Holistic Darwinism: Synergy, Cybernetics, and the Bioeconomics of Evolution

"This is an exceptionally ambitious and important book that proposes to change the way most of us have thought about 'Darwinism' and evolutionary processes. Corning achieves this goal in many ways, but most effectively by integrating both his own diverse work in recent years and citation of just about everyone who has played a major role in scholarly dialogue on evolutionary biology and behavior over the last generation." - Roger D. Masters. Dartmouth College"

In recent years, evolutionary theorists have come to recognize that the reductionist, individualist, gene-centered approach to evolution cannot sufficiently account for the emergence of complex biological systems over time. Peter A. Corning has been at the forefront of a new generation of complexity theorists who have been working to reshape the foundations of evolutionary theory. Well known for his Synergism Hypothesis - a theory of complexity in evolution that assigns a key causal role to various forms of functional synergy - Corning puts this theory into a much broader framework in "Holistic Darwinism", addressing many of the issues and concepts associated with the evolution of complex systems. Corning's paradigm embraces and integrates many related theoretical developments of recent years, from multilevel selection theory to niche construction theory, gene-culture coevolution theory, and theories of self-organization. Offering new approaches to thermodynamics, information theory, and economic analysis, Corning suggests how all of these domains can be brought firmly within what he characterizes as a postneo-Darwinian evolutionary synthesis.