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The competitive Darwin

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 April 2016

Hugh Paterson
Hugh Paterson*
Affiliation:
Department of Zoology and Entomology, University of Queensland, St. Lucia, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

Although Darwin was not the first to conceive directional selection as a mechanism of phenotypic change, it is his ideas that were received, and that have shaped population biology to this day. A significant change in his theoretical orientation occurred in the mid-1850s. About then he abandoned environmental selection in favor of competitive selection, and adopted relative adaptation with all its consequences as an alternative. These ideas changed his thinking fundamentally and shaped his argument throughout the writing of his great book. It is still these ideas that predominate today.

Here I examine Darwin's ideas in relation to his principle of divergence, sexual selection, and the nature and origin of species. Finally I suggest that had he not misunderstood the function of sexual communication he might well have understood the nature of species and provided a more penetrating resolution to Herschell's “mystery of mysteries,” with which he opened his book.

Type
Generating Diversity
Information
Paleobiology , Volume 31 , Issue S2 , 2005 , pp. 56 - 76
Copyright
Copyright © The Paleontological Society 

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