达尔文进化论的五大缺陷（下）

三、小进化与大进化２０世纪４０年代,美国遗传学家戈德施米特提出了“大进化”观念。戈氏认为达尔文主张的通过自然选择积累的微小变异,只能在物种范围内进行,即为“小进化”;而对生命演化史而言,有决定性意义的不是“小进化”,而是“大进化”。他认为“大进化”是...     

达尔文-科学进化论的奠基者

2009年, 时逢英国博物学家查尔斯·罗伯特·达尔文(Charles Robert Darwin,1809-1882)诞辰200周年, 进化论光辉著作《物种起源》发表150周年。历史的发展不断认证达尔文的《物种起源》一书是生物学史上不朽的经典著作, 如今《物种起源》所提及的许多观点已成为人尽皆知的常识, 并且还在不断地发展、完善, 为人类认识自然和自身发展指点方向。文章追忆了先贤的卓越科学贡献和科学探索精神, 并对百年来科学进步和进化论的发展重要成果进行了简要的评述, 指出了进化论未来研究的重点问题。     

达尔文进化论的五大缺陷（上）

达尔文进化论是一个伟大的学说,为１９世纪三大科学发现之一。它首次勾画出了生命由简单到复杂、由低级向高级发展的图式,创立了自然选择理论,为生命科学的研究和发展奠定了科学的基础,有力地将“特创论”、“神造论”扫进了历史垃圾堆,为马克思、恩格斯创立辩证唯物...     

达尔文进化论的科学本质与贡献

自达尔文1859年发表《物种起源》一书以来,“进化”已逐渐成为生物学文献中出现频率最高的词汇之一。随着科学界对生物进化现象的认识逐渐深入,人们对达尔文进化论的理解也在不断深化和提高。从魏斯曼等人提出“新达尔文主义：到摩尔根等人以“粒子遗传”替代“融合遗传”的概念以及费希尔、霍尔丹和赖特等人创立群体遗传学,     

达尔文进化论与考古学的科学性

关于考古学这个词的来源,我们知道其源于希腊文的αρχαολγ。这个词实际上可以拆分为αρχαο和λγ,前者意为古代或古代事物,后者意为科学。在古希腊,其最早泛指古代史的研究,后来用以表示古物和古迹的研究。     

达尔文进化论的挑战分子进化的中性学说

十九世纪中叶以前,弥漫在科学界上空的是特创论和物种不变论,首先打破这种阴霾空气的伟人当推英国生物学家达尔文。达尔文经过历时四载的航海考察,于1859年发表了创世之作《物种起源》,其核心进化论对科学界影响之巨大,被革命导师恩格斯将其与能量守恒定律和细胞学说一起,赞誉为十九世纪自然科学的三大发现。进化论在经过一个多世纪的风风雨雨之后,除被不断的补充、修正与完善之外,也遇到过强有力的挑战。本文在对达尔文主义和新达尔文主义作简短回顾的基础上,着重介绍非达尔文主义——分子进化的中性学说的形成、特点及对学术界的影响。     

被误解的命运：从达尔文理论到达尔文主义

1859年,达尔文发表了《物种起源》一书,系统地阐述了进化论思想。在书的结尾,他写下了一句意味深长的话：“人类的起源和历史也将由此得到许多启示。”然而,一百年后的1959年,美国著名遗传学家H．J．穆勒在纪念《物种起源》发表100周年大会上与另一位知名学者却发出不约而同的感慨：“这一百年来没有达尔文也是一样的。”     

澄江化石：“进化”达尔文进化论

自然科学思想史上影响最为深刻的两次革命，一次是无机科学界的“哥白尼革命”。1543年的《天体运行论》，首次论证了地球并不在太阳系中心，使长期禁锢人类思维的神学自然观受到质疑，从而不断激励人们去探索一个“天外有天”的真实宇宙世界。另一次则发生在有机科学界，称为“达尔文革命”。由1859年《物种起源》启动的这场旷日持久的革命影响更为广泛而     

达尔文学说与拉马克学说的联系及区别

达尔文学说与拉马克学说的联系及区别陈月强（贵州省镇宁民族师范学校５６１２００）拉马克学说与达尔文学说都是关于生物进化的学说，两者既有联系，又有区别，它们对现代生物学的各个领域都产生了重大影响，在今天仍具有重大的现实意义。拉马克认为生物具有变异的特性，...     

达尔文抄袭了吗？——谈谈达尔文和华莱士

2009年是达尔文诞辰200周年（1809—2009）,也是进化论思想诞生150周年（1859—2009）,这本来是人类科学史上最值得纪念的年份,然而就在人们要跨入2009年的前一天,却有人爆出了惊人的消息：达尔文抄袭,达尔文靠抄袭而成为“进化论之父”。这就像一盆冷水,     

Revisiting the eclipse of Darwinism

The article sums up a number of points made by the author concerning the response to Darwinism in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and repeats the claim that a proper understanding of the theorys impact must take account of the extent to which what are now regarded as the key aspects of Darwins thinking were evaded by his immediate followers. Potential challenges to this position are described and responded to.     

