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Darwinian evolution for culture
Following on from my piece about songs and scientists, underverse (Chris Schoen) has taken me to task:
… it becomes easy to see one of the flaws in memetic thinking. Changes in “culture” differ from changes in biology in that they are not random; they are directed toward a specific challenge or concern. -
Human-Chimp Gene Comparison Hints at Roots of Language | Wired Science | Wired.com
By comparing how a gene critical for language works in humans and chimpanzees, researchers have identified an entire network of genes involved in the incredible linguistic powers of Homo sapiens.
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Sharpening the Focus On Human Evolution
The identification of "Ardi" is a major breakthrough because her species was an early step in the process of human evolution. Scientists do not claim to know whether that Ardi's species evolved directly into modern humans, but it is an important branch on the family tree.
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Fun and Games in Fantasyland
Daniel Dennett commentary on Fodor, “Against Darwinism” January 29, 2007
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Neuroscience: Small, furry … and smart
Tsien, based at Princeton University in New Jersey at the time, named his creation Doogie after the teenage genius in the television programme Doogie Howser, MD. The work was one of the earliest examples of neuroscientists using genetic engineering to generate cognitively enhanced animals in a bid to understand memory and learning.
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neuroscientists using genetic engineering to generate cognitively enhanced animals in a bid to understand memory and learning.
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Much of the work involves making an adult brain behave more like a younger, more flexible version of itself by increasing the organ's plasticity.
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Can Evolution Run in Reverse? A Study Says It’s a One-Way Street - NYTimes.com
Evolutionary biologists have long wondered if history can run backward. Is it possible for the proteins in our bodies to return to the old shapes and jobs they had millions of years ago?
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Frans de Waal, David Sloan Wilson and Group Selection : The Primate Diaries
David Sloan Wilson currently has a response to my review "Survival of the Kindest" up at Seedmagazine.com. In his response he suggests that Dawkinsian critics such as Frans de Waal and Joan Roughgarden have adopted a group selection perspective in all but name
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A list of 26 Species "Concepts" : Evolving Thoughts
Here is a working list of species concepts presently in play. I quote "Concepts" above because, for philosophical reasons, I think there is only one concept - "species", and all the rest are conceptions, or definitions, of that concept. I have christened this the Synapormorphic Concept of Species in (Wilkins 2003).
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The Greatest Show on Earth: the Evidence for Evolution by Richard Dawkins: review - Telegraph
Steve Jones hails Richard Dawkins's new book, which brings together his thinking on Darwin
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A debate in Nature on Darwin and the mind
Last April, Johan J. Bolhuis and Clive D. L. Wynne published in Nature (458(7240), 832-833) a paper entitled "Can evolution explain how minds work?" doubting the use and usefulness of evolutionary analysis in understanding cognitive mechanisms. In response, Lewis Wolpert ("Cognition: evolution does help to explain how minds work" in Nature, 459(7246), 506-50), Sara J. Shettleworth ("Cognition: theories of mind in animals and humans." in Nature, 459(7246), 506-506) and Frans B. M. de Waal ("Darwin's last laugh." in Nature 460, 175 (9 July 2009) freely available here) separately defended the use of evolutionary theory, and in particular comparative analysis, in the study of cognition.
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Women are getting more beautiful - Times Online
“For women, looks are much less important in a man than his ability to look after her when she is pregnant and nursing, periods when women are vulnerable to predators. Historically this has meant rich men tend to have more wives and many children. So the pressure is on men to be successful.”
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The Invisible Hand, Trumped by Darwin? - NYTimes.com
The competitive forces that mold business behavior are like the forces of natural selection that molded elk. In each case, we see instances of socially benign conduct. But in neither can we safely presume that individual and social interests coincide.
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Watching the evolution of the “Origin of Species”
The idea that we can actually see change over time in a person’s thinking is fascinating. Darwin scholars are of course familiar with this story, but here we can view it directly, both on a macro-level as it animates, or word-by-word as we examine pieces of the text more closely.
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Creation/Evolution Journal | NCSE
The Creation/Evolution Journal was first published in 1980. In 1997, it became a part of Reports of the National Center for Science Education.
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On the Origin of Cooperation
How did cooperation evolve when cheaters—those who benefit without making sacrifices—can threaten its stability? In the ninth essay in Science's series in honor of the Year of Darwin, Elizabeth Pennisi discusses the genetic nuts and bolts of cooperation in systems from microbes to humans. -- Pennisi 325 (5945): 1196 -- Science
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Browne on Social Darwinism
Janet Browne: Darwin's Origin of Species, A Biography
New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 2006.
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a struggle for existence among nations and races
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the notorious doctrine of 'social Darwinism' took
the idea of success to justify social and economic policies in which struggle
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Mouse set to be 'evolution icon'
Linnen and colleagues at Harvard and the University of California at Berkeley have now worked out exactly how the mice evolved so quickly.
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Darwin’s Dangerous Idea | Open Culture
Why did so many find Charles Darwin’s concept of natural selection so subversive and disconcerting straight from the beginning? American philosopher Daniel Dennett explains.
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