Gene-centered view of evolution selection was developed mainly in the works of Richard Dawkins, W. D. Hamilton, Colin Pittendrigh and George C. Williams. It was mainly popularized and expanded by Dawkins in his book "The Selfish Gene" (1976). According to Williams' 1966 book "Adaptation and Natural Selection", Williams argued that "[t]he natural selection of phenotypes cannot in itself produce cumulative change, because phenotypes are extremely temporary manifestations." Each phenotype is the unique product of the interaction between genome and environment. It does not matter how fit and fertile a phenotype is, it will eventually be destroyed and will never be duplicated. Since 1954, it
Gene-centered view of evolution for the evolution of social characteristics such as selfishness and altruism. The formulation of the central dogma of molecular biology was summarized by Maynard Smith: The rejection of the inheritance of acquired characters, combined with Ronald Fisher the statistician, giving the subject a mathematical footing, and showing how Mendelian genetics was compatible with natural selection in his 1930 book "The Genetical Theory of Natural Selection". J. B. S. Haldane, and Sewall Wright, paved the way to the formulation of the selfish-gene theory. For cases where environment can influence heredity, see epigenetics. The view of the gene as the unit of