50 Years Ago

Animal Dispersion in Relation to Social Behaviour. By Prof. V. C. Wynne-Edwards — The theme of this book is that over-exploitation of food resources by an animal population will lead to dissipation of the resources and deterioration of the population; that there exists an optimum level of any food resource for allowing sustained productivity; that this needs to be matched by the maintenance of an optimum level of the animal population exploiting it; and that this optimum is attained by means of the many behaviour patterns and devices (especially social ones) found among animals. The author further postulates that this end-result of evolution has been brought about in the past not by individual natural selection, but by group selection of populations ... The enormous weakness of this enormous book, so full of fascinating information, so impregnated with one particular teleological bias, is that it gives no single case-history of group selection ... Whether it occurs widely at all the courageous reader had better decide for himself.

From Nature 16 February 1963

100 Years Ago

At the end of last month the president and fellows of Harvard College voted to establish the Harvard University Press, for the publication of works of a high scholarly character ... The function of a university press should be to publish works of prime importance and distinctive merit which can rarely be profitable undertakings, but are nevertheless of high value to students in various departments of intellectual activity. This appears to be the aim of the Harvard syndics, as it is of like boards of other universities in the United States.

From Nature 13 February 1913