The Non-Mendelian Revolution - A conceptual reinterpretation of the genetic revolution

Article number 10179470

Proefschrift voorgedragen tot het behalen van de graad van Doctor in de Wijsbegeerte. Koen B. Tanghe’s The Non-Mendelian Revolution reinterprets the history of genetics through a philosophical lens, arguing that the “genetic revolution” was not merely empirical but conceptual: it marked a shift from organism- or trait-centered thinking to gene-centrism, where genes are viewed as the fundamental units of selection and biological agency. By tracing this shift from classical Mendelian frameworks to the explicit gene-centered perspective popularized by Dawkins in the 1970s, Tanghe shows how this conceptual revolution reshaped debates on heredity, evolution, and the nature-nurture relationship, highlighting that the transformation was as much about how biologists think about life as about experimental discoveries.