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The Synergism Hypothesis Thirty years later

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 May 2016

Peter A. Corning
Peter A. Corning*
Affiliation:
Institute for the Study of Complex Systems, 3501 Beaverton Valley Road, Friday Harbor, WA 98250. PACorning@complexsystems.org

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I think it is fair to say that synergy is an idea whose time has finally come. It seems that every week another new example of synergy is reported in some scientific journal, and articles about synergy are nowadays routinely accepted for publication in various disciplines. This was certainly not the case 30 years ago. Back then using the term “synergy” in a journal submission was an almost certain kiss of death. I speak from personal experience. So times have changed. However, the theory proposed in my 1983 book, The Synergism Hypothesis: A Theory of Progressive Evolution^ has had a more complex journey, and herein lies a bit of intellectual history and some lessons about the culture and politics of science.

Type
Founders' Forum
Information
Politics and the Life Sciences , Volume 30 , Issue 1 , Spring 2011 , pp. 61 - 64
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Politics and the Life Sciences 

References

1. Corning, Peter A., The Synergism Hypothesis: A Theory of Progressive Evolution (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1983).Google Scholar
2. Corning, Peter A., “The co-operative gene: On the role of synergy in evolution,” Evolutionary Theory, 1996, 11: 183–207.Google Scholar
3. Ridley, Mark, The Cooperative Gene: How Mendel's Demon Explains the Evolution of Complex Beings (New York: The Free Press, 2001).Google Scholar
4. Wilson, David Sloan, “Beware of theories of everything,” Evolutionary Psychology, 2004, 2: 1–2.Google Scholar
5. Corning, Peter A., Synergy Live: A blog about Holistic Darwinism, and Anything Else on My Mind, online: www.synergylive.blogspot.com Google Scholar
6. Corning, Peter A., Holistic Darwinism: Synergy, Cybernetics, and the Bioeconomics of Evolution (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005).Google Scholar