拉马克的归来—对达尔文主义的再审视

适应性突变（adaptive mutation）和表观遗传学（epigenetics）的新进展为拉马克主张的＂获得性遗传＂提供了越来越多的证据,暗示它在生物进化中所起的作用可能远比我们之前想象的要大的多。这虽然与新达尔文主义相左,但却在一定程度上符合经典达尔文主义：作为＂自然选择＂的重要补充,＂获得性遗传＂至少应视作一个辅助的机制而纳入＂达尔文框架＂中。这种建立在多元论基础上的进化观正是达尔文留给后人最重要的遗产。     

Bionomics: Vernon Lyman Kellogg and the Defense of Darwinism

Bionomics was a research approach invented by British biological scientists in the late nineteenth century and adopted by the American entomologist and evolutionist Vernon Lyman Kellogg in the early twentieth century. Kellogg hoped to use bionomics, which was the controlled observation and experimentation of organisms within settings that approximated their natural environments, to overcome the percieved weaknesses in the Darwinian natural selection theory. To this end, he established abionomics laboratory at Stanford University, widely published results from his bionomic investigations, and encouraged other biological researchers to adopt bionomics. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Darwinism and Ethology The Role of Natural Selection in Animals and Humans

The role of behaviour in biological evolution is examined within the context of Darwinism. All Darwinian models are based on the distinction of two mechanisms: one that permits faithful transmission of a feature from one generation to another, and another that differentially regulates the degree of this transmission. Behaviour plays a minimal role as an agent of transmission in the greater part of the animal kingdom; by contrast, the forms it may assume strongly influence the mechanisms of selection regulating the different rates of transmission. We consider the decisive feature of the human species to be the existence of a phenotypical system of cultural coding characterized by precision and reliability which are the distinctive features of genetic coding in animals. We examine the consequences for the application of the Darwinian model to human history. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Formalizing Darwinism and inclusive fitness theory

Inclusive fitness maximization is a basic building block for biological contributions to any theory of the evolution of society. There is a view in mathematical population genetics that nothing is caused to be maximized in the process of natural selection, but this is explained as arising from a misunderstanding about the meaning of fitness maximization. Current theoretical work on inclusive fitness is discussed, with emphasis on the author''s ‘formal Darwinism project’. Generally, favourable conclusions are drawn about the validity of assuming fitness maximization, but the need for continuing work is emphasized, along with the possibility that substantive exceptions may be uncovered. The formal Darwinism project aims more ambitiously to represent in a formal mathematical framework the central point of Darwin''s Origin of Species, that the mechanical processes of inheritance and reproduction can give rise to the appearance of design, and it is a fitting ambition in Darwin''s bicentenary year to capture his most profound discovery in the lingua franca of science.     

The formal Darwinism project: a mid-term report

For 8 years I have been pursuing in print an ambitious and at times highly technical programme of work, the 'Formal Darwinism Project', whose essence is to underpin and formalize the fitness optimization ideas used by behavioural ecologists, using a new kind of argument linking the mathematics of motion and the mathematics of optimization. The value of the project is to give stronger support to current practices, and at the same time sharpening theoretical ideas and suggesting principled resolutions of some untidy areas, for example, how to define fitness. The aim is also to unify existing free-standing theoretical structures, such as inclusive fitness theory, Evolutionary Stable Strategy (ESS) theory and bet-hedging theory. The 40-year-old misunderstanding over the meaning of fitness optimization between mathematicians and biologists is explained. Most of the elements required for a general theory have now been implemented, but not together in the same framework, and 'general time' remains to be developed and integrated with the other elements to produce a final unified theory of neo-Darwinian natural selection.     

Similarities and Varieties: A Brief Sketch on the Reception of Darwinism and Sociobiology in Japan

This paper discusses the reception of Darwinian evolutionary theory and sociobiology in Japan. Darwinism was introduced into Japan in the late 19th century and Japanese people readily accepted the concept of evolution because, lacking Christianity, there was no religious opposition. However, the theory of evolution was treated as a kind of social scientific tool, i.e., social Spencerism and eugenics. Although evolutionary biology was developed during the late 19th and the early 20th century, orthodox Darwinian theory was neglected for a long time. In the mid 1980s, sociobiology was introduced but it was ignored and criticized by a large part of the ecologist-evolutionist community in Japan. This hostile attitude was due to the absence of Darwinism among these scientists. Compared with the reception of sociobiology in English-speaking countries, there were both similarities and differences in Japan.     

Moral Darwinism: Ethical evidence for the descent of man

Could an ethical theory ever play a substantial evidential role in a scientific argument for an empirical hypothesis? InThe Descent of Man, Darwin includes an extended discussion of the nature of human morality, and the ethical theory which he sketches is not simply developed as an interesting ramification of his theory of evolution, but is used as a key part of his evidence for human descent from animal ancestors. Darwin must rebut the argument that, because of our moral nature, humans are essentially different in kind from other animals and so had to have had a different origin. I trace his causal story of how the moral sense could develop out of social instincts by evolutionary mechanisms of group selection, and show that the form of Utilitarianism he proposes involves a radical reduction of the standard of value to the concept of biological fitness. I argue that this causal analysis, although a weakness from a normative standpoint, is a strength when judged for its intended purpose as part of an evidential argument to confirm the hypothesis of human descent.     

Behavioral and neural Darwinism: Selectionist function and mechanism in adaptive behavior dynamics

An evolutionary theory of behavior dynamics and a theory of neuronal group selection share a common selectionist framework. The theory of behavior dynamics instantiates abstractly the idea that behavior is selected by its consequences. It implements Darwinian principles of selection, reproduction, and mutation to generate adaptive behavior in virtual organisms. The behavior generated by the theory has been shown to be quantitatively indistinguishable from that of live organisms. The theory of neuronal group selection suggests a mechanism whereby the abstract principles of the evolutionary theory may be implemented in the nervous systems of biological organisms. According to this theory, groups of neurons subserving behavior may be selected by synaptic modifications that occur when the consequences of behavior activate value systems in the brain. Together, these theories constitute a framework for a comprehensive account of adaptive behavior that extends from brain function to the behavior of whole organisms in quantitative detail.