Adaptation versus Evolution.

Schwartz J.H.
Departments of Anthropology and History and Philosophy of Science, 3H01 WWPH, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15260 USA

Thursday 26/08/04

Time: 08:30

Sala: 500

More than a century ago, De Vries and Bateson pointed out that, despite the title of Darwin's most famous opus, On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, this treatise dealt not with the evolution of organisms, but with their survival. A more appropriate title would be: On the Origin of Adaptation by Means of Natural Selection. Through neo-Darwinism, however, "adaptation" and "evolution" became so intertwined that alternative theories which sought to distinguish between the two concepts were summarily dismissed. The situation was complicated further by Mayr's biological species concept, which applied Morganā??s and then Fisher's particular melding of Mendelism and Darwinism to a model of evolution and speciation that relied on notions of isolating mechanisms and the availability of "unoccupied" "econiches.ā? While this speculation may seem to make some intuitive sense, it is not necessarily biologically or genetically correct. From the perspective of developmental regulation and cell biology, isolation is not a requisite for the origin of genetic and potential morphological novelty. Environment does play a role, but not as traditionally conceived. In the end, it is important to distinguish not only between adaptation and evolution, but also between different ā??kindsā? of adaptation. Various primates, especially lemurs, provide excellent examples of how rethinking "adaptation" versus "evolution" might fruitfully be approached.


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