The ‘Major Transitions in Evolution’ (MTE) framework has emerged as the dominant paradigm for understanding the origins of life's hierarchical organization, but it has been criticized on the grounds that it lacks theoretical unity, that is, that the events included in the framework do not constitute a coherent category. I agree with this criticism, and I argue that the best response is to modify the framework so that the events it includes do comprise a coherent category, one whose members share fundamental similarities. Specifically, I recommend defining major transitions as all those, and only those, events and processes that result in the emergence of a new population of evolutionary individuals. Two sorts of change will be required to achieve this. First, events and processes that do not meet this criterion, such as the origins of the genetic code and of human language, should be excluded. Second, events and processes that do meet the criterion, but which have generally been neglected, should be included. These changes would have the dual benefits of making MTEs a philosophically coherent category and of increasing the sample size on which we may infer trends and general principles that may apply to all MTEs.

中文翻译：

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主要的转变是什么？

“进化中的重大转变”（MTE）框架已经成为理解生命等级组织起源的主导范式，但它因缺乏理论统一性而受到批评，即框架中包含的事件不构成一个连贯的类别。我同意这种批评，我认为最好的回应是修改框架，使其包含的事件确实包含一个连贯的类别，其成员具有基本的相似性。具体来说，我建议将主要转变定义为所有这些，并且仅是那些导致新的进化个体群体出现的事件和过程。要实现这一点，需要进行两种改变。首先，不符合这个标准的事件和过程，例如遗传密码和人类语言的起源，应该被排除在外。其次，应该包括符合标准但通常被忽略的事件和过程。这些变化将具有双重好处，即使 MTE 成为一个哲学上一致的类别，并增加样本量，我们可以据此推断适用于所有 MTE 的趋势和一般原则。