John Tyler Bonner, one of our most distinguished and insightful
biologists, here challenges a central tenet of evolutionary biology. In
this concise, elegantly written book, he makes the bold and provocative
claim that some biological diversity may be explained by something other
than natural selection. With his customary wit and accessible style,
Bonner makes an argument for the underappreciated role that
randomness--or chance--plays in evolution. Due to the tremendous and
enduring influence of Darwin's natural selection, the importance of
randomness has been to some extent overshadowed. Bonner shows how the
effects of randomness differ for organisms of different sizes, and how
the smaller an organism is, the more likely it is that morphological
differences will be random and selection may not be involved to any
degree. He traces the increase in size and complexity of organisms over
geological time, and looks at the varying significance of randomness at
different size levels,
from microorganisms to large mammals. Bonner also discusses how sexual
cycles vary depending on size and complexity, and how the trend away
from randomness in higher forms has even been reversed in some social
organisms. Certain to provoke lively discussion, Randomness in Evolution
is a book that may fundamentally change our understanding of evolution
and the history of life.
