George C. Williams and Evolutionary Literacy

Michael P. Cohen works at the intersection of literary theory and nature writing. His books include Pathless Way: John Muir and American Wilderness (1984), A Garden of Bristlecones: Tales of Change in the Great Basin (1998) and Granite and Grace: Seeking the Heart of Yosemite (2019).

• Introduction: The Face of the Adaptationist Program.- Chapter 1. A Balance of Forces: Homes and Schools, Genes, Senescence, and Altruism.- Chapter 2.Design, Parsimony, and a Critique of Adaptation.- Chapter 3.Opening Sociobiology: Disciplining the Plain Style.- Chapter 4.Sex, Death, and the Language of Sociobiology.- Chapter 5.How Scientific Reductionism leads to Evolutionary Explanation.- Chapter 6.Evolution and Human Ethics: An Expansion from Sociobiology.- Chapter 7.History, Natural Selection, and the Book of Nature.- Chapter 8.Repairing Human Natures.- Chapter 9.The Dark Side of Biology.- Chapter 10.How Shall a Human Face Death.

“One cannot write clearly until one has thought clearly. George C. Williams did both. For anyone whose science, style of thought, or writing has been influenced by his, this book is well worth a read.” (Stephen C. Stearns, The Quarterly Review of Biology, Vol. 98 (4), December, 2023)