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This book makes the case that natural selection can do the exact opposite, favouring traits that directly harm an organism's ability to survive and reproduce, by synthesizing evidence from evolution, ecology and genetics to explain how maladaptations are possible, with drastic consequences for our understanding of the design of living things.
List of contents
- 1: Making room for maladaptation
- 2: Natural selection through genetics
- 3: Population ecology of natural selection
- 4: Maladaptation in social behaviour
- 5: Maladaptation within the body
- 6: Maladaptive transitions in complexity
- 7: Deep origins of maladaptation
- 8: Revisiting the design argument
- Appendix: A simple mathematical model of maladaptation
- Bibliography
- Index
About the author
Philip G. Madgwick has a PhD from the University of Bath on social evolution, preceded by a First Class degree in the Biological Sciences from the University of Oxford, with First Class supplementary honours in the History and Philosophy of Science. He was a post-doctoral researcher at Syngenta, UK, funded by the IVCC, working on insecticide resistance management in vector control, before becoming a research scientist at Syngenta, working in the broad areas of the evolution, ecology and genetics of insect control. Philip remains academically active through publications, collaborations and learned societies.
Summary
This book makes the case that natural selection can do the exact opposite, favouring traits that directly harm an organism's ability to survive and reproduce, by synthesizing evidence from evolution, ecology and genetics to explain how maladaptations are possible, with drastic consequences for our understanding of the design of living things.
