Evolutionary processes such as natural selection and random drift are commonly regarded as causes of population-level change. We respond to a recent challenge that drift and selection are best understood as statistical trends, not causes. Our reply appeals to manipulation as a strategy for uncovering causal relationships: if you can systematically manipulate variable A to bring about a change in variable B, then A is a cause of B. We argue that selection and drift can be systematically manipulated to produce (...) different kinds of population-level change. They should therefore be regarded as causes. (shrink)

According to the received view of evolution, only genes are inherited. From this view it follows that only genetically-caused phenotypic variation is selectable and, thereby, that all selection is at bottom genetic selection. This paper argues that the received view is wrong. In many species, there are intergenerationally-stable phenotypic differences due to environmental differences. Natural selection can act on these nongenetically-caused phenotypic differences in the same way it acts on genetically-caused phenotypic differences. Some selection is at bottom nongenetic selection. The (...) argument against the received view involves a reformulation of the concepts of inheritance and heritability. Inherited factors are all those developmental factors responsible for parent–offspring similarity; some inherited factors are genetic and some are not. Heritable variation is intergenerationally-stable phenotypic variation; some such variation is genetically-caused and some is not. The received view and its critics The possibility of nongenetic selection (the lucky butterfly) The reality of nongenetic selection 3.1 Imprinting mechanisms 3.2 Other learning mechanisms 3.3 Other nongenetic mechanisms Genetic and nongenetic inheritance mechanisms Genetic and nongenetic inherited factors Genetic and nongenetic heritability Conclusions + Current address: Dr Matteo Mameli, Research Fellow, King's College, Cambridge, CB2 1ST, United Kingdom, matteo.mameli{at}kings.cam.ac.uk' + u + '@' + d + ''//-->. (shrink)

The co-evolutionary concept of Three-modal stable evolutionary strategy of Homo sapiens is developed. The concept based on the principle of evolutionary complementarity of anthropogenesis: value of evolutionary risk and evolutionary path of human evolution are defined by descriptive (evolutionary efficiency) and creative-teleological (evolutionary correctly) parameters simultaneously, that cannot be instrumental reduced to others ones. Resulting volume of both parameters define the trends of biological, social, cultural and techno-rationalistic human evolution by two gear mechanism ˗ gene-cultural co-evolution and techno- humanitarian balance. (...) The resultant each of them can estimated by the ratio of socio-psychological predispositions of humanization/dehumanization in mentality. Explanatory model and methodology of evaluation of creatively teleological evolutionary risk component of NBIC technological complex is proposed. Integral part of the model is evolutionary semantics (time-varying semantic code, the compliance of the biological, socio-cultural and techno-rationalist adaptive modules of human stable evolutionary strategy). (shrink)

Taking as its point of departure a sharp critique of Rawls's influential A Theory of Justice, this book looks at politics from an aesthetic perspective.

Mikhail Yampolsky. Point – pathos – totality. Two situations are possible when two fragments are confronted in montage. First, we can have a continuitycorresponding to some established narrative codes. For instance, a character crosses the right border of the frame and reappears from behind the left side of the next frame. Such a figure will be read as a representation of continuity, but shown not in its integrity. The gap in spatial continuity is compensated here by the continuity of a (...) story. On the other hand, we can have a junction that has no support by any code and that opens up opportunities for the display of metaphors, metonyms and allegories. There are also possibilities for violent conflicts and shocks as in Godard. We do not really know how all these non-codified figures of montage work. There is no generally accepted theoretical model that could explain how we are able to synthesize two heterogeneous pieces.All his life Sergei Eisenstein was fascinated by montage and tried to understand its way of functioning. He was particularly interested in solving the mystery ofinteraction between elements belonging to two different media such as sound and image and in their way of creating unity. This article focuses on Eisenstein’s late writings in which he used the idea of pathos and Hegelian dialectics for the analysis of montage as a dynamic process. According to Eisenstein, montage fuses different pieces of footage but also triggers the whole mechanism of the evolution of culture. Cinema, from this point of view, is not simply an art of modernity but a highest stage in the development of culture somewhat similar to the stage of the absolute knowledge that the spirit reaches in Hegel. (shrink)