The organising principle of the entire domain.
14 topics · 18 curated works
No prior grounding assumed.
Tree Thinking: An Introduction to Phylogenetic Biology
David A. Baum & Stacey D. Smith · 2012
Teaches phylogenetic trees as the basic vocabulary of comparative biology, and shows how routinely they are misread by people trained to read a…
Assumes you know the vocabulary.
On the Origin of Species
Charles Darwin · 1859
Descent with modification through natural selection accounts for the diversity and design of living things without a designer.
+4 more at this level
Primary sources and full treatments.
Evolution in Mendelian Populations
Sewall Wright · 1931
Shows that in small populations random sampling of gametes can shift allele frequencies independently of selection, and proposes that drift and…
+11 more at this level
12 of 18 works
David A. Baum & Stacey D. Smith
Teaches phylogenetic trees as the basic vocabulary of comparative biology, and shows how routinely they are misread by people trained to read a ladder instead of a branching diagram.
Charles Darwin
Descent with modification through natural selection accounts for the diversity and design of living things without a designer.
Assumes no biology, only stamina — the argument is cumulative and the evidence arrives slowly, on purpose
about 10 hours to readlink checked 17 Sept 2026Notes on this copyCharles Darwin
Proposes that traits costly or even harmful to survival can still spread if they increase an individual's success in securing mates, a second engine of evolution distinct from natural selection.
about 21 hours to readlink checked 17 Sept 2026Notes on this copyStephen Jay Gould & Richard C. Lewontin
Warns that biologists routinely invent an adaptive story for any trait rather than testing whether it is a byproduct of development or architecture, like the spandrels forced by a dome on arches.
link checked 17 Sept 2026Notes on this copyMartin A. Nowak
Sets out five distinct mechanisms - kin selection, direct and indirect reciprocity, network reciprocity and group selection - by which cooperation can be favoured despite its cost to the cooperator.
link checked 17 Sept 2026Notes on this copyStephen C. Stearns (YaleCourses)
Treats natural selection as a quantitative claim about differential reproduction, then derives life-history trade-offs, sex and social behaviour from it rather than describing them separately.
link checked 17 Sept 2026Notes on this copySewall Wright
Shows that in small populations random sampling of gametes can shift allele frequencies independently of selection, and proposes that drift and selection interact across subdivided populations.
link checked 17 Sept 2026Notes on this copyErnst Mayr
Defines species by reproductive isolation rather than morphology, and argues geographic isolation of populations is the ordinary route to a new one.
Notes on this copyPaul R. Ehrlich & Peter H. Raven
Proposes that reciprocal selection between butterflies and the plants they eat drives both groups' diversification, coining the term coevolution for the pattern.
George C. Williams
Argues natural selection acts on individual organisms, not groups or species, and that adaptation should never be invoked beyond what selection at the individual level can actually produce.
Notes on this copyMotoo Kimura
Argues most substitutions observed at the molecular level are selectively neutral and fixed by genetic drift, not natural selection, because the rate is too high and too clock-like for selection to explain.
link checked 17 Sept 2026Notes on this copyJohn Maynard Smith & George R. Price
Shows why animal contests are usually settled by ritual display rather than lethal force, by defining an evolutionarily stable strategy that cannot be invaded once it is common.
link checked 17 Sept 2026Notes on this copy