Williams revolution

From EvoWiki

The Williams revolution was the paradigm shift of the 1960s which saw the gene become the focus of evolutionary thinking. The revolution was a revision of the earlier modern synthesis which saw evolutionary biology united with genetics. The revolution is named after George C. Williams, one of the principal architects of the revolution, whose 1966 book Adaptation and Natural Selection popularised the theory.

Before the paradigm shift most evolutionary thinkers considered selection to favour individuals, groups (group selection) and species, and people talked of individuals acting "for the good of the species". The Williams revolution, however, established gene selection as the principal process of selection, and showed that because genes were the units of selection, selection would favour genes which maximised their own survival, not that of the group or species.

The revolution was based on the findings of population genetics, and other principal architects of the revolution include W.D. Hamilton, John Maynard Smith, Robert Trivers and Richard Dawkins, who popularised the revolution in The Selfish Gene.