Synopsis
A new theory is developed in this text which examines the evidence of evolution in the light of new evolutionary models and advances in taxonomic theory. The author rejects the cladistic school of taxonomy and argues that internal processes play a much greater role in the evolution of humanity. The theory continues that the formation of new species is the main boost to evolutionary change, that evolutionary novelties tend to arise in the centre of a species' distribution, and that taxonomy, once of secondary importance, has become a major process in evolutionary interpretation. It is claimed that the resulting picture of human and primate evolution is one that fits the facts more successfully than the orthodox "onward and upward through adaptation" model.
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Revue de presse
`...this refreshing and original volume should not be ignored. John Napier, one of the two people to whom it is dedicated, would have enjoyed reading it.' Nature
`This volume will surely be an essential source of facts and ideas for all students of evolution and of living and fossil primates for a very long time.' Primate Eye
'This is without question an important book for advanced undergraduates, graduate students and professionals in the field.' C. Dean, Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society (1992), 105
'he has produce a succinct, evolutionary-taxonomic outline which is a valuable contribution in its own right; it also acts as a basis for his detailed study of human evolution which follows ... I believe Dr Groves has produced a most useful, succinct distillation of recent taxonomic and evolutionary concepts and these, plus his clear summaries of the fossil hominid material, should be found most valuable by the readership which he has targeted ... Dr Groves' book should find a place on the book shelves of most serious primatologists and palaeoanthropologists. Its factual material provides a useful reference and summary, its controversial aspects a stimulus to debate and re-analysis.' Len Freedman, ASHB News, Vol. 4, No. 1, January 1992
Présentation de l'éditeur
The current ferment in evolutionary thought has passed almost unnoticed in anthropology. This book examines the evidence of primate and human evolution in the light of new evolutionary models and of advances in taxonomic theory. In the process, the author has found it necessary to resurrect, in modified form, a theory proposed as long ago as 1924, the `Nomogenesis' of Lev Berg. Dr Groves criticizes the cladistic school of taxonomy, and he adapts it in the light of theories of speciation theory in which internal processes play a major role in human evolution; the formation of new species is the main boost to evolutionary change; evolutionary novelties tend to arise in the centre of a species' distribution; and taxonomy, often looked on as mere stamp-collecting, becomes of major importance in evolutionary interpretation. The resulting picture of human (and primate) evolution is one that fits much better with the facts than the orthodox `onward and upward through adaptation' model. For this new paperback edition, the text has been brought up to date. Several new illustrations and eight short appendices have been added.
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