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What is wrong with absolute individual fitness?

David Sloan Wilson1

  • 1Department of Biology, Binghamton University, Binghamton, NY 13902, USA. dwilson@binghamton.edu

Trends in Ecology & Evolution
|May 17, 2006
PubMed
Summary

Evolutionary fitness is relative, not absolute. Focusing on absolute fitness criteria can be misleading, especially with complex genetic and population structures, requiring models based on relative fitness differences.

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Area of Science:

  • Evolutionary Biology
  • Population Genetics

Background:

  • Evolutionary fitness is fundamentally a relative concept, comparing an organism's success to others with alternative traits.
  • Many evolutionary models incorrectly use absolute individual fitness criteria (AFC).

Purpose of the Study:

  • To highlight the limitations of absolute fitness criteria in evolutionary biology.
  • To explain when absolute fitness criteria can be justified and when they fail.
  • To advocate for models explicitly using relative fitness.

Main Methods:

  • Theoretical analysis of evolutionary principles.
  • Examination of assumptions underlying absolute fitness criteria.
  • Discussion of complex genotype-phenotype relationships and population structures.

Main Results:

  • Absolute fitness criteria are only valid under specific, often violated, assumptions like random group formation and tight coupling of phenotypic and genetic variation.
  • Complex genotype-phenotype relationships can decouple phenotypic from genetic variation, leading to non-random group variation.
  • This non-random variation can favor traits that do not maximize absolute individual fitness.

Conclusions:

  • Complex biological systems necessitate evolutionary models based on relative fitness differences within and among groups.
  • Explicitly modeling relative fitness is crucial for accurately understanding evolution in nature.
  • Revisiting evolutionary arguments framed by absolute fitness is necessary.

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