Now on ScienceBlogs: Oldest Human-Made Object in Space
I am an evolutionist who studies all aspects of humanity in addition to the biological world, as I relate in my book Evolution for Everyone: How Darwin's Theory Can Change the Way We Think About Our Lives.
In addition to my academic research, I manage a number of programs and
websites for expanding evolution beyond the biological sciences in
higher education(EvoS),
public policy formulation (The Evolution Institute),
community based research (Binghamton Neighborhood Project)
and the study of religion (Evolutionary Religious Studies).
November 17, 2009
Category: Truth and Reconciliation in Group Selection
We have reached the end of the T&R series. In a truth and reconciliation process, truth is required for reconciliation. There must be a consensus on what happened, even if all wrongs cannot be righted. I have had my say...
Posted by David Sloan Wilson at 4:48 PM • 15 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 13, 2009
Category: Truth and Reconciliation in Group Selection
August 22, 2009. I am at the annual meeting of the European Society for Evolutionary Biology (ESEB) in Turin, Italy. Twelve hundred evolutionists have gathered to strut their stuff and party over a five-day period. I'm here to speak at...
Posted by David Sloan Wilson at 1:01 PM • 6 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 11, 2009
Category: Truth and Reconciliation in Group Selection
John Maynard Smith and Eors Szathmary boldly expanded the symbiotic cell theory of Lynn Margulis to include other major transitions. They were a bit timid in their discussion of human evolution, however, restricting themselves to the genetic basis of language....
Posted by David Sloan Wilson at 11:23 PM • 18 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 9, 2009
Category: Truth and Reconciliation in Group Selection
Just as Brutus was a close companion to Caesar but proved to be his undoing, evolutionary theory seemed to provide a rock-solid foundation for individualism-- until Lynn Margulis came along. Lynn is famous so you might already know her story....
Posted by David Sloan Wilson at 6:09 PM • 28 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 7, 2009
Category: Truth and Reconciliation in Group Selection
In T&R XIV I showed that prejudice against group selection is impervious to evidence from laboratory experiments. It is also impervious to evidence from the wild. I will focus on one of many examples that can be provided. In 1995,...
Posted by David Sloan Wilson at 5:18 PM • 114 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 5, 2009
Category: Truth and Reconciliation in Group Selection
The newest issue of Science Magazine includes a lovely demonstration of multilevel selection by Omar Tonsi Eldakar, my former graduate student, who is currently at the University of Arizona's Center for Insect Science. Readers who have been following my "Truth...
Posted by David Sloan Wilson at 1:21 PM • 33 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Truth and Reconciliation in Group Selection
In the storybook portrayal of science, theories are tested by experiments, which are conducted in laboratories so that the conditions can be rigorously controlled. How would group selection be tested in the laboratory? Let's begin with the thousands of selection...
Posted by David Sloan Wilson at 10:09 AM • 17 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 4, 2009
Category: Truth and Reconciliation in Group Selection
Pity people who become icons. Once they represent an important idea in the minds of others, they can't change their iconic status, even when they change their own minds. Such was the fate of William D. Hamilton, the legendary founder...
Posted by David Sloan Wilson at 9:28 AM • 6 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 3, 2009
Category: Truth and Reconciliation in Group Selection
Meet Athena Aktipis--evolutionist, mother of two, and salsa dance instructor in her spare time. Perhaps it was the dancer in Athena that caused her to teach multilevel selection by having the students get up and move. Each student is given...
Posted by David Sloan Wilson at 3:33 PM • 22 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
November 2, 2009
Category: Truth and Reconciliation in Group Selection
Richard Dawkins did not invent naïve gene selectionism (see T&R X) but he spread it far and wide with the publication of The Selfish Gene. Let's follow his logic, beginning on page 6 of the 1989 paperback edition: This book...
Posted by David Sloan Wilson at 8:23 AM • 29 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Orac 02.14.2012
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