Department of Philosophy, Boston University, Boston, Massachusetts.
School of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Bordeaux/University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia.
J Exp Zool B Mol Dev Evol. 2019 Dec;332(8):321-330. doi: 10.1002/jez.b.22898. Epub 2019 Sep 18.
Identifying and theorizing major turning points in the history of life generates insights into not only world-changing evolutionary events but also the processes that bring these events about. In his treatment of these issues, Bonner identifies the evolution of sex, multicellularity, and nervous systems as enabling the "evolution of evolution," which involves fundamental transformations in how evolution occurs. By contextualizing his framework within two decades of theorizing about major transitions in evolution, we identify some basic problems that Bonner's theory shares with much of the prevailing literature. These problems include implicit progressivism, theoretical disunity, and a limited ability to explain major evolutionary transformations. We go on to identify events and processes that are neglected by existing views. In contrast with the "vertical" focus on replication, hierarchy, and morphology that preoccupies most of the literature on major transitions, we propose a "horizontal" dimension in which metabolism and microbial innovations play a central explanatory role in understanding the broad-scale organization of life.
确定和理论化生命历史上的重大转折点不仅能深入了解改变世界的进化事件，还能深入了解引发这些事件的过程。在处理这些问题时，邦纳将性、多细胞性和神经系统的进化确定为“进化的进化”的促成因素，这涉及到进化发生方式的根本转变。通过将他的框架置于关于进化重大转变的二十年理论背景中，我们确定了邦纳理论与主流文献的一些基本问题。这些问题包括隐含的进步主义、理论不统一以及解释重大进化转变的能力有限。我们接着确定了现有观点所忽视的事件和过程。与大多数关于重大转变的文献所关注的以复制、层次结构和形态为重点的“垂直”视角相反，我们提出了一个“水平”维度，其中新陈代谢和微生物创新在理解生命的广泛组织中起着核心解释作用。
