A call for book recommendations, and the old "Selfish Gene" controversy

I recently set out on a quest to familiarise myself on at least an
educated layman's level with various sciences, such as relativity,
quantum physics, evolutionary biology, and so on. A short while ago, I
read Dawkins's "The Selfish Gene", which I found eloquent, informative,
and intuitively convincing -- in short, I'll buy it -- but as a
scientist (although not a biologist), I keep my mind open to the
possibility that it (and I) may be wrong.

I gather that back in the 1970's, when "The Selfish Gene" was first
published, it was rather controversial. Now, I am lead to understand
that the gene-centric evolution theory is widely accepted. However, I
should not blind myself to the fact that the sources I have come across
-- as a reader of, and frequent "agreer" with, Richard Dawkins -- may
be biased. As such I ask you, hopefully a representative cross-section
of the evolutionary biology community, the question: Am I safe in
regarding the gene-centric view laid out by Dawkins as a generally
accepted theory; that I may, within the boundaries of empirical
scientific uncertainty, regard as fact? Is there still controversy on
this topic? Is there something I should read -- some layman-accessible
literature that presents a reasonable, opposing viewpoint?

I'm sorry to take up your time with such a non-technical question, but
I will nonetheless post this in the hope that you may think that
spreading the good word (and combating or preventing the spread of
misinformation) about evolutionary biology to an ignorant public may be
worthwhile. :-)

--
Petter Häggholm
Graduate student, Dept. of Comp. Sci.
University of British Columbia



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