Gould S.J. The Structure of Evolutionary Theory

Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2002. — 1464 p.The world's most revered and eloquent interpreter of evolutionary ideas offers here a work of explanatory force unprecedented in our time - a landmark publication, both for its historical sweep and for its scientific vision.
With characteristic attention to detail, Stephen Jay Gould first describes the content and discusses the history and origins of the three core commitments of classical Darwinism: that natural selection works on organisms, not genes or species; that it is almost exclusively the mechanism of adaptive evolutionary change; and that these changes are incremental, not drastic. Next, he examines the three critiques that currently challenge this classic Darwinian edifice: that selection operates on multiple levels, from the gene to the group; that evolution proceeds by a variety of mechanisms, not just natural selection; and that causes operating at broader scales, including catastrophes, have figured prominently in the course of evolution.
Then, in a stunning tour de force that will likely stimulate discussion and debate for decades, Gould proposes his own system for integrating these classical commitments and contemporary critiques into a new structure of evolutionary thought.
Defining and Revising the Structure of Evolutionary Theory
The History of Darwinian Logic and Debate
The Essence of Darwinism and the Basis of Modern Orthodoxy: An Exegesis of the Origin of Species
Seeds of Hierarchy
Internalism and Laws of Form: Pre-Darwinian Alternatives to Functionalism
The Fruitful Facets of Galton’s Polyhedron: Channels and Saltations in Post-Darwinian Formalism
Pattern and Progress on the Geological Stage
The Modern Synthesis as a Limited Consensus
Towards a Revised and Expanded Evolutionary Theory
Species as Individuals in the Hierarchical Theory of Selection
Punctuated Equilibrium and the Validation of Macroevolutionary Theory
The Integration of Constraint and Adaptation (Structure and Function) in Ontogeny and Phylogeny: Historical Constraints and the Evolution of Development
The Integration of Constraint and Adaptation (Structure and Function) in Ontogeny and Phylogeny: Structural Constraints, Spandrels, and the Centrality of Exaptation in Macroevolution
Tiers of Time and Trials of Extrapolationism, With an Epilog on the Interaction of General Theory and Contingent History