Nature screws up again: touts need for severe revision of evolutionary theory while harboring a conflict of interest

Nature has shown some bad behaviors lately, and now you can add onto them two more: an ignorance of evolutionary biology and a lack of fact-checking. Both of these are instantiated in a recent book review, which, as we see so often, describes modern evolutionary biology as woefully incomplete.  The review, moreover, fails to mention all the critics of this “need for speed.” Finally, the review (of a book touting the deficiency of evolutionary theory), was written by a collaborator of several authors of the book, showing a severe conflict of interest. It’s no surprise that the authors’ colleague gave their book a glowing review.

A letter written by some well known evolutionary biologists pointing out these two deficiencies was promptly rejected by Nature.

I’ll give a critique of the book review first, and then show the letter sent to Nature that was rejected. Finally, I’ll give one of the signers’ responses to the rejection: Brian Charlesworth. I won’t give the names of the other signers of the letter (there were three), as Brian gave me permission to reproduce the letter but I haven’t asked the others.

First, the review. The book is Evolution Evolving: The Developmental Origins of Adaptation and Biodiversity, with authors Kevin Lala [formerly “Laland”], Tobias Uller, Natalie Feiner, Marcus Feldman and Scott Gilbert, published last winter by Princeton University Press, which apparently didn’t get the book vetted by competent evolutionists. The Nature review by Eva Jablonka, Israeli evolutionist and epigenetics maven, came out in January, so I’m a bit late to the party. Still, this shows that there remains a vocal minority of biologists who can’t resist showing us the many ways that evolutionary biology is wrong or incomplete, yet they’re singing the same old tune, one that’s been rebutted many times before.

Click below to read the fulsome review of the book; one that doesn’t even mention the many issues with the “new view of evolution” that have been pointed out for years.

Before I point out a few misguided statements, I urge you to read my take on a Nature paper called “Does evolutionary biology need a rethink?“, in which one group of “revisionists, with Laland (“Lala” above) being the first author, answers, “Yes, urgently”, while another group, with Greg Wray the first author, answers “No, all is well.”  As you’ll see from reading my piece, I side with the second group. Note that that exchange is already eleven years old, yet the promoters of the “rethink” view are advancing exactly the same arguments they made back then. These arguments are misguided because they are either flat wrong (e.g., their criticism of the neo-Darwinian view that mutations are “random”), or misleading (e.g., their view that development drives evolution, with development changing first and only then permitting adaptive genetic change). In her review above, Jablonka also throws in epigenetics, her speciality, which, while important in some respects, cannot form the basis of permanent adaptive evolution because environmentally-induced changes in DNA (“epigenetic” changes) persist at most for only two generations before the epigenetic marks are wiped away during gamete formation.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

First, for the topic of “development leading evolution,” “nongenetic forms of evolution” (learning, culture, etc.), and epigenetics, all touted in Jablonka’s article, see my post above, this one, and my several discussions of the flaws of touting epigenetics as a critical and neglected factor in adaptive evolution.  I won’t repeat my arguments, but I will point out a couple of howlers in Jablonka’s review.  Her quotes are indented below.

First, on development as the guiding factor of evolution:

Under the extended evolutionary synthesis, the questions that are fundamental to the field change. Instead of just asking what genetic mutations might give one organism an advantage over its peers, the authors argue, evolutionary biologists should also focus on the developmental mechanisms and structures that underlie fitness differences.

It’s time to admit that genes are not the blueprint for life.

A developmental focus, they say, could help in understanding phenomena that are mysterious under the modern synthesis. For example, selective breeding for ‘tameness’, whether in sheep, pigs, horses, dogs or foxes, leads to the evolution of a common series of traits that are not necessarily adaptive — including smaller brains and teeth, curly tails, white patches and flat muzzles. This link, across different animal groups, bred in different ways and at different times, baffled Darwin and others for more than a century.

. . . All these features involve the same embryonic cell type (the neural crest) and their development is thus driven by similar sets of genes.

