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The Structure of Evolutionary Theory |  | Author: Stephen Jay Gould
Publisher: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
Category: Book
List Price: $57.50
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Rating:  50 reviews
Sales Rank: 229564
Media: Hardcover
Pages: 1464
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 5.1
Dimensions (in): 10.2 x 6.7 x 2.7
ISBN: 0674006135
Dewey Decimal Number: 576.8
EAN: 9780674006133
ASIN: 0674006135
Publication Date: March 21, 2002
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Amazon.com Review
The theory of evolution is regarded as one of the greatest glimmerings of understanding humans have ever had. It is an idea of science, not of belief, and therefore undergoes constant scrutiny and testing by argumentative evolutionary biologists. But while Darwinists may disagree on a great many things, they all operate within a (thus far) successful framework of thought first set down in The Origin of Species in 1859. In The Structure of Evolutionary Theory, a monumental labor of academic love, Stephen Jay Gould attempts to define and revise that framework. Using the clear metaphors and personable style he is so well known for, Gould outlines the foundation of the theory and attempts to use it to show that modern evolutionary biology has lost its way. He then offers his own system for reconciling Darwin's "basic logical commitments" with the critiques of modern scientists. Gould's massive opus begs a new look at natural selection with the full weight of history behind it. His opponents will find much to criticize, and orthodox, reductionist Darwinists might feel that Gould has given them short shrift. But as an opening monologue for the new century's biological debates, The Structure of Evolutionary Theory sets a mountainous precedent in exhaustive scholarship, careful logic, and sheer reading pleasure. --Therese Littleton
Product Description
The world's most revered and eloquent interpreter of evolutionary ideas offers here a work of explanatory force unprecedented in our time--a landmark publication, both for its historical sweep and for its scientific vision. With characteristic attention to detail, Stephen Jay Gould first describes the content and discusses the history and origins of the three core commitments of classical Darwinism: that natural selection works on organisms, not genes or species; that it is almost exclusively the mechanism of adaptive evolutionary change; and that these changes are incremental, not drastic. Next, he examines the three critiques that currently challenge this classic Darwinian edifice: that selection operates on multiple levels, from the gene to the group; that evolution proceeds by a variety of mechanisms, not just natural selection; and that causes operating at broader scales, including catastrophes, have figured prominently in the course of evolution. Then, in a stunning tour de force that will likely stimulate discussion and debate for decades, Gould proposes his own system for integrating these classical commitments and contemporary critiques into a new structure of evolutionary thought. In 2001 the Library of Congress named Stephen Jay Gould one of America's eighty-three Living Legends--people who embody the "quintessentially American ideal of individual creativity, conviction, dedication, and exuberance." Each of these qualities finds full expression in this peerless work, the likes of which the scientific world has not seen--and may not see again--for well over a century. Stephen Jay Gould is the Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology at Harvard University and Vincent Astor Visiting Professor of Biology at New York University. A MacArthur Prize Fellow, he has received innumerable honors and awards and has written many books, including Ontogeny and Phylogeny and Time's Arrow, Time's Cycle (both from Harvard).
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Showing reviews 1-5 of 50
 A life's work March 15, 2007
Andrew S. Wollin (Australia)
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
An excellent academic book that covers Gould's life work in detail. It will (or should) become a standard reference for postgraduate students of biological evolution. It is not easy reading but is helped by an excellent table of contents; it summarises the main arguement of the book. My only critisism is that it seems to neglect the work of Simon and Salthe, both of whom have made significant contributions to a heirarchical (multi-level) theory of evolution.
Gould Unplugged February 24, 2006
Matthew Benoit (New Haven, CT USA)
20 out of 23 found this review helpful
This book (Gould's last) is a behemoth. With over 1400 pages, it becomes a physically taxing task to read it. This task is not lessened by the verbiage (and verbosity) that exemplify Gould's style. That being said, this book emcompasses such marvelous theoretical views and includes such a thorough history of evolutionary ideas, that it would be a shame to allow its size and density to prevent you from reading it. Gould spent his entire life pondering the big questions of evolutionary thought, and his ponderings are here revealed with significant insight into the roots of the questions themselves. It is an endeavor to read (as it was a lifetime to write), but the rewards of such an endeavor are innumerable and priceless.
Omits Evolution's astounding feat of social insects December 31, 2005
Maltese Falcon
1 out of 22 found this review helpful
In the weeks I spent poring over this landmark volume I don't recall any explanation of the social insects which have been heavily researched by others in recent years. Societies occur among very few vertebrates and the insects, the world's champs in mimicry including behavior mimicry, a possible clue.
Gould's last work sets the standard for the 21st century February 23, 2005
Charles K. Mackay (Coaldale, PA, United States)
25 out of 33 found this review helpful
Anything and everything by Gould is worth reading. He was aware that he was dying as he finished this book, and it bears the marks of an attempt to cram a lifetime of study and thought into one work. One feels that had he lived longer, the book would have been shorter. The extensive coverage of nearly forgotten figures who represent many examples of one type of opinion is not really necessary to make his points. The reader who is not a specialist will want to do a bit of skimming.
