TY - JOUR
T1 - The evolution of failure
T2 - explaining cancer as an evolutionary process
AU - Lean, Christopher
AU - Plutynski, Anya
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2015, Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht.
PY - 2016/1/1
Y1 - 2016/1/1
N2 - One of the major developments in cancer research in recent years has been the construction of models that treat cancer as a cellular population subject to natural selection. We expand on this idea, drawing upon multilevel selection theory. Cancer is best understood in our view from a multilevel perspective, as both a by-product of selection at other levels of organization, and as subject to selection (and drift) at several levels of organization. Cancer is a by-product in two senses. First, cancer cells co-opt signaling pathways that are otherwise adaptive at the organismic level. Second, cancer is also a by-product of features distinctive to the metazoan lineage: cellular plasticity and modularity. Applying the multilevel perspective in this way permits one to explain transitions in complexity and individuality in cancer progression. Our argument is a reply to Germain’s (2012) scepticism towards the explanatory relevance of natural selection for cancer. The extent to which cancer fulfills the conditions for being a paradigmatic Darwinian population depends on the scale of analysis, and the details of the purported selective scenario. Taking a multilevel perspective clarifies some of the complexities surrounding how to best understand the relevance of evolutionary thinking in cancer progression.
AB - One of the major developments in cancer research in recent years has been the construction of models that treat cancer as a cellular population subject to natural selection. We expand on this idea, drawing upon multilevel selection theory. Cancer is best understood in our view from a multilevel perspective, as both a by-product of selection at other levels of organization, and as subject to selection (and drift) at several levels of organization. Cancer is a by-product in two senses. First, cancer cells co-opt signaling pathways that are otherwise adaptive at the organismic level. Second, cancer is also a by-product of features distinctive to the metazoan lineage: cellular plasticity and modularity. Applying the multilevel perspective in this way permits one to explain transitions in complexity and individuality in cancer progression. Our argument is a reply to Germain’s (2012) scepticism towards the explanatory relevance of natural selection for cancer. The extent to which cancer fulfills the conditions for being a paradigmatic Darwinian population depends on the scale of analysis, and the details of the purported selective scenario. Taking a multilevel perspective clarifies some of the complexities surrounding how to best understand the relevance of evolutionary thinking in cancer progression.
KW - By-product of selection
KW - Cancer
KW - Darwinian populations
KW - Multilevel selection
KW - Tumors
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84957725375&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s10539-015-9511-1
DO - 10.1007/s10539-015-9511-1
M3 - Article
SN - 0169-3867
VL - 31
SP - 39
EP - 57
JO - Biology and Philosophy
JF - Biology and Philosophy
IS - 1
ER -