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| Preface | |
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| Acknowledgements | |
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| Brief Contents | |
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| Introduction | |
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| What evolution is about | |
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| Evolution yields striking insights | |
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| Ideas about evolution have a history | |
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| Creationists object to evolution for several reasons | |
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| Ignoring the reality of evolution would be dangerous | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Microevolutionary concepts | |
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| Adaptive evolution | |
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| When is evolution adaptive, and when is it neutral? | |
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| The ordinary causes of selection have extraordinary adaptive consequences | |
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| Natural selection can rapidly produce improbable states | |
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| Adaptations increase reproductive success | |
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| Selection has been demonstrated in natural populations | |
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| When selection is strong evolution can be fast | |
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| The context of selection depends on the thing selected | |
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| Selection to benefit groups at the expense of individuals is unlikely but not impossible | |
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| Four factors can limit adaptation | |
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| Conclusion | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| Neutral evolution | |
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| How do gene frequencies change when there is no selection? | |
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| Why variation in genes may not produce variation in fitness | |
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| Neutral genetic variation experiences random processes | |
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| Genetic drift: the gene-pool model | |
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| Genetic drift is significant in molecular evolution | |
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| Species dynamics resemble genetic dynamics | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| The genetic impact of selection on populations | |
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| Genetic change is a key to understanding evolution | |
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| Genetic systems are sexual or asexual, haploid or diploid | |
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| A brief comment on the role of models in science | |
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| Genetic change in populations under selection | |
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| What population genetics implies for evolutionary biology | |
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| The fitness concept in population genetics | |
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| Quantitative genetic change under selection | |
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| Evolutionary implications of quantitative genetics | |
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| Population and quantitative genetics are being integrated | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| The origin and maintenance of genetic variation | |
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| Without genetic variation, there can be no evolution | |
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| Mutations are the origin of genetic variation | |
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| Rates of mutation | |
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| How random are mutations? | |
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| The effect of recombination on genetic variability | |
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| The amount of genetic variation in natural populations | |
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| Evidence of natural selection from DNA sequence evolution | |
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| Genetic variation is maintained by a balance of forces | |
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| Genetic diversity of complex quantitative traits | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| The importance of development in evolution | |
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| The study of development answers important evolutionary questions | |
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| What happens during development from egg to adult? | |
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| Developmental patterns are associated with phylogeny | |
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| Developmental control genes are lineage-specific toolkits for constructing organisms | |
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| All evolutionary change involves changes in development | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| The expression of variation | |
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| The environmentally induced responses of one genotype produce several phenotypes | |
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| Reaction norms help us to analyze patterns of gene expression | |
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| The genotype-phenotype map has some important general features | |
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| Macro- and microevolution meet in the butterfly wing | |
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| Adaptive plasticity in leaf development is mediated by phytochromes | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| Design by selection for reproductive success | |
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| The evolution of sex | |
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| To be sexual or asexual-that is the question | |
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| Variation in sexual life cycles | |
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| Distribution patterns of sexual reproduction | |
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| Sex has important consequences | |
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| The evolutionary maintenance of sex is a puzzle | |
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| Evidence on the function of sex is scarce but increasing | |
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| A pluralistic explanation of sex may be correct | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| Genomic conflict | |
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| Multilevel selection occurs in a nested hierarchy of replicators | |
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| Genomic conflict may have been a driving force in many evolutionary transitions | |
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| Genomic conflict in sexual and asexual systems | |
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| The cytoplasm is a battleground for genomic conflicts | |
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| Genetic imprinting in mammals-a conflict over reproductive investment? | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| Life histories and sex allocation | |
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| Natural selection is made possible by variation in life-history traits | |
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| To explain life-history evolution, we combine insights from five sources | |
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| The evolution of age and size at maturation | |
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| The evolution of clutch size and reproductive investment | |
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| Lifespans evolve, and so does aging | |
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| How should parents invest in male and female offspring or function? | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| Sexual selection | |
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| Key questions about sexual selection | |
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| Sexual selection explains the existence of costly mating traits | |
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| How did sexual selection originate? | |
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| Organisms compete for mates in contests, scrambles, and endurance rivalries | |
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| Choosing mates can increase fitness, but choice has costs | |
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| There is a great deal of evidence for sexual selection | |
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| What determines the strength of sexual selection? | |
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| Sexual selection in plants involves pollen and pollination | |
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| Sexual selection also occurs in gametes | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| Principles of macroevolution | |
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| Speciation | |
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| Speciation connects micro- to macroevolution | |
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| What is a species? | |
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| Species concepts can be reconciled with species criteria | |
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| Species originate as byproducts of intra-specific evolution | |
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| Reproduction isolation is a criterion of speciation | |
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| Experiments on speciation yield two important results | |
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| Speciation is the birth, extinction the death of a lineage | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| Phylogeny and systematics | |
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| Molecular systematics has yielded surprising insights | |
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| How phylogenetic concepts are defined | |
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| How to build a phylogenetic tree | |
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| The names of groups should reflect relationships | |
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| Important issues in molecular systematics | |
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| The genealogy of genes can differ from the phylogeny of species | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| Comparative methods: trees, maps, and traits | |
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| Putting trees on to maps reveals history | |
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| Plotting traits on to phylogenetic trees reveals their history | |
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| Anole lizards repeatedly evolved similar ecomorphs on different islands | |
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| Species are not independent samples | |
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| General comments on comparative methods | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| The history of life | |
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| Key events in evolution | |
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| The origin of life | |
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| The origin of the genetic code | |
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| The evolution of chromosomes | |
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| Eukaryotes differ from prokaryotes in key organizational features | |
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| The origin of multicellularity | |
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| The evolution of germ line and soma | |
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| Principles involved in key evolutionary events | |
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| The evolution of cooperation | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| Major events in the geological theater | |
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| Organisms and landscapes are historical mosaics | |
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| How has the planet shaped life? | |
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| Mass extinctions repeatedly changed the course of evolution | |
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| Other catastrophes have had dramatic local effects | |
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| How has life shaped the planet? | |
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| Conclusion | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| The fossil record and life's history | |
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| The major eras | |
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| The major radiations | |
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| Groups expanding, vanishing, or gone | |
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| Vanished communities and extraordinary extinct creatures | |
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| Stasis may be selected | |
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| Punctuational change is real but not universal | |
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| Cope's Law-things get bigger-can be explained by either drift or selection | |
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| Evolution does not make progress; it simply continues to operate | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| Integrating micro- and macroevolution | |
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| Coevolution | |
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| Scales of coevolution | |
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| Levels of coevolution | |
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| Principles of coevolution | |
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| Striking outcomes of coevolution-and its absence | |
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| Discussion | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| Human evolution and evolutionary medicine | |
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| The evolution of humans | |
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| How our history has affected health and disease | |
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| How selection shapes virulence and atresia | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| Conclusion and prospect | |
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| Key conclusions about evolution | |
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| Applying evolution to humans remains controversial | |
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| Evolutionary biology focused on genetics and will focus on development | |
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| How are traits fixed? How do constraints evolve? | |
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| Other unsolved problems | |
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| What are the limits to evolutionary prediction? | |
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| It is taking a long time to assimilate Darwin's insights | |
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| Summary | |
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| Recommended Reading | |
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| Questions | |
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| Genetic appendix | |
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| The blueprint of an organism is encoded in DNA molecules | |
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| Transmission of genetic material during cell division | |
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| DNA has a tendency to change by mutation | |
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| The genetic composition of a population | |
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| Glossary | |
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| Answers to questions | |
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| Literature cited | |
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| Index | |