Evolution Driven by Organismal Behavior (PDF)

Rui Diogo is an Associate Professor at Howard University College of Medicine and a member of the Resource Faculty at the Center for the Advanced Study of Hominid Paleobiology at George Washington University. One of the youngest researchers to be nominated as Fellow of the American Association of Anatomists, he won several prestigious awards, being the only researcher to be selected for the first/second place for best article of the year in the top anatomical journal two times in just three years (2013/2015). Author or co-author of more than 100 papers in top journals, such as Nature, and of numerous book chapters, he is the co-editor of three books and the sole or first author of eleven books covering subjects as diverse as fish evolution, chordate development, and human medicine and pathology, including a book adopted at medical schools worldwide, "Learning and understanding human anatomy and pathology: an evolutionary and developmental guide for medical students."

“Rui Diogo has published a book that goes against the current in being truly large in scope but also single-authored. … The book is full of vignettes of ideas and of papers and the alternative explanations the author provides to some of the conclusions of those papers.” (Marcelo R. Sa´nchez-Villagra, Swiss Journal of Palaeontology, Vol. 137, 2018)





“In this relatively slim, but very ambitious volume, the author lays out his own view of how morphological evolution takes place in the context of the many variables that may influence its path. … the 415-entry bibliography is very impressive, and reads like a who’s who of evolutionary biology. This is an impressive work that is jam-packed with complex concepts and ideas. … everyone should find it rewarding and thought-provoking.” (John G. Fleagle, The Quarterly Review of Biology, Vol. 92 (4), December, 2017)“The book is a provocative and worthy addition to the field. … this interesting book is suitable for all four-year colleges and above. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above; faculty and professionals.” (J. Nabe, Choice, Vol. 55 (1), September, 2017) 



“The author presents an integrated picture of the origins of evolutionary theory, how it has progressed over time, and provides context for how he has developed ONCE, an integrative and unifying viewpoint about evolution that focuses on behavior of the individual organism, as opposed to a gene-based model, as a driving mechanism to evolution. This book would be useful for graduate students in the biological sciences and history and philosophy of science.” (Anne M. Burrows, Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, July, 2017)

“Rui Diogo’s new book is not only a brilliant collection of theoretical and empirical data on biological evolution but also an attempt to provide an empirically based explanation for the two most ‘difficult’ phenomena in the theory of evolution. … The book will be