George Christopher Williams (May 12, 1926 – September 8, 2010) was an American
evolutionary biologist
Evolutionary biology is the subfield of biology that studies the evolutionary processes (natural selection, common descent, speciation) that produced the diversity of life on Earth. It is also defined as the study of the history of life for ...
.
Williams was a
professor
Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who professes". Professors ...
of
biology
Biology is the scientific study of life. It is a natural science with a broad scope but has several unifying themes that tie it together as a single, coherent field. For instance, all organisms are made up of cells that process hereditary i ...
at the
State University of New York at Stony Brook who was best known for his vigorous critique of
group selection
Group selection is a proposed mechanism of evolution in which natural selection acts at the level of the group, instead of at the level of the individual or gene.
Early authors such as V. C. Wynne-Edwards and Konrad Lorenz argued that the behavi ...
. The work of Williams in this area, along with
W. D. Hamilton
William Donald Hamilton (1 August 1936 – 7 March 2000) was a British evolutionary biologist, recognised as one of the most significant evolutionary theorists of the 20th century.
Hamilton became known for his theoretical work expounding a ...
,
John Maynard Smith
John Maynard Smith (6 January 1920 – 19 April 2004) was a British theoretical and mathematical evolutionary biologist and geneticist. Originally an aeronautical engineer during the Second World War, he took a second degree in genetics un ...
,
Richard Dawkins, and others led to the development of the
gene-centered view of evolution
With gene defined as "not just one single physical bit of DNA utall replicas of a particular bit of DNA distributed throughout the world", the gene-centered view of evolution, gene's eye view, gene selection theory, or selfish gene theory hol ...
in the 1960s.
Academic work
Williams' 1957 paper ''Pleiotropy, Natural Selection, and the Evolution of Senescence'' is one of the most influential in 20th century evolutionary biology, and contains at least 3 foundational ideas. The central hypothesis of
antagonistic pleiotropy remains the prevailing evolutionary explanation of senescence. In this paper Williams was also the first to propose that
senescence should be generally synchronized by
natural selection
Natural selection is the differential survival and reproduction of individuals due to differences in phenotype. It is a key mechanism of evolution, the change in the heritable traits characteristic of a population over generations. Cha ...
. According to this original formulation
if the adverse genic effects appeared earlier in one system than any other, they would be removed by selection from that system more readily than from any other. In other words, natural selection will always be in greatest opposition to the decline of the most senescence-prone system.
This important concept of synchrony of senescence was taken up a short time later by
John Maynard Smith
John Maynard Smith (6 January 1920 – 19 April 2004) was a British theoretical and mathematical evolutionary biologist and geneticist. Originally an aeronautical engineer during the Second World War, he took a second degree in genetics un ...
, and the origin of the idea is often misattributed to him, including in his obituary in the journal ''
Nature
Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. Although humans are ...
''. Finally, Williams' 1957 paper was the first to outline the "
grandmother hypothesis". William's formulation stated that natural selection might select for menopause and post-reproductive life in females (though not explicitly mentioning grandchildren or the
inclusive fitness
In evolutionary biology, inclusive fitness is one of two metrics of evolutionary success as defined by W. D. Hamilton in 1964:
* Personal fitness is the number of offspring that an individual begets (regardless of who rescues/rears/supports them ...
contribution of grand-parenting).
In his first book, ''
Adaptation and Natural Selection
''Adaptation and Natural Selection: A Critique of Some Current Evolutionary Thought'' is a 1966 book by the American evolutionary biologist George C. Williams. Williams, in what is now considered a classic by evolutionary biologists, outlines a ...
'', Williams advocated a "ground rule - or perhaps ''doctrine'' would be a better term - ... that
adaptation is a special and onerous concept that should only be used where it is really necessary", and, that, when it is necessary,
selection
Selection may refer to:
Science
* Selection (biology), also called natural selection, selection in evolution
** Sex selection, in genetics
** Mate selection, in mating
** Sexual selection in humans, in human sexuality
** Human mating strateg ...
among
genes or individuals would in general be the preferable explanation for it. He elaborated this view in later books and papers, which contributed to the development of a gene-centered view of evolution;
Richard Dawkins built on Williams' ideas in this area in the book ''
The Selfish Gene
''The Selfish Gene'' is a 1976 book on evolution by the ethologist Richard Dawkins, in which the author builds upon the principal theory of George C. Williams's '' Adaptation and Natural Selection'' (1966). Dawkins uses the term "selfish gen ...
''.
Williams was also well known for his work on the
evolution of sex
Sexual reproduction is an adaptive feature which is common to almost all multicellular organisms and various unicellular organisms, with some organisms being incapable of asexual reproduction. Currently the adaptive advantage of sexual repro ...
, and was an advocate of
evolutionary medicine
Evolutionary medicine or Darwinian medicine is the application of modern evolutionary theory to understanding health and disease. Modern biomedical research and practice have focused on the molecular and physiological mechanisms underlying he ...
.
In later books, including ''Natural Selection: Domains, Levels and Challenges'', Williams softened his views on group selection, recognizing that
clade selection,
trait group selection and
multilevel selection
Group selection is a proposed mechanism of evolution in which natural selection acts at the level of the group, instead of at the level of the individual or gene.
Early authors such as V. C. Wynne-Edwards and Konrad Lorenz argued that the behav ...
did sometimes occur in nature, something he had earlier thought to be so unlikely it could be safely ignored.
