Search results for "Evolutionary Theory"
showing 10 items of 35 documents
Theoretical Biology and Evolutionary Theory
2015
During the nineteen-sixties and seventies, several biologists made decisive contributions to the development of evolutionary thought and theoretical biology, smoothly bridging the gap between science and humanities, and overcoming the classic antagonism Snow claimed to exist between the two worlds. Scientists like Jacob , Lorenz , Monod , Rensch , von Bertalanffy or Waddington , to whom I pay homage here, are a select group of scientists pertaining to the so-called third culture, who have staged a scientific assault on Natural Philosophy—the forerunners of subsequent science popularisers such as Dawkins , Gould , Penrose , Gell-Mann or Pinker . Finally I call for a more detailed study of th…
New insigths relating to the beginning of the Neolithic in the eastern Spain: Evaluating empirical data and modelled predictions
2018
Abstract In this paper we present recent research concerning the neolithization process in the East of Spain, evaluating the time span between the last hunther-gatherer groups and the first farmers ( c . 5950–5150 cal. BC). To do that we have compiled and filtered current information about radiocarbon dates and sites in order to discuss the state of the art relating to the models used to explain the Neolithic spread in the region. In this sense we compare archaeological data with recent results of virtual model (ABM) in accordance with the scenarios and mechanisms proposed. On this basis we evaluate the empirical data relating to the current model for explaining the Neolithic spread at the …
Predictors of enhancing human physical attractiveness: Data from 93 countries
2022
People across the world and throughout history have gone to great lengths to enhance their physical appearance. Evolutionary psychologists and ethologists have largely attempted to explain this phenomenon via mating preferences and strategies. Here, we test one of the most popular evolutionary hypotheses for beauty-enhancing behaviors, drawn from mating market and parasite stress perspectives, in a large cross-cultural sample. We also test hypotheses drawn from other influential and non-mutually exclusive theoretical frameworks, from biosocial role theory to a cultural media perspective. Survey data from 93,158 human participants across 93 countries provide evidence that behaviors such as a…
Historia breve de las contribuciones evolucionistas a la Filosofía Biológica predarwinista: desde la Edad Media hasta Darwin
2010
ResumenEl artículo presenta una sucinta exposición de las principales aportaciones sobre Filosofía Biológica realizadas por diversos autores al desarrollo del pensamiento evolucionista, durante el período histórico transcurrido entre el medievo y la articulación de la teoría darwinista. En particular, expone las contribuciones de diversa índole realizadas por Andrés Vesalio, Andrew Battell, Jacobo Bondt, Nicolás Tulp, Edward Tyson, John Ray, Benoit de Maillet, Pierre Louis Moreau de Maupertuis, Karl von Linneo, Georges Louis Leclerc, Félix de Azara y Jean Baptiste Lamarck.Palabras claveHistoria de la ciencia, historia de la filosofía biológica, evolucionismo predarwinista, orígenes de la pr…
«Evo-devo meets the Mind». La questione dell’esperienza estetica e l’evoluzionismo contemporaneo, dall’ipotesi degli adattamenti modulari all’interpr…
2013
Is it achievable to read aesthetic experience as a modular adaptation, and what would be its implication on the image of man, on aesthetics and on evolutionary theory itself? An alternative path is offered by evolutionary morphology, starting from the elaboration of a biologic concept of organism and from the notion of homology of function as a system of interconnections organized in a hierarchy. We deduce the possibility of thinking the peculiar innovation of aesthetic experience in an evolutionary way.
Predictors of enhancing human physical attractiveness: Data from 93 countries
2022
People across the world and throughout history have gone to great lengths to enhance their physical appearance. Evolutionary psychologists and ethologists have largely attempted to explain this phenomenon via mating preferences and strategies. Here, we test one of the most popular evolutionary hypotheses for beauty-enhancing behaviors, drawn from mating market and parasite stress perspectives, in a large cross-cultural sample. We also test hypotheses drawn from other influential and non-mutually exclusive theoretical frameworks, from biosocial role theory to a cultural media perspective. Survey data from 93,158 human participants across 93 countries provide evidence that behaviors such as a…
The Principle of Stasis: Why drift is not a Zero-Cause Law
2016
This paper analyses the structure of evolutionary theory as a quasi-Newtonian theory and the need to establish a Zero-Cause Law. Several authors have postulated that the special character of drift is because it is the default behaviour or Zero-Cause Law of evolutionary systems, where change and not stasis is the normal state of them. For these authors, drift would be a Zero-Cause Law, the default behaviour and therefore a constituent assumption impossible to change without changing the system. I defend that drift's causal and explanatory power prevents it from being considered as a Zero-Cause Law. Instead, I propose that the default behaviour of evolutionary systems is what I call the Princ…
Global organizations and supply chain: new research avenues in the international human resource management
2014
Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to aim at proposing a research agenda in the intersection of strategic supply chain management and logistics (SCML) of global organizations from the perspective of international human resource management (IHRM).Design/methodology/approach– To disclose the intellectual structure of research to date across both fields, the content of up to 280 articles dealing with IHRM and 174 papers addressing challenges in SCML in global organizations from a human resource management (HRM) viewpoint were analyzed. A stepwise hierarchical cluster and discriminant analysis were conducted to map a joint research agenda. Approaches from Upper Echelons theory and Co-Evoluti…
Evolutionary theory: it's on the school syllabus in Mexico
2008
Bateman gradients from first principles
2022
In 1948, Angus Bateman presented experiments and concepts that remain influential and debated in sexual selection. The Bateman gradient relates reproductive success to mate number, and Bateman presented this as the cause of intra-masculine selection. A deeper causal level was subsequently asserted: that the ultimate cause of sex differences in Bateman gradients is the sex difference in gamete numbers, an argument that remains controversial and without mathematical backup. Here I develop models showing how asymmetry in gamete numbers alone can generate steeper Bateman gradients in males. This conclusion remains when the further asymmetry of internal fertilisation is added to the model and fe…