On Twitter Ryan Baldini asked for a “top 5” list of evolutionary biologists. Even though this is a sharply delimited list, beyond the top two I think there is going to be debate. As for those, I think Charles Darwin and R. A. Fisher take those stops. Darwin for developing a theory of evolution that was more than purely descriptive in its power (pre-Darwinian theories were not powerful theoretical frameworks, even if they intuited the likelihood of various evolutionary processes). Fisher, for fusing Mendelian genetics with evolutionary biology, and also for being seminal in the creation of population genetics, which is arguably the most elementary system by which one can explore evolutionary processes. But below these top two I think one can go many disparate directions.
For example, Alfred Russell Wallace was there with Darwin as a proponent of natural selection as a mechanism for Darwinian evolution. In fact he was arguably a more staunch pan-selectionist than Darwin himself. Then you have the two other dominant figures in early population genetics, Sewall Wright and J. B. S. Haldane. The debates between Wright and Fisher were influential within evolutionary genetics for decades.
In the second half of the 20th century it strikes me that W. D. Hamilton and John Maynard Smith loom very large. As in the comparison between Fisher and Haldane, I think there is a difficulty in that both Hamilton and Maynard Smith were very influential and brilliant thinkers, so choosing one seems to unintentionally diminish the other. But for me W. D. Hamilton probably does rank as third on the list, behind Fisher and Darwin. And many do argue that he is their heir (in his biography Hamilton does admit his huge debt to Fisher, though later on in life he also states that he began to view Sewall Wright more favorably). Contemporary with Hamilton and Maynard Smith was George Williams, who made some important conceptual breakthroughs in the 1960s which paralleled Hamilton’s formal endeavors.
Because of the important of population genetics in modern evolutionary biology, I think I’m inclined argue that Wright and Haldane should be in the top five. That leaves only one slot, and I’d give that as I note above to Hamilton, another theorist. This is obviously a biased and subjective list. Others may differ, and I invite you to offer your own ideas.
On another note, despite my moderation policy the comments are beginning to become more frequent here. If you want a response to a comment place it on an “open thread” if it is off topic. I try and respond to queries, but I can’t keep track of it all quite a bit of the time.
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