Williams became convinced that the genic neo-Darwinism of his earlier years, while essentially correct as a theory of microevolutionary change, could not account for evolutionary phenomena over longer time scales, and was thus an "utterly inadequate account of the evolution of the Earth's biota" (1992, p. 31). In particular, he became a staunch advocate of clade selection – a generalisation of species selection to monophyletic clades of any rank – which could potentially explain phenomena such as adaptive radiations, long-term phylogenetic trends, and biases in rates of speciation/extinction. In Natural Selection (1992), Williams argued that these phenomena cannot be explained by selectively-driven allele substitutions within populations, the evolutionary mechanism he had originally championed over all others. This book thus represents a substantial departure from the position of Adaptation and Natural Selection.
Academic career
Williams received a
Ph.D.
A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is ...
in biology from the
University of California at Los Angeles
The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California ...
in 1955. At Stony Brook he taught courses in
marine vertebrate zoology
The State Museum of Zoology (german: Staatliches Museum für Tierkunde) in Dresden is a natural history museum that houses 10,000–50,000 specimens, including skeletons and large insect collections. Many are types. The collection suffered war ...
, and he often used
ichthyological examples in his books.
In 1992, Williams was awarded the
Daniel Giraud Elliot Medal
The Daniel Giraud Elliot Medal is awarded by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences "for meritorious work in zoology or paleontology study published in a three- to five-year period." Named after Daniel Giraud Elliot, it was first awarded in 1917.
...
from the
National Academy of Sciences.
He won the
Crafoord Prize
The Crafoord Prize is an annual science prize established in 1980 by Holger Crafoord, a Swedish industrialist, and his wife Anna-Greta Crafoord. The Prize is awarded in partnership between the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and the Crafoord Foun ...
for Bioscience jointly with
Ernst Mayr and
John Maynard Smith
John Maynard Smith (6 January 1920 – 19 April 2004) was a British theoretical and mathematical evolutionary biologist and geneticist. Originally an aeronautical engineer during the Second World War, he took a second degree in genetics un ...
in 1999. Richard Dawkins describes Williams as "one of the most respected of American evolutionary biologists".
Books
* Williams, G.C. 1966. ''
Adaptation and Natural Selection
''Adaptation and Natural Selection: A Critique of Some Current Evolutionary Thought'' is a 1966 book by the American evolutionary biologist George C. Williams. Williams, in what is now considered a classic by evolutionary biologists, outlines a ...
.'' Princeton University Press, Princeton, N.J.
* Williams, G.C., ed. 1971. ''
Group Selection
Group selection is a proposed mechanism of evolution in which natural selection acts at the level of the group, instead of at the level of the individual or gene.
Early authors such as V. C. Wynne-Edwards and Konrad Lorenz argued that the behavi ...
.'' Aldine-Atherton, Chicago.
* Williams, G.C. 1975. ''Sex and Evolution.'' Princeton University Press, Princeton, N.J.
* Paradis, J. and G.C. Williams. 1989. ''T.H. Huxley's Evolution and Ethics : with New Essays on its Victorian and Sociobiological Context.'' Princeton University Press, Princeton, N.J.
* Williams, G.C. 1992. ''Natural Selection: Domains, Levels, and Challenges.'' Oxford University Press, New York.
* Nesse, R.M. and G.C. Williams. 1994. ''Why We Get Sick : the New Science of Darwinian Medicine.'' Times Books, New York.
* Williams, G.C. 1996. ''Plan and Purpose in Nature.'' Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London (published in the U.S. in 1997 as ''The Pony Fish's Glow : and Other Clues to Plan and Purpose in Nature.'' Basic Books, New York).
Selected papers
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Controversy
Williams supervised an undergraduate project in 1985 which consisted of a student, Mitchell Behm, tossing live animals into tubs with domesticated ferrets, which Behm subsequently admitted he partly did "for his own amusement." Dr. Charles Middleton, Director of the Division of Laboratory Animal Resources stated, "If animals are just going to tear each other up, the experiment would not have been approved." Ferrets were illegal in New York at the time, without a license, which neither individual had.
After police investigation, Williams received a formal reprimand from SUNY Stony Brook for never receiving approval because of not detailing the pain of the animals involved, and for allowing non-campus animals to participate. Because the statute of limitations had expired, Williams narrowly escaped strict disciplinary action, in addition to criminal prosecution. Dr. Mark Lerman, Medical Director of Lifeline for Wildlife said there was no justification and that the experiment was completely useless.
The experiments were in direct violation of the
Animal Welfare Act of 1966
The Animal Welfare Act (Laboratory Animal Welfare Act of 1966, ) was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson on August 24, 1966. It is the main federal law in the United States that regulates the treatment of animals in research and exhibi ...
and its
PHS policy amendment introducing the
Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee
Institutional Animal Care and Use Committees (IACUCs) are centrally important in applying laws about animal research in the United States. Similar systems operate in other countries, but generally under different titles; for example, in Canada a t ...
model,
to which SUNY and all of its researchers were subject in 1988.
References
External links
Official website
Article from ''Science''by
Carl Zimmer
Carl Zimmer (born 1966) is a popular science writer, blogger, columnist, and journalist who specializes in the topics of evolution, parasites, and heredity. The author of many books, he contributes science essays to publications such as ''The Ne ...
A Conversation With George C. Williams by Frans RoesObituary by Richard Dawkins, October 1, 2010Stephen C. Stearns, "George Christopher Williams", Biographical Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences (2011)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Williams, George Christopher
1926 births
2010 deaths
Evolutionary biologists
Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences
Stony Brook University faculty
University of California, Los Angeles alumni
Critics of creationism
Neurological disease deaths in New York (state)
Deaths from Parkinson's disease
Biogerontologists
20th-century American biologists
Modern synthesis (20th century)
21st-century American biologists
People from Charlotte, North Carolina
Scientists from North Carolina