Well, as Dawkins pointed out years ago, genes are not the “blueprint for life,” but the “recipe for life,” as one needs environmental inputs to convert the DNA into an organism. As for development guiding evolution, what Jablonka and her pals apparently mean that existing developmental pathways constrain evolution: mutations can only show their effect within and already-evolved system of gene interactions. The pleiotropic effect of “tameness” mutations on several species is easily explained because you’re selecting at the same time for the side effects of tameness genes, which happen to affect morphology and color. That’s not new, and certainly doesn’t mandate a rethink of evolution.  As Brian wrote me:

“As has always been acknowledged by anyone with half a brain, the phenotypic effects of mutations are constrained by the existing developmental system. As Haldane put it, selection on humans could produce a race with the intellect of Shakespeare and the physique of Carnera, but for a race of angels we’d have to wait for the necessary mutations, both for the wings and the moral qualities.” 

But then Jablonka as well as Lala et al. (and other miscreants like Denis Noble) use this observation to claim that NEW TRAITS AND PRESUMABLY THE MUTATIONS UNDERLYING THEM ARE NOT RANDOM. From Jablonka:

The modern synthesis dictates that genetic mutations arise at random, which makes it hard to understand why these traits would consistently evolve in all these tamed animals. But seen through a developmental lens, things are clearer. . . . Thus, new traits do not arise at random. Some are more likely than others, and suites of traits often arise together. Understanding such ‘developmental biases’ can enable researchers to better understand how traits originate, what directions future evolution might take and how rapidly evolution might proceed.

They simply do not understand what evolutionists mean when they say features (and mutations) arise “at random” in evolution. The meaning is that mutations and the traits they produce occur irrespective of whether they are good or bad for the individual’s reproduction. Of course some changes are more likely than others, and mutations often have pleiotropic (“side”) effects on other traits. This means that what is subject to selection is the net effect of a mutation on the replication rate of the mutated gene.

What are examples of the “better understanding” that comes from considering development? The ones given by Jablonka, presumably from Lala et al., are not impressive. Here’s an example called “inheritance beyond genes”:

For example, certain whales learn from their mothers how to corral schools of fish into air bubbles. Desert woodrats (Neotoma lepida) eat their mothers’ faeces, which contain gut microorganisms that allow the woodrats to digest plants rich in highly toxic creosote. And molecules called epigenetic marks, which are associated with DNA and modify gene activity, are passed down through generations too. Epigenetic marks that form when mice in the laboratory are trained to link a particular smell with an electric shock, for example, have been passed down to their grandchildren — the young mice are scared of the same smell, even though they have never received the shock.

Two quick points: have the authors ever heard of “learning”? Or that learning might be primed by genes, as our learning of languages primes us to produce comprehensible syntax, but which language we speak depends on our environment? Is imitation of adaptive parental behavior (itself either genetically primed or learned) something new? Nope.  And as for epigenesis, I have heard of the mouse study, but no epigenetic trait produced by the environment can persist for more than a handful of generations, as epigenetic modifications of DNA are wiped out during gamete formation. This form of “Lamarckian” inheritance won’t work.

Here’s one more:

Furthermore, some organisms construct environments to benefit the development of subsequent generations. Dung beetles, for instance, make balls of cow dung, into which they add their own faeces as food, and lay a single egg. The nutrients and microbes in these balls influence how the larvae develop, and in turn the sizes and shapes of the beetles and how they evolve.

Is it a revolutionary insight to discover that parents do things that benefit the fitness of their offspring? Human mothers feed their babies, and sometimes what they feed them could affect their own future evolution. Big whoop!

This all shows that the insights that supposedly mandate a new theory of evolution aren’t new at all, but are comfortably part of the already-existing Modern Synthesis of evolutionary theory.  But these authors, it seems, want to make their mark by advancing the same old tired arguments that have long been refuted.

Along with several other authors, Brian Charlesworth noted that Jablonka seems resistant to even mentioning the many objections to the “new” theory of evolution. Brian and others sent the letter below to Nature for consideration for publication. The references given in the submitted letter are included, and I’ve put in the links. Doug Futuyma’s paper is especially thorough and on the mark, and here’s his point, given in the last sentence of the abstract: “Evolutionary theory will continue to be extended, but there is no sign that it requires emendation.”

