Peter Saunders has been applying mathematics in biology for over 40 years, in microbiology and physiology as well as in development and evolution. He has been a critic of neo-Darwinism for almost as long. His major research interest is in the ways complex nonlinear systems differ from the simple linear systems on which most of our intuition is based. This leads, for example, to a straightforward explanation of punctuated equilibria.
He has a BA in Applied Mathematics from the University of Toronto and a PhD in Theoretical Astrophysics from the University of London. He has lectured in the University of London since 1964, first at Queen Elizabeth College and then at King’s College. He was a co-founder of the Institute of Science in Society and is still its co-director and also deputy editor of its journal Science in Society.
"The natural selection of random variations cannot provide an adequate explanation of why organisms are the way they are and how they came to be that way. For that, we must draw on all of science."
An accessible account of the mathematics of catastrophe theory, this book also shows how it can be applied in novel ways to the study of complex systems.
Beyond neo-Darwinism, an Introduction to the New Evolutionary Paradigm. (M.W. Ho and P.T. Saunders, eds). Academic Press 1984.
Theoretical Biology: Epigenetic and Evolutionary order from Complex Systems. (B.C. Goodwin and P.T. Saunders, eds). Edinburgh University Press, 1989.
Morphogenesis (Collected works of A.M. Turing, Vol 3). Elsevier, 1992.
Beyond Neo-Darwinism: An Epigenetic Approach to Evolution. M.W. Ho & P.T.Saunders. Journal of Theoretical Biology (1979) 573-591.
Neo-Darwinism (Reply to Ernst Mayr). P.T.Saunders and M.W.Ho. Times Literary Supplement, 23 November 1984, p.1342
The Organism as a Dynamical System. In Thinking about Biology, SFI Studies in the Sciences of Complexity, Lecture Notes Vol. III (F. Varela & W. Stein, eds). Addison Wesley, Reading, 1993, pp 41-63.
Evolution without Natural Selection: Further Implications of the Daisyworld Parable. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 166 (1994) 365-373.
A reappraisal of the glucose homeostat which comprehensively explains the type II diabetes mellitus – Syndrome X complex. J.H. Koeslag, P.T.Saunders & E. Terreblanche. Journal of Physiology 549.2, (2003) 333-346.
Reductio ad absurdum (Review of A. Rosenberg: Darwinian Reductionism: Or How to Stop Worrying and Love Molecular Biology). Trends in Ecology and Evolution 22 (2006) 118-119.
Evolutionary Psychology: A House Built on Sand. In Embodiment and Epigenesis: Theoretical and Methodological Issues in Understanding the Role of Biology within the Relational Developmental System Part A: Philosophical, Theoretical, and Biological Dimensions. (eds R. M. Lerner & J. B. Benson) Academic Press, New York, 2013, pp257–284.
Dynamical systems, the epigenetic landscape, and punctuated equilibria. In Handbook of Developmental Systems Theory & Methodology (eds P.C.M. Molenaar, R.M. Lerner and K.M. Newell). Guilford Press, New York, 2014, pp 154-167.
For a complete list of publications from Peter Saunders, click here.