| Species, Species Concepts and Primate Evolution 1993 Edition Contributor(s): Kimbel, William H. (Editor), Martin, Lawrence B. (Editor) |
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ISBN: 0306442973 ISBN-13: 9780306442971 Publisher: Springer OUR PRICE: $208.99 Product Type: Hardcover - Other Formats Published: April 1993 Annotation: In order to meld the facts of organic diversity with the continuity of the evolutionary process, this volume details the diversity of theoretical perspectives and methodological approaches currently employed by primate evolutionary biologists and paleontologists. Specific coverage includes: species concepts and their role in evolutionary theory, the speciation process and the biology of species differences among living primates, and the problems of species recognition in the primate fossil record. |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Science | Life Sciences - Zoology - Primatology - Science | Life Sciences - Biology - Science | Life Sciences - Zoology - General |
| Dewey: 599.804 |
| LCCN: 93006920 |
| Series: Advances in Primatology |
| Physical Information: 1.45" H x 6.5" W x 9.62" (2.28 lbs) 560 pages |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: A world of categones devmd of spirit waits for life to return. Saul Bellow, Humboldt's Gift The stock-in-trade of communicating hypotheses about the historical path of evolution is a graphical representation called a phylogenetic tree. In most such graphics, pairs of branches diverge from other branches, successively marching across abstract time toward the present. To each branch is tied a tag with a name, a binominal symbol that functions as does the name given to an individual human being. On phylogenetic trees the names symbolize species. What exactly do these names signify? What kind of information is communicated when we claim to have knowledge of the following types? "Tetonius mathewzi was ancestral to Pseudotetonius ambiguus. " "The sample of fossils attributed to Homo habzlis is too variable to contain only one species. " "Interbreeding populations of savanna baboons all belong to Papio anubis. " "Hylobates lar and H. pileatus interbreed in zones of geographic overlap. " While there is nearly universal agreement that the notion of the speczes is fundamental to our understanding of how evolution works, there is a very wide range of opinion on the conceptual content and meaning of such particular statements regarding species. This is because, oddly enough, evolutionary biolo- gists are quite far from agreement on what a species is, how it attains this status, and what role it plays in evolution over the long term. |