Ewolucja. Twórcza moc selekcji
Evolution. The Creative Power of Selection

Author(s): Jerzy Dzik
Subject(s): Scientific Life
Published by: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego
Keywords: natural selection; selection; speciation; tree of life; altruism; democracy; cultural evolution
Summary/Abstract: An instructive introduction to the theory of evolution and its applications in biology, physics, chemistry, geology and humanities. The author shows that evolution is a physical process, occurring in geological time dimension, describes how the Darwin’s theory of natural selection works in immunology, neurobiology, sociology as well as in certain aspects of culture and political institutions. He also shows the effects achieved through the action of selection in different areas of biological and social life. He discusses such problems as: the ambiguity of the term “theory of evolution”, the falsifiability of evolutionary hypotheses, connection between evolution and thermodynamics, the concept of reductionism, methodological background of phylogenetics, cladistics, evolutionary developmental biology and homeotic genes, as well as the cumulative nature of social and cultural evolution.

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