The Extended Phenotype
By suggesting that individual organisms should be viewed as a single coherent unit, working to maximize their own reproductive success, the author explains that as these organisms are "selfish" they have the capacity to effect the body of another animal, so revolutionizing our views of adaptation.
Stats for nerds
20recommend
46mentions
36people
2008–2026years
61% recommend37% neutral2% critical
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- Not even close. Evolutionary selection pressures don't usually act directly on genetics. Perhaps you are incorrectly attempting to rely on intuition, and over-simplistic phrases like selection pressures. Intuition is incredibly misleading with evolution.
Your pink and blue example is actually a great model to work from. Think about the genes and the expression of those genes, and then think about what is being selected if all the blue animals are eaten.
Or think about what would happen if there was a mountain range, and pink animals were eaten on one side and blue ones were eaten on the other side.
Or think about what if one of the blue fathers has pink polka dots that gave it a 10% better chance of survival.
Always concentrate on watching that genes are passed on by reproduction - getting eaten doesn't have to be a problem if reproduction has already occurred (unless parental investment is needed or you get complicated like kin selection).
I am not a biologist. But 'The Selfish Gene' is one of my favourite books because of the concepts within. Unfortunately I think Dawkins went off the deep end later (with what I thought was religious zeal). The Extended Phenotype is even harder to read, but also worthwhile.
It is a fun topic because many phrases about evolution seem misleadingly about death rather than reproduction. And the meaning of the word evolution is absolutely twisted in everyday conversation. Ignoring the troubles with bible bashers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survival_of_the_fittest - "fittest" has an unobvious meaning.
- Smart people say and do dumb stuff, just like everyone.
It is a logical error to think people are not smart because they do or say things that are not smart.
You show your own biases by your opinions on Americans, and by mentioning money at all.
Dawkins was popular elsewhere.
Personally I had no time for his prosyletising (I just ignored it because I dislike religious politicking).
Every few years I read The Selfish Gene and The Extended Phenotype again. Amazing books: to me they indicate he was very very smart. Evolution is difficult to understand and many people misunderstand even the basics.
- The seminal work is the 1982 book "The Extended Phenotype" by Richard Dawkins.
- Dawkins is not an original researcher. He is wonderful at synthesizing research and writing eloquent popular books.
The importance of The Selfish Gene is to write a correct summary of the neo-Darwinian project. In the future (perhaps even now), it will be more famous for the coining of meme (in an appendix IIRC).
However, The Extended Phenotype is a remarkably original exposition of important (then) contemporary frontiers of Darwinism. It is a powerful idea, powerfully described.
It is certainly his most important original contribution to the literature. And a beautiful book. True and convincing. It will change your view of the world. There is no higher praise.
- Those are all very good questions, and I can't do them justice in an HN comment. But here's a first cut:
> How do you believe the results you are getting? What makes such a belief justified?
Read David Deutsch "The Fabric of Reality" chapter 7.
> What is the nature of consciousness?
Read Daniel Dennett, "Consciousness Explained".
> What are things beautiful? What makes something ascetically pleasing.
Read Richard Dawkins, "The Selfish Gene" (and, if you want to get deep into these weeds, "The Extended Phenotype").
> Why any of this exists at all?
What makes you think that any of this does exist at all?
> What is the purpose of this existence?
What makes you think that this existence has a purpose?
> Is something ethical? Science can provide answer about consequences of an action but cannot determine if said action is moral or ethical.
Read "The Evolution of Cooperation" by Robert Axelrod. (The Selfish Gene addresses this as well.)
> science is not a book of facts.
That's true.
> It is merely a process for testing a hypothesis.
No, it's not "merely" that. It is a process for producing good explanations that account for observations. That turns out to be tremendously powerful.
> It is not a replacement for philosophy, it is underpinned by philosophy.
No, it isn't. The existence of philosophy (and philosophers!) can be explained by science.
- You should read the extended phenotype by Richard Dawkins if you haven't already
Related
The Selfish Gene
220 recommend · 573
The Blind Watchmaker
38 recommend · 78
Biology is technology
2 recommend · 4
The Ancestor's Tale
21 recommend · 28
The Greatest Show on Earth
11 recommend · 28
Molecular Biology of the Cell
49 recommend · 102
2015–2023
Revolutionary Phenotype
recommend · 12
