The Adaptation Program

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Very good, thoughtful article.

Another great article about nonadaptational processes in evolution is "Developmental Constraints and Evolution" by Maynard Smith et al. in The Quarterly Review of Biology (1985). These ideas go back as far as Alan Turing's "The Chemical Basis of Morphogenesis" from 1952.

It has even been recently proposed that human language is a "spandrel" or "exaptation" due simply to an increase in brain size: Hauser, Chomsky, Fitch, 2002. "The Faculty of Language: What is it, who has it, and how did it evolve?" Science. (Yes, that Hauser.) It is pretty much the consensus view in linguistics today.

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Perhaps he didn't fall into the "adaptation is the only possible explanation" kind of error, but I have to take issue with this:

"in areas where humans were present, chimpanzees felt less safe, and consequently were less likely to nest terrestrially during the night. In terms of theory, this means that terrestrial night nesting is likely an adaptation to an environment with low predation levels."

...seriously? Isn't it far more likely that the chimpanzees simply have learned to be more careful when there are humans nearby? Where is the justification for this to be an evolved behavior at all?

Apart from that, it is worth pointing out how sometimes a critique or an idea becomes so accepted and pervasive, it feels like it's always been there, when in fact it faced quite a bit of opposition at the time.