In Voltaire's Candide, Dr. Pangloss is portrayed as a clueless scholar who, despite the evidence, insists that "all is for the best in this best of all possible worlds". Gould and Lewontin asserted that it is Panglossian for evolutionary biologists to view all traits as atomized things that had been naturally selected for, and criticised biologists for not granting theoretical space to other causes, such as phyletic and developmental constraints. The relative frequency of spandrels, so defined, versus adaptive features in nature, remains a controversial topic in evolutionary biology.[58][59][60]An illustrative example of Gould's approach can be found in Elisabeth Lloyd's case study suggesting that the female orgasm is a by-product of shared developmental pathways.[61] Gould also wrote on this topic in his essay "Male Nipples and Clitoral Ripples," prompted by Lloyd's earlier work.[62]
In his essay Nonmoral Nature, Stephen Jay Gould notes that the ichneumon wasp was a major challenge for 19th-century naturalists trying to reconcile the notion of a benevolent God with the brutal realities of nature. No less than Charles Darwin, Gould cites, found the ichneumon as rendering the two ideas incompatible:
stephen jay gould nonmoral nature essay
In Voltaire's Candide, Dr. Pangloss is portrayed as a clueless scholar who, despite the evidence, insists that "all is for the best in this best of all possible worlds". Gould and Lewontin asserted that it is Panglossian for evolutionary biologists to view all traits as atomized things that had been naturally selected for, and criticised biologists for not granting theoretical space to other causes, such as phyletic and developmental constraints. The relative frequency of spandrels, so defined, versus adaptive features in nature, remains a controversial topic in evolutionary biology.[54] An illustrative example of Gould's approach can be found in Elisabeth Lloyd's case study suggesting that the female orgasm is a by-product of shared developmental pathways.[55] Gould also wrote on this topic in his essay "Male Nipples and Clitoral Ripples"[56] prompted by Lloyd's earlier work. 2ff7e9595c
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