"The Selfish Gene" caused a wave of excitement among biologists and the general public when it was first published in 1976. Its vivid rendering of a gene's eye view of life, in lucid prose, gathered together the strands of thought about the nature of natural selection into a conceptual framework with far-reaching implications for our understanding of evolution. Time has confirmed its significance. Intellectually rigorous, yet written in non-technical language, "The Selfish Gene" is widely regarded as a masterpiece of science writing, and its insights remain as relevant today as on the day it was published.
Chapters:
1. Why are people?
2. The replicators
3. Immortal coils
4. The gene machine
5. Aggression stability and the selfish machine
6. Genesmanship
7. Family planning
8. Battle of the generations
9. Battle of the sexes
10. You scratch my back, I'll ride on yours
11. Memes: the new replicators
12. Nice guys finish first
13. The long reach of the gene