How humanity brought about the climate crisis by departing from its evolutionary trajectory 15,000 years ago--and how we can use evolutionary principles to save ourselves from the worst outcomes. Despite efforts to sustain civilization, humanity faces existential threats from overpopulation, globalized trade and travel, urbanization, and global climate change. In
A Darwinian Survival Guide, Daniel Brooks and Salvatore Agosta offer a novel--and hopeful--perspective on how to meet these tremendous challenges by changing the discourse from sustainability to survival. Darwinian evolution, the world's only theory of survival, is the means by which the biosphere has persisted and renewed itself following past environmental perturbations, and it has never failed, they explain. Even in the aftermath of mass extinctions, enough survivors remain with the potential to produce a new diversified biosphere.
Drawing on their expertise as field biologists, Brooks and Agosta trace the evolutionary path from the early days of humans through the Late Pleistocene and the beginning of the Anthropocene all the way to the Great Acceleration of technological humanity around 1950, demonstrating how our creative capacities have allowed humanity to survive. However, constant conflict without resolution has made the Anthropocene not only unsustainable, but unsurvivable. Guided by the four laws of biotics, the authors explain how humanity should interact with the rest of the biosphere and with each other in accordance with Darwinian principles. They reveal a middle ground between apocalypse and utopia, with two options: alter our behavior now at great expense and extend civilization or fail to act and rebuild in accordance with those same principles. If we take the latter, then our immediate goal ought to focus on preserving as many of humanity's positive achievements--from high technology to high art--as possible to shorten the time needed to rebuild.
人類在15,000年前偏離了其演化軌跡，導致了氣候危機的發生，本書介紹了如何利用演化原則來避免最壞的結果。
儘管人類已經努力維持文明，但仍面臨人口過剩、全球貿易和旅行、城市化以及全球氣候變化等存在威脅的問題。在《達爾文生存指南》中，丹尼爾·布魯克斯和薩爾瓦多·阿戈斯塔提供了一個新穎且充滿希望的觀點，即通過將話語從可持續性轉向生存，來應對這些巨大挑戰。他們解釋說，達爾文的進化論是唯一的生存理論，是生物圈在過去的環境干擾後持續存在並更新自己的手段。即使在大規模滅絕之後，仍有足夠的倖存者有潛力產生新的多樣化生物圈。
布魯克斯和阿戈斯塔以野外生物學家的專業知識，追溯了人類從早期到晚更新世以及人類世的開始，一直到1950年技術人類的大加速，展示了我們的創造能力如何使人類得以生存。然而，持續的沒有解決的衝突使人類世不僅不可持續，而且無法生存。根據生物學的四個法則，作者解釋了人類應該如何根據達爾文的原則與生物圈和其他人互動。他們揭示了一個介於末日和烏托邦之間的中間地帶，有兩個選擇：現在改變我們的行為，付出巨大代價並延長文明，或者不采取行動，並根據同樣的原則重建。如果我們選擇後者，那麼我們的即時目標應該是盡可能保留人類的正面成就，從高科技到高藝術，以縮短重建所需的時間。
Daniel R. Brooks is Professor Emeritus, University of Toronto, Senior Research Fellow, H. W. Manter Laboratory of Parasitology, University of Nebraska State Museum, and Fellow of the Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study (STIAS). He is the coauthor of
The Stockholm Paradigm and
The Major Metaphors of Evolution. Salvatore J. Agosta is Associate Professor at Virginia Commonwealth University and Fellow of the Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study. He is the author of more than fifty scientific publications and coauthor of
The Major Metaphors of Evolution: Darwinism Then and Now.
丹尼爾·R·布魯克斯（Daniel R. Brooks）是多倫多大學的名譽教授，內布拉斯加州立大學博物館的H.W.曼特爾寄生蟲學實驗室的高級研究員，以及斯泰倫博斯研究所（STIAS）的研究員。他是《斯德哥爾摩範式》和《演化的主要隱喻》的合著者。
薩爾瓦多·J·阿戈斯塔（Salvatore J. Agosta）是維吉尼亞聯邦大學的副教授，也是斯泰倫博斯研究所的研究員。他是五十多篇科學論文的作者，並且是《演化的主要隱喻：達爾文主義的過去與現在》的合著者。
