The extended evolutionary synthesis: its structure, assumptions and predictions.
(2015) In Royal Society of London. Proceedings B. Biological Sciences 282(1813).- Abstract
- Scientific activities take place within the structured sets of ideas and assumptions that define a field and its practices. The conceptual framework of evolutionary biology emerged with the Modern Synthesis in the early twentieth century and has since expanded into a highly successful research program to explore the processes of diversification and adaptation. Nonetheless, the ability of that framework satisfactorily to accommodate the rapid advances in developmental biology, genomics and ecology has been questioned. We review some of these arguments, focusing on literatures (evo-devo, developmental plasticity, inclusive inheritance and niche construction) whose implications for evolution can be interpreted in two ways-one that preserves... (More)
- Scientific activities take place within the structured sets of ideas and assumptions that define a field and its practices. The conceptual framework of evolutionary biology emerged with the Modern Synthesis in the early twentieth century and has since expanded into a highly successful research program to explore the processes of diversification and adaptation. Nonetheless, the ability of that framework satisfactorily to accommodate the rapid advances in developmental biology, genomics and ecology has been questioned. We review some of these arguments, focusing on literatures (evo-devo, developmental plasticity, inclusive inheritance and niche construction) whose implications for evolution can be interpreted in two ways-one that preserves the internal structure of contemporary evolutionary theory and one that points towards an alternative conceptual framework. The latter, which we label the 'extended evolutionary synthesis' (EES), retains the fundaments of evolutionary theory, but differs in its emphasis on the role of constructive processes in development and evolution, and reciprocal portrayals of causation. In the EES, developmental processes, operating through developmental bias, inclusive inheritance and niche construction, share responsibility for the direction and rate of evolution, the origin of character variation and organism-environment complementarity. We spell out the structure, core assumptions and novel predictions of the EES, and show how it can be deployed to stimulate and advance research in those fields that study or use evolutionary biology. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/7844579
- author
- Laland, Kevin N ; Uller, Tobias LU ; Feldman, Marcus W ; Sterelny, Kim ; Müller, Gerd B ; Moczek, Armin ; Jablonka, Eva and Odling-Smee, John
- organization
- publishing date
- 2015
- type
- Contribution to journal
- publication status
- published
- subject
- in
- Royal Society of London. Proceedings B. Biological Sciences
- volume
- 282
- issue
- 1813
- article number
- 20151019
- publisher
- Royal Society Publishing
- external identifiers
-
- pmid:26246559
- wos:000362050000002
- scopus:84938898766
- pmid:26246559
- ISSN
- 1471-2954
- DOI
- 10.1098/rspb.2015.1019
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- 5c27875e-b5f1-42f6-81ac-dc4c564ec187 (old id 7844579)
- date added to LUP
- 2016-04-01 10:49:17
- date last changed
- 2022-04-28 01:28:55
@article{5c27875e-b5f1-42f6-81ac-dc4c564ec187,
abstract = {{Scientific activities take place within the structured sets of ideas and assumptions that define a field and its practices. The conceptual framework of evolutionary biology emerged with the Modern Synthesis in the early twentieth century and has since expanded into a highly successful research program to explore the processes of diversification and adaptation. Nonetheless, the ability of that framework satisfactorily to accommodate the rapid advances in developmental biology, genomics and ecology has been questioned. We review some of these arguments, focusing on literatures (evo-devo, developmental plasticity, inclusive inheritance and niche construction) whose implications for evolution can be interpreted in two ways-one that preserves the internal structure of contemporary evolutionary theory and one that points towards an alternative conceptual framework. The latter, which we label the 'extended evolutionary synthesis' (EES), retains the fundaments of evolutionary theory, but differs in its emphasis on the role of constructive processes in development and evolution, and reciprocal portrayals of causation. In the EES, developmental processes, operating through developmental bias, inclusive inheritance and niche construction, share responsibility for the direction and rate of evolution, the origin of character variation and organism-environment complementarity. We spell out the structure, core assumptions and novel predictions of the EES, and show how it can be deployed to stimulate and advance research in those fields that study or use evolutionary biology.}},
author = {{Laland, Kevin N and Uller, Tobias and Feldman, Marcus W and Sterelny, Kim and Müller, Gerd B and Moczek, Armin and Jablonka, Eva and Odling-Smee, John}},
issn = {{1471-2954}},
language = {{eng}},
number = {{1813}},
publisher = {{Royal Society Publishing}},
series = {{Royal Society of London. Proceedings B. Biological Sciences}},
title = {{The extended evolutionary synthesis: its structure, assumptions and predictions.}},
url = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2015.1019}},
doi = {{10.1098/rspb.2015.1019}},
volume = {{282}},
year = {{2015}},
}