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From Heredity and Genetics: The Dialogue Continued
Wright, “The Roles of Mutation”
As this 1932 diagram shows, biologists such as Sewell Wright had come a long way from using Darwin’s flowing prose and agrarian metaphors to explain evolutionary processes. Here Wright used abstract statistical representations (“adaptive landscapes”) to show the distribution of genetic variations in groups of organisms. This new focus on populations rather than individuals marked a major shift in the study of evolution—and it was the key to reconciling Darwinian evolution with genetics.
Sewall Wright (1889–1988). “The Roles of Mutation, Inbreeding, Crossbreeding and Selection in Evolution,” Sixth International Congress of Genetics. Brooklyn, N.Y.: Brooklyn Botanic Garden, 1932.
