Précis ofEvolution in Four Dimensions

Abstract

In his theory of evolution, Darwin recognized that the conditions of life play a role in the generation of hereditary variations, as well as in their selection. However, as evolutionary theory was developed further, heredity became identified with genetics, and variation was seen in terms of combinations of randomly generated gene mutations. We argue that this view is now changing, because it is clear that a notion of hereditary variation that is based solely on randomly varying genes that are unaffected by developmental conditions is an inadequate basis for evolutionary theories. Such a view not only fails to provide satisfying explanations of many evolutionary phenomena, it also makes assumptions that are not consistent with the data that are emerging from disciplines ranging from molecular biology to cultural studies. These data show that the genome is far more responsive to the environment than previously thought, and that not all transmissible variation is underlain by genetic differences. In Evolution in Four Dimensions (2005) we identify four types of inheritance (genetic, epigenetic, behavioral, and symbol-based), each of which can provide variations on which natural selection will act. Some of these variations arise in response to developmental conditions, so there are Lamarckian aspects to evolution. We argue that a better insight into evolutionary processes will result from recognizing that transmitted variations that are not based on DNA differences have played a role. This is particularly true for understanding the evolution of human behavior, where all four dimensions of heredity have been important.

Towards a unified science of cultural evolution

“…But not disenfranchised for long: Discoverers of HOX genes, phylogeneticists, embryologists, and renaissant paleontologists recruited partners to a fusion as evolutionary developmental biology became the newer synthesis, one increasingly overreaching the original. Raff (1996), Arthur (1997), Davidson (2001), Schlosser andWagner (2004), Carroll (2005), and others drive an expansive adaptive radiation of the new theory that even reaches culture, with Oyama et al (2001), Jablonka and Lamb (2005), and Odling-Smee et al (2003). This list could have been quadrupled (Maienschein & Laublicher 2006).…”

How life changes itself: The Read–Write (RW) genome

“…The Lamarckian community has become animated about the possibility that environmentally-induced epigenetic chromatin modifications will have major phenotypic effects and will maintain themselves for sufficient generations to establish modified populations as taxonomically distinct entities [194,195]. Whether this turns out to prove the case is still undetermined.…”

An evolutionary framework for cultural change: Selectionism versus communal exchange

“…If it were possible to root the social and behavioral sciences in an evolutionary framework, they might achieve a unification comparable with Darwin's unification of the life sciences. Thus it is unsurprising that, dating back to Herbert Spencer's introduction of the notion of social Darwinism a few years after Darwin's Origin of Species, Darwinian thinking has been applied to a range of phenomena outside of biology, including creativity [14,111], neural copying and pruning [11,12,13,23,26], law [55], cosmology [118], computer-mediated communication [74], and perhaps most extensively, cultural and economic change [7,8,15,71,86,87,107,108]. Elements of culture build on one another cumulatively, as demonstrated even in laboratory settings [10].…”