But the length is a minor flaw. The book is an attempt to make all of his conclusions available to both the lay reader and his colleagues. Fundamentalists will read it as a critique of Darwinism; it's not. It represents an extension of Darwin to take into account all that the 20th century revealed about genetics, extinction, cladistics, emergent properties, and astronomical catastrophes. Hopefully it will stand as a monument to empiricism in the face of the new Dark Age that some see coming -- a time when we will forget not only what we knew, bu that we ever knew it.
 Needs a sympathetic rewrite or at least an editor January 24, 2005
Bukkene Bruse (Iowa)
49 out of 71 found this review helpful
I do not recommend you read this book unless you are an academic in the field and need to do so. Although I am unsympathetic with many of the ideas in it, the primary reason for my low rating is that the book was overlong and poorly written where it matters.
I'll start with what I liked about the book. The first chapters were on the history of evolutionary theory, and it is here where Gould's principal strength as a popularizer comes through well. Although these chapters could have been more concise, and they were oriented towards backing Gould's ideas, I enjoyed them for the most part. The last chapters in the modern theory section on the importance of constraint were interesting, though they suffered heavily from Gould's style of discourse. I found the last pages of the book on the importance of contingency to be quite beautiful.
The bulk of the book consisted of the material on punctuated equilibrium and Gould's hierarchy of Darwinian individuals. I had issues with the ideas themselves, but these are a distant second to what I felt about Gould's notion of an argument. Evolutionary biology is not a branch of philosophy and textual analysis should not, as Gould claims, "be pursued more often in scientific discussion." They are not done so, according to him, because of the "philistinistic culture of science." Molecular biology and mathematics are vital components of evolutionary biology, as much and perhaps more so than the incomplete fossil record. Gould gave lip service to molecular biology and much less respect to the now venerable and important discipline of population genetics - except of course when the results from these fields backed up his narrative.
Gould's use of lawyerly argument, where verdict is truth, is the reason why he is rightfully disdained for opening the door to creation "science" in the debate on teaching evolution in schools. By stripping away hard science, and replacing it with metaphors, cartoons, and narratives, Gould took a rigorous theory, based firmly on empirical and deductive facts, and replaced it with a secular creation myth that is open to attack. Although this has made him the darling of what he calls the "literati", it is also what made him a bad scientist. The fact that he addressed modern Darwinism tangentially, chose instead to focus on Darwin's and others Victorian era writings, and rejected ideas because they didn't "feel right," didn't improve his standing with me.
Gould's writing when it came to the science under debate was a nightmare. Intentionally or not, he constructed a complex hierarchy of nested, irrelevant tangents; tangents that were fragments within sentences, which were then tangents within paragraphs, which were in turn tangents within sections, ad nauseam. One of the most frustrating aspects of the book was that he refused to give a clear definition of what he meant by "punctuated equilibrium" until pg 1001: "We locate any revisionary status for punctuated equilibrium in its suggestions about the nature of stasis, and particularly its implications for attributing macroevolutionary phenomena to causes operating on the differential success of species treated as Darwinian individuals. Ordinary speciation remains fully adequate to explain the causes and phenomenology of punctuation." Others, such as Richard Dawkins, have done much on addressing this definition of punctuated equilibrium. My comment here is that it took so long to come to it, and up until this point Gould hinted at saltationist underpinnings to punctuated equilibrium, only to later decry and impugn the integrity of his critics for criticizing these alternative definitions.
My main intellectual criticism was of Gould's hierarchy of Darwinian individuals. I thought this was fine as a phenomenological tool to describe macroevolutionary events, but Gould inverted cause and phenomena to claim that species selection is irreducible to gene or organism selection. His reason why? "Nonlinearities." Along with not knowing what the word "fractal" means, which he used quite a bit to mean either "self-similar" or "scales up", Gould thought "nonlinear" meant "hopelessly complex." His style of argument? Keep repeating the word irreducible until the reader breaks down. Gould was snidely dismissive towards the results of population genetics, but only addressed them directly in a (relatively) brief two page discussion where he claimed that they had to be invalid because population genetics models were able to explain both punctuated equilibrium (stasis followed by rapid change) and his cartoon notion of Victorian gradualism. Since Gould himself was clear that both are evident in the fossil record, it is strength, not a weakness, of a modeling system to be able to explain both.
Although the ideas in the book did not all resonate with me, I would have recommended it if it was more clear and much, much more concise, since the ideas in it are an important part of the current discussion on evolutionary theory. But because of the poor writing in the important scientific parts of the book, and Gould's often unprofessional comments towards critics, I don't think this behemoth of a tome is worth your time.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 50
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