Multilevel Selection and the Major Transitions in Evolution

A number of recent biologists have used multilevel selection theory to help explain the major transitions in evolution. I argue that in doing so, they have shifted from a ‘synchronic’ to a ‘diachronic’ formulation of the levels of selection question. The implications of this shift in perspective are explored, in relation to an ambiguity in the meaning of multilevel selection. Though the ambiguity is well‐known, it has never before been discussed in the context of the major transitions.

[1]  E. Szathmáry,et al.  Group selection of early replicators and the origin of life. , 1987, Journal of theoretical biology.

[2]  Samir Okasha,et al.  Why Won't the Group Selection Controversy Go Away? , 2001, The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science.

[3]  Elisabeth S. Vrba,et al.  What is Species Selection , 1984 .

[4]  L. Buss,et al.  The evolution of individuality , 1987 .

[5]  I. L. Heisler,et al.  Alternative formulations of multilevel selection , 1988 .

[6]  G. Price.  The nature of selection , 1995 .

[7]  J. Griesemer.  The Units of Evolutionary Transition , 2001 .

[8]  Eörs Szathmáry,et al.  The Major Transitions in Evolution , 1997 .

[9]  R. Michod,et al.  On the Reorganization of Fitness During Evolutionary Transitions in Individuality1 , 2003, Integrative and comparative biology.

[10]  R. Lewontin.  ‘The Selfish Gene’ , 1977, Nature.

[11]  Rom Harré,et al.  The Philosophy of evolution , 1981 .

[12]  R E Michod,et al.  Mutation, Multilevel Selection, and the Evolution of Propagule Size during the Origin of Multicellularity , 2001, The American Naturalist.

[13]  Stephen Jay Gould,et al.  The hierarchical expansion of sorting and selection: sorting and selection cannot be equated , 1986, Paleobiology.

[14]  Kurt M. Fristrup,et al.  The Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection: A Hierarchical Expansion , 1982, Paleobiology.

[15]  Samir Okasha,et al.  MULTILEVEL SELECTION AND THE PARTITIONING OF COVARIANCE: A COMPARISON OF THREE APPROACHES , 2004, Evolution; international journal of organic evolution.

[16]  Richard E. Michod,et al.  Cooperation and Conflict in the Evolution of Individuality. I. Multilevel Selection of the Organism , 1997, The American Naturalist.

[17]  R. Dawkins.  The Extended Phenotype , 1982 .

[18]  D. Wilson.  A theory of group selection. , 1975, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[19]  S. Siller.  Foundations of Social Evolution , 1999, Heredity.