Studies in Behavioural Adaptation – serie
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3 produkter
529 kr
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This book describes to the advanced student how models of animal behaviour are developed, why they are developed and how such models are changed, elaborated and eventually replaced. In each chapter, the author introduces models from a subject area, before going on to consider one or two models in detail. The author outlines how the modellers came to frame their problem in a mathematical form. The later sophistication of each model is described and important factors in the evolution of a behavioural ecological model identified. These include moves towards greater ecological validity, assumption reduction and paradigm shifts. This book should be of interest to advanced students in ecology or animal behaviour with no great mathematical skills.
529 kr
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This book grew from small beginnings as I began to find unexpected patterns emerging from the data in the literature. The more I thought about the way in which primate social systems worked, the more interesting things turned out to be. I am conscious that, at times, this has introduced a certain amount of complexity into the text. I make no apologies for that: what we are dealing with is a complex subject, the product of evolutionary forces interacting with very sophisticated minds. None the less, I have done my best to explain every thing as clearly as I can in order to make the book accessible to as wide an audience as possible. I have laid a heavy emphasis in this book on the use of simple graphical and mathematical models. Their sophistication, however, is not great and does not assume more than a knowledge of elementary probability theory. Since their role will inevitably be misunderstood, I take this opportunity to stress that their function is essentially heuristic rather than explanatory: they are designed to focus our attention on the key issues so as to point out the directions for further research. A model is only as good as the questions it prompts us to ask. For those whose natural inclination is to dismiss modelling out of hand, I can only point to the precision that their use can offer us in terms of hypothesis-testing.
1 066 kr
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In the early years of this century a Scottish doctor speculated on the evolutionary origin of human tears. It seemed to him that with the increase in brain size and cognitive powers of our early ancestors many events in the struggle for existence would be just too distressing to observe. How comforting then, for the mother, distraught by the sight of her child being devoured by a lion, to cloud her vision with a flood of tears! Just so, though if the good doctor had pondered further, the following picture might have occurred to him, comfortable in his speculative armchair, and given him some pause for thought. ' ~ . . . . ~ . . ~ ~ . . •. . u" . . , ~- . ' _ . . . . . . . vii viii SERIES EDITOR'S FOREWORD These stories do not, of course, get us very far in understanding the evolution of tears or anything else, but they do remind us how far the study of behavioural adaptation has come this century. This is, in fact, an exciting time for students of behaviour. The last twenty years have seen a great advance in the theoretical armoury for tackling questions of behavioural evolution and adaptation, and a parallel expansion in empirical studies, particularly in the field. The concepts of inclusive fitness and the evolutionarily stable strategy, for example, have helped to explain major features of social behaviour and have generated entirely new questions and predictions for the field worker to examine.