Areas of current and future growth
This chapter will reflect on the chapters in this book and suggest directions and gaps that theory will have to consider as we move forward. Our goal here is to motivate future work in light of the developments discussed in this book. We will emphasize the role of the empirical-theoretical connection that will be a thread across chapters. Clearly, eco-evolutionary theoretical developments are currently being developed, and we imagine and hope that future versions of theoretical ecology will reveal strong growth in this important area. Much work is being developed related to evolutionary response to global change (e.g., evolutionary rescue). Again, consistent with the themes being developed in this book, we would argue that this multi-disciplinarian approach to theory (evolution and ecology, agriculture and ecology, economics and ecology, society and ecology) have become part of the toolbox of modern ecology and modern theoretical ecology and likely will play a massive role in future theoretical development.