Permanent Evolution


Book Description

Yuri Tynianov was a key figure of Russian Formalism, an intellectual movement in early 20th century Russia that also included Viktor Shklovsky and Roman Jakobson. Tynianov developed a groundbreaking conceptualization of literature as a system within—and in constant interaction with—other cultural and social systems. His essays on Russian literary classics, like Pushkin’s Eugene Onegin and works by Dostoevsky and Gogol, as well as on the emerging art form of filmmaking, provide insight into the ways art and literature evolve and adapt new forms of expression. Although Tynianov was first a scholar of Russian literature, his ideas transcend the boundaries of any one genre or national tradition. Permanent Evolution gathers together for the first time Tynianov’s seminal articles on literary theory and film, including several articles never before translated into English.




The Science of Life and Evolution


Book Description

This book talks about the scientific processes involved with the matter of our being and how we are evolved, as are all species when their DNA molecules react to the effects of their incoming environment and are dealt with. Some billions of years ago, DNA molecules not only came into being in the right conditionsincluding the presence of five elements (hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, carbon, and phosphorous) and a moist environment when an enzyme-assisted chemical process resulted in them becoming established, but additionally, they were activated by the damaging effects of incoming environmental-related energy pulses causing a vibrational response to occur. (The physical phenomenon of vibration and resonance is the most common in the universe.) The DNA molecules suffered controlled physical damage during this process, but by a hit-and-miss replacement procedure, they were and are adapted by way of adjustments to the individual coding of the DNA nucleotide pairs making up the molecule, which eventually becomes part of the gene, resulting in an electrical-generation force-field activated output (protein, hormones, etc.) being initiated from the cells that resulted in the protection of the DNA molecules from the incoming environmental energy pulse impacts but also resulted in these protective outputs from the cells becoming the physical attributes of the species that allow it, the specimen, to survive in its particular environment. Eukaryotic, multicell species developed when a single cell, prokaryotic species invaded another that had been invaded by a single mitochondria cell that was adept at reducing sugar molecules and releasing energy pulses and energy that was available for the combined cells utilisation. These combined cells with energy pulses and energy available twenty-four hours a day for processes then took off. With an understanding of physics, electrical engineering, etc., it became possible to establish the functioning of cells, differentiation of cells, etc., and with that the causes of genetic problems such as cancer development, MS, diabetes, etc. A similar record-based process results in the brain glia cells utilising junk DNA nucleotide pairs to guide mental reactions, leading to survival in the environment. The question then is we survive but what are we?




Evolution Reloaded


Book Description

Every conscious person on the earth is curious to know how the species of human beings along with other living systems as well as the whole universe came into existence. The theory of Darwin which ignited the imaginations of many generations of thinking people all over the world even to this day is no more than a hypothesis, except for the concept of speciation which can be a working principle to understand about minor changes that a species undergoes over a period of time. In this new theory of evolution, in what can be called as a syncretism of the ideas of the East and the West, the author takes a convincing turn from the realm of external attributes or the form of an organism to the realm of internal attributes or the life of an organism to unfurl a new hypothesis which can give more logical answers to the mysteries of evolution.




Reticulate Evolution


Book Description

Written for non-experts, this volume introduces the mechanisms that underlie reticulate evolution. Chapters are either accompanied with glossaries that explain new terminology or timelines that position pioneering scholars and their major discoveries in their historical contexts. The contributing authors outline the history and original context of discovery of symbiosis, symbiogenesis, lateral gene transfer, hybridization or divergence with gene flow and infectious heredity. By applying key insights from the areas of molecular (phylo)genetics, microbiology, virology, ecology, systematics, immunology, epidemiology and computational science, they demonstrate how reticulate evolution impacts successful survival, fitness and speciation. Reticulate evolution brings forth a challenge to the standard Neo-Darwinian framework, which defines life as the outcome of bifurcation and ramification patterns brought forth by the vertical mechanism of natural selection. Reticulate evolution puts forward a pattern in the tree of life that is characterized by horizontal mergings and lineage crossings induced by symbiosis, symbiogenesis, lateral gene transfer, hybridization or divergence with gene flow and infective heredity, making the “tree of life” look more like a “web of life.” On an epistemological level, the various means by which hereditary material can be transferred horizontally challenges our classic notions of units and levels of evolution, fitness, modes of transmission, linearity, communities and biological individuality. The case studies presented examine topics including the origin of the eukaryotic cell and its organelles through symbiogenesis; the origin of algae through primary and secondary symbiosis and dinoflagellates through tertiary symbiosis; the superorganism and holobiont as units of evolution; how endosymbiosis induces speciation in multicellular life forms; transferrable and non-transferrable plasmids and how they symbiotically interact with their host; the means by which pro- and eukaryotic organisms transfer genes laterally (bacterial transformation, transduction and conjugation as well as transposons and other mobile genetic elements); hybridization and divergence with gene flow in sexually-reproducing individuals; current (human) microbiome and viriome studies that impact our knowledge concerning the evolution of organismal health and acquired immunity; and how symbiosis and symbiogenesis can be modelled in computational evolution.




