Adaptation and Natural Selection

Adaptation and Natural Selection: A Critique of Some Current Evolutionary Thought is a 1966 book by the American George C. Williams on evolutionary biology. In it, Williams outlines a gene-centric viewpoint of evolution, disparaging group selection and progress. This gene-centric viewpoint was subsequently adopted by the scientific community in the Williams revolution.

The book takes its title from a lecture by George Gaylord Simpson in January 1947 at the University of Princeton.

The concepts were popularised amongst the general public by Richard Dawkin 's 1976 book The Selfish Gene.

Contents

• • Preface

1. Introduction 3
2. Natural Selection, Adaptation, and Progress 20
3. Natural Selection, Ecology and Morphogenesis 56
4. Group Selection 92
5. Adaptations of the Genetic System 125
6. Reproductive Physiology and Behavior 158
7. Social Adaptations 193
8. Other Supposedly Group-Related Adaptations 221
9. The Scientific Study of Adaptation 251

• • Literature Cited 275
  • Index 291

References

• 1996 edition ISBN 0-691-02615-7

External links

• http://pup.princeton.edu/titles/558.html
• http://cogweb.ucla.edu/Abstracts/Williams_66.html