Peter A. Corning, who is long retired from teaching in the multi-disciplinary human biology program at Stanford University, is still active. He’s currently publishing a new MIT Press book (his seventh) on Evolution “On Purpose”: Teleonomy in Living Systems (coedited with five colleagues). Another new (trade) book, now pending, is Superorganism: A New Social Contract for Our Endangered Species. Peter is also widely recognized for his theory about the causal role of cooperative effects (functional synergy) in evolution (as opposed to the competitive “selfish gene” model), most recently in his 2018 book, Synergistic Selection: How Cooperation Has Shaped Evolution and the Rise of Humankind (World Scientific). He and his wife, Susan, now live near Seattle, close to their three children and two grandchildren (so far).
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Class of 1956