Holistic Darwinism synergy, cybernetics, and the bioeconomics of evolution - Corning, Peter A. (University of Chicago Press, 2005)
Includes bibliographical references (pages 473-528) and index
Introduction: The new evolutionary paradigm; Part I: Synergy and evolution: from the origins of life to global governance; 1. Synergy: another idea whose time has come; 2. Holistic Darwinism: synergistic selection and the evolutionary process; 3. The synergism hypothesis: on the concept of synergy and its role in the evolution of complex systems; 4. Synergy versus self-organization in the evolution of complex systems; 5. The re-emergence of emergence: a venerable concept in search of a theory; 6. Synergy, cybernetics, and the evolution of politics
In recent years, evolutionary theorists have come to recognize that the reductionist, individualist, gene-centered approach to evolution cannot sufficiently account for the emergence of complex biological systems over time. Peter A. Corning has been at the forefront of a new generation of complexity theorists who have been working to reshape the foundations of evolutionary theory. Well known for his Synergism Hypothesis--a theory of complexity in evolution that assigns a key causal role to various forms of functional synergy--Corning puts this theory into a much broader framework in Holistic Dar