The Selfish Genius The Selfish Genius The Selfish Genius: How Richard Dawkins Rewrote Darwin's Legacy is a 2009 book by Fern Elsdon-Baker about the history of evolutionary theory, published to coincide with the 150th anniversary of the publication of Charles Darwin's "On the Origin of Species". The book provides an overview of the historical and philosophical debates that have continued throughout the history of evolutionary theory, and carry on to this day in debates surrounding the merits of gene-centric selection and group selection models. The book is particularly critical of the popular science author Richard Dawkins, claiming that he presents a brand of
Gene-centered view of evolution Gene-centered view of evolution The gene-centered view of evolution, gene's eye view, gene selection theory, or selfish gene theory holds that adaptive evolution occurs through the differential survival of competing genes, increasing the allele frequency of those alleles whose phenotypic trait effects successfully promote their own propagation, with gene defined as "not just one single physical bit of DNA [but] all replicas of a particular bit of DNA distributed throughout the world". The proponents of this viewpoint argue that, since heritable information is passed from generation to generation almost exclusively by DNA, natural selection and evolution are best considered from