Sociobiology: The New Synthesis
 |
|
| Author | Edward O. Wilson |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Subject | Sociobiology |
| Publisher | Harvard University Press |
|
Publication date
|
1975 |
| Pages | 697 |
| ISBN | |
| OCLC | 42289674 |
| 591.56 21 | |
| LC Class | QL775 .W54 2000 |
| Preceded by | The Insect Societies |
| Followed by | On Human Nature |
Sociobiology: The New Synthesis (1975; 25th anniversary edition 2000) is a book by E. O. Wilson that helped start the sociobiology debate, one of the great scientific controversies in biology of the 20th century (see Criticism of evolutionary psychology). Wilson popularized the term "sociobiology" as an attempt to explain the evolutionary mechanics behind social behaviour such as altruism, aggression, and the nurturing of the young. It formed a position within the long-running nature versus nurture debate. The fundamental principle guiding sociobiology is that an organism's evolutionary success is measured by the extent to which its genes are represented in the next generation.
The book was generally well reviewed in biological journals. It received a much more mixed reaction among sociologists, mainly triggered by the brief coverage of the implications of sociobiology for human society in the first and last chapters of the book.
The book was first published in 1975. It has been reprinted at least 14 times up to 2014. It has been translated into languages including Chinese, Japanese, and Spanish. An abridged edition was published in 1980.
The book is illustrated with 31 halftone figures, 209 line drawings by Sarah Landry, and 43 tables.
Wilson summarizes the concepts of population genetics, a branch of evolutionary theory combining Mendelian genetics and natural selection in mathematical form to explain the pressures on animal societies. In particular, altruism, self-sacrificing behaviour, would die out unless something such as kin or group selection maintains it.
...
Wikipedia