The letter:

We are writing to express our concern about the review in Nature by Eva Jablonka of the recent book by Kevin Lala et al. (Evolution Evolving)(16^th January 2025 pages 539-541). The book expounds the “Extended Evolutionary Synthesis” or “EES” which is claimed by its proponents to repair problems with the science of evolutionary biology. Prof. Jablonka was a co-author with two of the book’s authors of an article promoting these claims ¹, which would seem to be a conflict of interest for its reviewer. The article that accompanied that publication and refuted such claims ², is not mentioned by Jablonka, nor are other critiques of the EES, e.g., ³. These papers make clear that several of Jablonka’s assertions are wrong, including the claim that evolutionary biologists believe that mutations “arise at random” with respect to their effects on traits, and that constraints imposed by development on evolutionary changes have been ignored by them. The review gives a false impression of the current state of the flourishing field of evolutionary biology, which owes little to the EES. It is regrettable that Nature should give a platform for such disinformation.

1          Laland, K. et al. Does evolutionary theory need a rethink? Yes, urgently. Nature 514, 161-164 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/514161a

2          Wray, G. A. et al. Does evolutionary theory need a rethink? No, all is well. Nature 514, 161-164 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/514161a

3          Futuyma, D. J. Evolutionary biology today and the call for an extended synthesis. Interface Focus 7, 20160145. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsfs.2016.0145 (2017). [JAC: This is a Royal Society journal]

What transpired is that Brian says he heard nothing from Nature for a long time. He wrote back to the editor asking what happened to the joint letter. The editor explained that an automatic email response had been sent saying that if the authors didn’t hear anything within three weeks, then the letter was rejected. Brian says he didn’t see that response and admits it could have been binned without him reading it.  The editor also explained why the letter above was rejected, but I can’t reproduce that email without permission. However, you can get a sense of what the editor said from Brian’s final response here:

Dear EDITOR’S NAME REDACTED

Thank your for response. I and my co-authors do not consider it to besatisfactory, for the following reasons.

First, no automated response was received by me; our email was simply ignored.

Second, you say that “the comment piece cited in the review did include both pro and con arguments and authors from both camps”. I assume that you are referring to the reference to Laland et al. 2015, which is the only citation given by Jablonka. This was a polemical piece, arguing for the EES [“Extended Evolutionary Synthesis”] with a few dismissive references to works by mainstream evolutionary biologists.

Third, if asking someone to review a book by their close collaborators is not a conflict of interest, it’s hard to see what would constitute one.

Fourth, you say that “it didn’t make a fresh point that would be of broad interest to readers”. The point of our letter was to make it clear that Jablonka and other advocates of the EES consistently ignore the counterarguments made by ourselves and others in the evolutionary biology and genetics community. Indeed, her review contains the same tired old mistatements about randomness of mutations and developmental constraints that she and her clique keep on making. lt’s hardly our fault that these are not novel. The title of the review “A new vision for evolution is long overdue” gives the completely misleading impression that there are serious problems with our field. This is a view that is held only by a small, but extremely vocal, fringe group, most of whom (including Jablonka) have made no significant original research contributions to the field. No other field of science seems to get this kind of treatment from Nature.

Fifth, you say that “in the end the main goal of our book reviews is to set out issues in a readable way for readers across all disciplines, and we consider that Jablonka did a reasonable job here”. This seems to assign lesser importance to scientific accuracy. Indeed, you have just published a letter about the Jablonka review by a Chinese scientist trying to revive Darwin’s long discredited theory of pangenesis. He states that the theory was published in the last edition of the Origin of Species in 1859 (in fact, the last edition was published in 1872 and contains no reference to pangenesis, which was described in Darwin’s Variation in Animals and Plants under Domestication in 1868. Seemingly, the most basic fact checking is not done by Nature).

In view of these concerns about the treatment of the field of evolutionary biology by Nature, which are shared by my cosignatories (who are all regarded as leading figures in the field, and members of various national academies), I am cc-ing this email to your chief editor.

Yours sincerely,
Brian Charlesworth

Sadly the readers of Nature who are not evolutionary biologists will now think that Lala et al.’s book has indeed shown the need for a “new vision of evolution.” Given the history of the arguments made by the authors, and Jablonka’s summary of the book in her review, there is no such need. Nature blew it by rejecting the letter, which makes essential points (especially Jablonka’s failure to say that the “new vision” is deeply controversial), and also by getting a pal of the book’s authors to review it. What kind of review did they expect?