The Imitation Factor by Lee Dugatkin, Free Press, $25, ISBN
0684864533
JUST when you thought it was safe to declare this the age of the gene, some
biologists beg to differ. The race to sequence the human genome grabs headlines,
and newspapers abound with claims that genes have been identified for
everything. Lee Dugatkin, a biologist at the University of Louisville in
Kentucky, is one who fears that such gene-centrism forms a blind spot when it
comes to other ways of transmitting information across generations.
Dugatkin accuses evolutionary biologists of ignoring the capacity of animals
to learn valuable skills and…
