Abstract
This dissertation attempts to re-evaluate the Darwinian concept of adaptation in light of recent evidence from the fields of Evolutionary Developmental Biology and Self-Organization. Recent findings seem to suggest that certain features of organisms, genomes, etc., might be explicable as the product of fixed principles of self-organization, rather than as product(s) of natural selection. This and similar findings potentially alter the landscape for the Darwinian idea of adaptation driven by natural selection. It is my position that the reception of these new ideas and findings has been much too enthusiastic and uncritical. Philosophers of biology in particular have gotten carried away with the incorporation of development into the evolutionary fold, and while I think that development certainly deserves inclusion (and has for a long time), we must be more mindful of the changes we make to the prevailing theory. What I seek to provide with this dissertation, is a more conservative take on the inclusion of development into the MS version of evolutionary theory. This conservative position seeks to preserve some of the more traditional opinions of the Synthesis Architects, while attending to recent findings from molecular biology, self-organization, complexity theory, physics, and the like. Most importantly, I hope to provide a more refined account of natural selection, and prove to the reader that natural selection is still a potent causal force in explaining adaptive complexity.
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