Holistic Darwinism

Citation

Corning, P.A. (2006), "Holistic Darwinism", Kybernetes, Vol. 35 No. 7/8, pp. 1302-1303. https://doi.org/10.1108/03684920610675346

This book is written by Peter A. Corning who is director of the Institute for the Study of Complex Systems. He is also the author of “The Synergism Hypothesis and Nature's Magic” among other books.

The publishers write that:

In recent years evolutionary theorists have come to recognise that the reductionist, individualist, gene‐centred approach to evolution cannot sufficiently account for the emergence of complex biological systems over time … Corning's paradigm embraces and integrates many related theoretical developments of recent years, from multilevel selection theory to niche construction theory, gene‐culture coevolution, and theories of self‐organisation.

There is a determined effort to include new initiatives in such fields as information theory, economic analysis and thermodynamics.

The author's aim is to show how all these domains can be linked together in what he describes as a “post‐neo‐Darwinian evolutionary synthesis”.

The book has an Introduction followed by four parts:

1. 1.

   synergy and evolution: from the origins of life to global governance;

2. 2.

   bioeconomics and evolution;

3. 3.

   from thermodynamics and information theory to thermodynamics and control information; and

4. 4.

   evolution and ethics.

Notes, references and an index are also included. More information about the text can be obtained from the University of Chicago Press (Tel: US 773‐702‐7740 or e‐mail: sxh@press.uchicago.edu. A full review of this important book will also be included in later issues of this journal.