger that these explanations tend to step outside the bounds of scientific theory and become powerful popular myths instead. In Neil Messer's "Selfish Genes and Christian Ethics", the author is challenging this tendency. Instead, he provides a Christian theological anthropology, which, among other things, aims to give Christians and the churches the confidence to engage with assumptions that evolutionary theory and religious beliefs are untenable. This is a valuable resource for anyone engaged in the study of theology, providing the reader with the ability to consider both the theoretical and the practical questions raised by evolutionary discussions of ethics and morality.

Author : Alexander Cooper
Publisher : BookSummaryGr
Page : 37 pages
File Size : 45,6 Mb
Release : 2021-10-09
Category : Science
ISBN : 9791220878395

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Summary of The Selfish Gene by Alexander Cooper Pdf

Summary of The Selfish Gene In his book, The Selfish Gene, Dawkins argues for the gene as the basic unit of evolution. He claims that organisms are “survival shells” for the “replicators” within us. Replicators, the units that evolve, are genes. They are inherently selfish in that they only care about their own survival and the survival of their copies. As a result, no true altruism exists. Anytime an organism helps another, both sets of genes are benefiting. Dawkins expands his theory to attempt to explain topics like kin altruism, eusociality, group dynamics and culture. He writes for the scientist looking for a new idea and for the layman just looking to learn more by explaining his theory in a way that appeals to all. Here is a Preview of What You Will Get: ⁃ A Full Book Summary ⁃ An Analysis ⁃ Fun quizzes ⁃ Quiz Answers ⁃ Etc. Get a copy of this summary and learn about the book.