Macroevolution and macroecology for the biological synthesis

Abstract

I argue for a systems approach to Evolutionary Biology, urging for more attention at the higher levels of the biological hierarchies. An example is provided on how the higher levels may constrain and enhance our knowledge of lower level phenomena. The neo-Darwinian Evolutionary Synthesis is appropriate for the organismic and populational levels. I consider Historical Biology decoupled from the populational level and basic for the development of Macroevolutionary Theory. Such a theory may function as a paradigm for cladistics, having applications in both Macroevolution and Macroecology. Biosystematics deals with the history of species and monophyla (biodiversity), while Ecosystematics deals with the history of biotas (ecodiversity). The new insights into Historical Biology produced by macroevolutionary and macroecological studies are so startling and of such broad ontological and epistemological connotations that I boldly predict an approaching revolution in the area of Historical Biology and of our present understanding of Evolutionary Theory.