That Whole Inclusive Fitness Thing
Back in August of last year, Nature published a paper by Nowak, Tarnita and Wilson – that third author, Wilson, is E.O. — entitled “The evolution of eusociality.” It generated a bit of stir when it was published, and now Nature published a reply to this article – five replies, actually – the first of which was co-authored (maybe “signed” is better here?) by 150 or so people defending inclusive fitness theory.
The blogosphere has been buzzing about all this, and there are plenty of opinions to sample, so I’ll just suggest a look at a post by Jerry Coyne, who does a good job of summarizing the debate in his blog. He also posted another interesting item following that, featuring a little piece that Richard Dawkins wrote about the whole thing. (Dawkins also seems to be commenting on the blog.)
And David Sloan Wilson had some remarks as well…
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