Sex Reproduction And Darwinism

This collection of essays looks at sexuality and reproduction from an evolutionary perspective. Covering experimental discoveries as well as theoretical investigations, the volume explores the relationship between evolution and other areas of human behaviour.

Darwinism is one of the most successful scientific theories, and its validity is largely unquestioned within the scientific community. Most criticism comes from creationist streams of thought, and primarily focuses on aspects of improbability, such as on the alleged improbability of the origin of life, or of accidental mutations and natural selection yielding the astonishing complexity of living beings. In this work, a new criticism of the theory of natural selection is introduced. Its aim is to show that a salient characteristic of living beings, sexual reproduction, defies Darwinism, and not based on an improbability, but on an impossibility of explanation. Moreover, it is a critique that does not endorse creationism, but demands that the discussion about the explanation of organic phenomena should be held in a much broader philosophical context.

Darwins Secret Sex Problem What Darwin Ignored . . . For all his revolutionary insight into the fascinating processes of evolution so useful to current scientific research, health care, and technology, Darwin never seriously confronted the crucial, insurmountable gap in his grand theory between asexual replication and sexual reproduction. Nor could Darwins famed natural selection have provided simultaneous on-time delivery of the first male/female pair of millions of sexually unique species required for evolutions bedrock premise of common descenta fundamental flaw fatal to the romanticized microbe-to-man Evolution Story. Darwins Secret Sex Problem is a witty, engaging, scientifically sound exploration of perhaps the greatest secret of sexualitythe utter inability of Darwinian evolution to explain its origin (John E. Silvius, PhD, Senior Professor Emeritus of Biology, Cedarville University). I highly recommend this book by F. LaGard Smith, a nonspecialist whose careful research demonstrates that he understands the crucial issues surrounding evolutions fatal sex problem, and who has a remarkable ability to communicate complex concepts to a broad audience (Geoff Barnard, PhD, MA, retired Reproductive Endocrinologist and Cambridge University Research Scientist).

Just over one hundred and thirty years ago Charles Darwin, in The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex (1871), developed remarkably accurate conclusions about man's ancestry, based on a review of general comparative anatomy and psychology in which he regarded sexual selection as a necessary part of the evolutionary process. But the attention of biologists turned to the more general concept of natural selection, in which sexual selection plays a complex role that has been little understood. This volume significantly broadens the scope of modern evolutionary biology by looking at this important and long neglected concept of great importance. In this book, which is the first full discussion of sexual selection since 1871, leading biologists bring modern genetic theory and behavior observation to bear on the subject. The distinguished authors consider many aspects of sexual selection in many species, including man, within the context of contemporary evolutionary theory and research. The result is a remarkably original and well-rounded view of the whole concept that will be invaluable especially to students of evolution and human sexual behavior. The lucid authority of the contributors and the importance of the topic will interest all who share in man's perennial fascination with his own history. The book will be of central importance to a wide variety of professionals, including biologists, anthropologists, and geneticists. It will be an invaluable supplementary text for courses in vertebrate biology, theory of evolution, genetics, and physical anthropology. It is especially important with the emergence of alternative explanations of human development, under the rubric of creationism and doctrines of intelligent design.

In the current resurgence of interest in the biological basis of animal behavior and social organization, the ideas and questions pursued by Charles Darwin remain fresh and insightful. This is especially true of The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex, Darwin's second most important work. This edition is a facsimile reprint of the first printing of the first edition (1871), not previously available in paperback. The work is divided into two parts. Part One marshals behavioral and morphological evidence to argue that humans evolved from other animals. Darwin shoes that human mental and emotional capacities, far from making human beings unique, are evidence of an animal origin and evolutionary development. Part Two is an extended discussion of the differences between the sexes of many species and how they arose as a result of selection. Here Darwin lays the foundation for much contemporary research by arguing that many characteristics of animals have evolved not in response to the selective pressures exerted by their physical and biological environment, but rather to confer an advantage in sexual competition. These two themes are drawn together in two final chapters on the role of sexual selection in humans. In their Introduction, Professors Bonner and May discuss the place of The Descent in its own time and relation to current work in biology and other disciplines.

The Arthur M. Sackler Colloquia of the National Academy of Sciences address scientific topics of broad and current interest, cutting across the boundaries of traditional disciplines. Each year, four or five such colloquia are scheduled, typically two days in length and international in scope. Colloquia are organized by a member of the Academy, often with the assistance of an organizing committee, and feature presentations by leading scientists in the field and discussions with a hundred or more researchers with an interest in the topic. Colloquia presentations are recorded and posted on the National Academy of Sciences Sackler colloquia website and published on CD-ROM. These Colloquia are made possible by a generous gift from Mrs. Jill Sackler, in memory of her husband, Arthur M. Sackler.

This new book emphasizes how our modern cultures have changed or suppressed the expression of some of our "Stone Age" and genetic sexual and reproductive adaptations. These biological adaptations often can still be found in modern humans, in their original Stone Age form---- or modified to some degree---- In the DNA of our present hunter-gatherer populations. For example, I'll review----with up-to-date research input----- how our maladaptive cultural choices have changed natural breast-feeding into artificial bottle-feeding by many modern women, and the effects of this choice or necessity on child and maternal health. Certainly, most present-day people would not be able to----and probably wouldn't want to----return completely to our hunter-gatherer ways; all I am saying is that we can choose to return to the more natural expression of SOME of our Stone Age reproductive and sexual adaptations. Please Note: a few of the chapters of this new book will contain UPDATED AND MUCH REVISED versions of portions of the "Boxes" in Human Reproductive Biology (2014), by Richard E. Jones and Kristin H. Lopez, with permission previously obtained from Academic Press/Elsevier.