Re: On a proposal to make a correction to Wikipedia's definition of "Evolution".

On 12 Oct, 14:23, Faustino Núñez Hernández <faus...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I know that environmental conditions don't have a direct impact on
variation or mutation, which in certain sense have a randomness
component.

In this sense, it is appropriate that we wonder about mutating ,
varying or changing capacity of living organisms itself , as a
specific biological capacity regardless the environment , and
regardless the fact that environment will have the last word and will
select only some mutations .

You have to be careful here. The liiving oranism does not mutate or
change. Evolution does not happen on the individual level but on the
population level.


A classical conception would lean on the idea that environment causes
variations or mutations , insofar as it leans on the idea that
variations or mutations are oriented to environmental
(re)adaptation .

The variation and mutation are not oreintated at anything. Adaption
happens through natuaral selection carried out by the environment.

But , without denying this , we know it's not that simple , because we
don't see a simple connection between environment and mutations or
variations .

What do you mean by connection? What variations are successful is down
to environment. The actual alterations themselves are controlled in
terms of level to some degree (after all too much mutation or too
little and a population would ever be overly diverse or not be able to
adapt) but other than that it needs to be 'random' to be effective.


There must be a way how environment influences
variations , but it is truly complex and indirect .

If you are saying the environment dictates what mutations happen then
you only need to consider the mechanism needed for that to see it's
not a viable idea. There would need to be a mechanism that could
understand what gene to change to trigger off a certain result and do
it in such a way as not to upset all the other values of future
generations. You'd have to have a kind of super computer involved with
the process.

A much better way is for the changes to be random and then the
environment change this noise into signal over several generations.
Remember an individual does not mutate, the mutation happens on a very
very low level at the time of reproduction. Although you appear to
want to happen in a way more akin to a science fiction novel where
evolution is some kind of mystical force. It's not. It's a very simple
and practical process.


Perhaps it would
be also appropriate here to wonder : how should we define
"environment" ? But this is only one of many necessary questions.

Envrionment is all that an individual comes incontact with. This
includes other species and members of the same species. Environment is
a well understood aspect of evolution.


When I see how primates have developed their extremities for grabbing
the branches and adapting to arboreal life, how dolphings have
adjusted the shape of their bodies for optimal movement in water , or
how cheetah have developed their extremities for optimal movements on
terrestrial surface , I see there's a clear connection with the
environment .

There is - but a creature does not adapt to the environment - a
population does. Each generation of primates has variation in it and
that variation, when pitted agasinst the world around the primates,
leads to variations in reproductive success. So a monkey better at
climbing trees because a mutation lead to a better grip is likely to
do better than it's peers.

If evolution was guided it would be a much much quicker process but
also prone to lead to far more dead ends as each species trues to
double guess what other species are doing. You end with much more
change and potential more chaotic evolution.

It is also true that the causes why a form of life
could reach certain new environmental conditions can be very random ,
such as changes of the environment by itself , or demographic
expansions towards new places . But this observation does not reveal
us too much about connections between environment and biological
variations .

It does, it's just you don't want to accept random change filtered by
the environment. It works, it's used for pragmatic processes. The
right degree or randomeness is much better than a bad guess.


In short : there's a clear relation between environment and living
organism characteristics , but we don't know all the little details of
this relation .

There is relationship, it's standard in evolution.

It looks like things happen this way : the environment demands to
living organisms something like a general essential biological pattern
that all living organisms have to obey ; but , around this minimun
pattern , the environments admits certain variability . It is this
environmentally permitted variability that justifies the current
existence of different biological species .

Sorry but the environment demands nothing as it's not a human. It is
what it is. If it's cold, it's cold, there is no intent involved.
Don't confuse human concepts with cold hard reality.

And maybe in this case a certain randomness is also allowed .

Mutations are random, the degree of mutation appears to be controlled
by nature but it's still random and arguably needs to be to be
effective. Must genetic change is about recombining existing elements
from the genetic pool.


I suggested one new definition of evolution , but now I suggest that
maybe it would be better to admit TWO DEFINITIONS OF EVOLUTION , or a
doubled sensed definition of Evolution :

Unless you have some support for you concept, which appears to be
rather undefined and more wishful thinking than anything, the existing
definition works well.

Stew Dean


.

Relevant Pages

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