The Cooperative Gene: How Mendel's Demon Explains the Evolution of Complex BeingsSimon and Schuster, 2001 - 324 pages "Why isn's all life pond-scum? Why are there multimillion-celled, long-lived monsters like us, built from tens of thousands of cooperating genes? Mark Ridley presents a new explanation of how complex large life forms like ourselves came to exist, showing that the answer to the greatest mystery of evolution for modern science is not the selfish gene; it is the cooperative gene." "In this thought-provoking book, Ridley breaks down how two major biological hurdles had to be overcome in order to allow living complexity to evolve: the proliferation of genes and gene-selfishness. Because complex life has more genes than simple life, the increase in gene numbers poses a particular problem for complex beings."--BOOK JACKET. |
Contents
Keeping Living Things Simple | 1 |
The Gene Number of the Beast | 28 |
The Mutational Meltdown | 55 |
The History of Error | 79 |
The Ultimate Existential Absurdity | 108 |
Darwinian Mergers and Acquisitions | 133 |
The Justice of the Peas | 165 |
The Long Reach of the Lawbreaker | 199 |
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Common terms and phrases
50 per cent assassin gene average bacteria bacterium bad genes body breed cell division Chapter Chinese whispers chloroplasts chromosome clonal cloning complex life forms conflict contain copying error copying mistakes creatures defects diploid DNA molecules duplicated enzymes error rate escalating damage eukaryotic cell evolution of complexity evolutionary evolved exist extra genes favour female fertilized fetus fossil fruit flies gametes gender gene numbers gene sets gene shuffling gene therapy genetic genome happen harmful mutation hormone human increase individual inherited kind lawbreaking look male mate choice maternal genes Maynard Smith mechanisms meiosis Mendelian merger million mitochondria molecular molecule mother multicellular mutation rate mutational meltdown natural selection nucleus number of genes organelles origin pair parent population probably problem produce protein pseudogene random recombination replicating reproduction RNA viruses selfish genes sequence sexual sexual reproduction single-celled sister-killer gene species sperm stage sugar theory TIGER COMES tion