Nowe idee w biologii ewolucyjnej: od NDMS do EES

Nowoczesna synteza neodarwinowska (NDMS — neo-Darwinian modern synthesis) przez kilkadziesiąt lat stanowiła podstawę teorii ewolucji. Okazało się jednak, że NDMS ma swoje ograniczenia, a jej ustalenia są nieaktualne w odniesieniu do różnych obszarów badań biologicznych. Nowa, rozszerzona synteza ewolucyjna (EES — extended evolutionary synthesis), uwzględniająca bardziej złożone interakcje między genomami, komórkami a środowiskiem, umożliwia ponowną ocenę wielu założeń NDMS. Do standardowego paradygmatu zakładającego, że głównym mechanizmem zmienności biologicznej jest powolna kumulacja losowych mutacji punktowych, należy teraz dołączyć nowe dane oraz koncepcje symbiozy, duplikacji genu, horyzontalnego transferu genów, retrotranspozycji, epigenetycznych sieci kontrolnych, tworzenia nisz, mutacji warunkowanych środowiskowo i wielkoskalowej reinżynierii genomu w odpowiedzi na bodźce środowiskowe. Otwarcie myśli ewolucjonistycznej na szersze i bardziej ekscytujące spojrzenie na wielką teorię Darwina może nieść konsekwencje dla wiary chrześcijańskiej.

Between Teleophilia and Teleophobia

Denis Noble convincingly describes the artifacts of theory building in the Modern Synthesis as having been surpassed by the available evidence, indicating more active and less gene-centric evolutionary processes than previously thought. We diagnosis the failure of theory holders to dutifully update their beliefs according to new findings as a microcosm of the prevailing larger social inability to deal with competing paradigms. For understanding life, Noble suggests that there is no privileged level of semiotic interpretation. Understanding multi-level semiosis along with organism and environment contrapunctally, according to Jakob von Uexküll’s theoretical biology, can contribute to the emerging extended evolutionary synthesis.

How Individualized Niches Arise: Mechanisms of Niche Construction, Niche Choice, and Niche Conformance

The debate between the extended evolutionary synthesis (EES) and the modern synthesis (MS) partly relies on different interpretations of niche construction. We dissect the umbrella term of niche construction into three separate mechanisms: niche construction (taken in a narrow sense), in which individuals make changes to the environment; niche choice, in which individuals select an environment; and niche conformance, in which individuals change their phenotypes. Each of these individual-level mechanisms affects an individual’s phenotype-environment match, its fitness, and its individualized niche, defined in terms of the environmental conditions under which an individual can survive and reproduce. Our conceptual framework distinguishes several ways in which individuals alter the selective regimes that they and other organisms experience. It also places clear emphasis on individual differences and construes niche construction and other processes as evolved mechanisms. We therefore argue that our framework helps to resolve the tensions between EES and MS.

Interpreting the History of Evolutionary Biology through a Kuhnian Prism: Sense or Nonsense?

Traditionally, Thomas S. Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962) is largely identified with his analysis of the structure of scientific revolutions. Here, we contribute to a minority tradition in the Kuhn literature by interpreting the history of evolutionary biology through the prism of the entire historical developmental model of sciences that he elaborates in The Structure. This research not only reveals a certain match between this model and the history of evolutionary biology but, more importantly, also sheds new light on several episodes in that history, and particularly on the publication of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species (1859), the construction of the modern evolutionary synthesis, the chronic discontent with it, and the latest expression of that discontent, called the extended evolutionary synthesis. Lastly, we also explain why this kind of analysis hasn’t been done before.

Evolution of darwinism. A new evolutionary synthesis: combining evolutionary genetics and development genetics

The results of the synthesis of evolutionary genetics and developmental genetics are presented, the causes of the crisis of evolutionary genetics and ways to overcome it are explained, and the mechanism of speciation of higher organisms is explained.Keywords: new evolutionary synthesis, evolutionary genetics, genetics of ontogenesis, morphogenetic program, developmental genes.

The Information Continuum Hypothesis of Evolution

Life is information dancing through time, embedded in matter and shaped by natural selection. Few biologists or philosophers concerned with evolution would object to this description. This apparent accord could be taken to indicate universal agreement on the forces shaping evolution; but the devil is in the details and disagreement is apparent if one looks behind the curtain. The decade strong prevalent paradigm of the Modern Synthesis holds the position that evolution happens by random changes and natural selection acting on genomic inheritance. But there is a new kid on the block; the proponents of an Extended Evolutionary Synthesis argue that inheritance is more than genomes and includes epigenetic information, niche constructs (ranging from the meerkats dens to humans railroads) and culture among other factors – and that these factors are both inheritance and a force shaping evolution. Here we introduce The Information Continuum Hypothesis of Evolution; a conceptual framework that focus on the inherited information rather than the diverse representations this inherited information may have (DNA, RNA, epigenetic markers, proteins, culture etc.). As a tool we introduce the concept “hereditome” to describe the combined inherited representations of information. We believe this framework may help bridge the apparent gap between the Modern Synthesis and the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis.

Theoretical plurality, the extended evolutionary synthesis, and archaeology

The study of cultural evolution now includes multiple theoretical frameworks. Despite common influence from Darwinian evolutionary theory, there is considerable diversity. Thus, we recognize those most influenced by the tenets of the Modern Synthesis (evolutionary archaeology, cultural transmission theory, and human behavioral ecology) and those most aligned more closely with concepts emerging in the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis (cultural macroevolution and evolutionary cognitive archaeology). There has been substantial debate between adherents of these schools of thought as to their appropriateness and priority for addressing the fundamentals of cultural evolution. I argue that theoretical diversity is necessary to address research questions arising from a complex archaeological record. Concepts associated with the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis may offer unique insights into the cultural evolutionary process.