Brown, Rachael L.
(2021)
Structuralism and Selectionism: Friends or Foes?
[Preprint]
Abstract
Historically, the empirical study of phenotypic diversification has fallen into two rough camps; (1) "structuralist approaches" focusing on developmental constraint, bias and innovation (with evo-devo at the core); and (2) "adaptationist approaches" focusing on adaptation and natural selection. Whilst debates, such as that surrounding the proposed "Extended" Evolutionary Synthesis, often juxtapose these two positions, this review focuses on the grey space in between. Specifically, here I look at the motivations behind the "structuralist" and "adaptationist" positions in order to make clear the ways that these two approaches to understanding phenotypic variation are in conflict, along with the ways in which they are commensurable. In doing so, this review makes much clearer (a) the particular value of the evo-devo approach to phenotypic diversity, but also (b) how it properly relates to other predominant approaches to the same issues in evolutionary biology more broadly.
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