Pillars of Evolution


Book Description

Pillars of Evolution provides a fresh and provocative perspective on adaptive evolution. Readers new to the study of evolution will find a refreshing new insight that establishes evolutionary biology as a rigorous and predictive science, whilst practicing biologists will discover a provocative book that challenges traditional approaches. The book begins by leading readers through the mechanics of heredity, reproduction, movement, survival, and development. With that framework in place, it then explores the numerous ways that traits emerge from the interactions between genetics, development, and the environment. The key message is that adaptive changes in traits (and their underlying allelic frequencies) evolve through the traits' functions and their connection with fitness. The complex mappings from genes-to-traits-to-fitness are characterized in the structure of evolution. A single "structure matrix" describes why individuals vary in the values of adaptive traits, their ability to perform the function of those traits, and in the fitness they accrue. Fitness depends on how organisms interact with and perceive their environment in time and space. These relationships are made explicit in spatial, temporal, and organizational scale that also sets the stage for the crucially important role that ecology always plays in evolution. The ecological hallmarks of density- and frequency-dependent interactions allow the authors to explore new and exciting insights into evolution's dynamics. The theories and principles are then brought together in a final synthesis on adaptation. The book's unique approach unites genetic, development, and environmental influences into a single comprehensive treatment of the eco-evolutionary process.




Knowledge and Technological Development Effects on Organizational and Social Structures


Book Description

As the growing relationship between individuals and technology continue to play a vital role in our society and work place, the progress and execution of information technology communication systems is important in maintaining our current way of life. Knowledge and Technological Development Effects on Organizational and Social Structures provides a wide ranging discussion on the exchanging of research ideas and practices in an effort to bring together the social and technical aspects within organizations and society. This collection focuses on new ideas and studies for research, students, and practitioners.




Evolution's First Philosopher


Book Description

John Dewey was the first philosopher to recognize that Darwin's thesis about natural selection not only required us to change how we think about ourselves and the life forms around us, but also required a markedly different approach to philosophy. Evolution's First Philosopher shows how Dewey's arguments arose from his recognition of the continuity of natural selection and mindedness, from which he developed his concept of growth. Growth, for Dewey, has no end beyond itself and forms the basis of a naturalized theory of ethics. While other philosophers gave some attention to evolutionary theory, it was Dewey alone who saw that Darwinism provides the basis for a naturalized theory of meaning. This, in turn, portends a new account of knowledge, ethics, and democracy. To clarify evolution's conception of natural selection, Jerome A. Popp looks at brain science and examines the relationship between the genome and experience in terms of the contemporary concepts of preparedness and plasticity. This research shows how comprehensive and penetrating Dewey's thought was in terms of further consequences for the philosophical method entailed by Darwin's thesis. Dewey's foresight is further legitimated when Popp places his work within the context of the current thought of Daniel Dennett.




Evolution-Revolution


Book Description

Originally published in 1971 Evolution – Revolution is an interdisciplinary volume examining inquiry around the central topic of evolution and revolution. Containing contributions from a number of eminent academics of the time, the book addresses the meaning and application of evolution and revolution in the context, not of what things are, or even how they behave, but how they become. The broad interdisciplinary range of essays explores this concept through the idea of development and change and argues that both change, and development must be measured against concepts of flux and that which endures. The editors of the book suggest that these are the ‘invariants’ which contemporary thinkers are beginning to accept as the process-counterparts of Platonic ‘immutables’. Thus this volume examines the two ‘immutables’ of evolution and revolution. The book covers the concept through essays in science, philosophic concepts of rationalism and existentialism, art and religion.




The Evolution of Personality and Individual Differences


Book Description

Capturing a scientific change in thinking about personality and individual differences, this volume provides theories and empirical evidence which suggest that personality and individual differences are central to evolved psychological mechanisms and behavioural functioning.




Developmental Approaches to Human Evolution


Book Description

Developmental Approaches to Human Evolution encapsulates the current state of evolutionary developmental anthropology. This emerging scientific field applies tools and approaches from modern developmental biology to understand the role of genetic and developmental processes in driving morphological and cognitive evolution in humans, non-human primates and in the laboratory organisms used to model these changes. Featuring contributions from well-established pioneers and emerging leaders, this volume is designed to build research momentum and catalyze future innovation in this burgeoning field. The book’s broad research scope encompasses soft and hard tissues of the head and body, including the skeleton, special senses and the brain. Developmental Approaches to Human Evolution is an invaluable resource on the mechanisms of primate and vertebrate evolution for scholars across a wide array of intersecting disciplines, including primatology, paleoanthropology, vertebrate morphology, evolutionary developmental biology and health sciences.