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 views selection as working on many levels, and has called attention to a hierarchical perspective of selection. Gould also called the claims of "Selfish Gene" "strict adaptationism", "ultra-Darwinism", and "Darwinian fundamentalism", describing them as excessively "reductionist". He saw the theory as leading to a simplistic "algorithmic" theory of evolution, or even to the re-introduction of a teleological principle. Mayr went so far as to say "Dawkins' basic theory of the gene being the object of evolution is totally non-Darwinian." Gould also addressed the issue of selfish genes in his essay "Caring groups and selfish genes". Gould acknowledged that Dawkins was