Re: Natural selection and favorable traits how were they measured

On Feb 17, 8:03 pm, wf3h <w...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Feb 17, 3:56 pm, noshellswill <noshellsw...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:



On Sun, 17 Feb 2008 06:06:26 -0800, wf3h wrote:
On Feb 16, 4:32 pm, John Harshman <jharshman.diespam...@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
backspace wrote:
Darwin:
"..I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if
useful, is preserved, by the term natural selection, in order to mark
its relation to man's power of selection. But the expression often
used by Mr. Herbert Spencer, of the Survival of the Fittest, is more
accurate ...."

Question:

Other than noting that slight variations were preserved, how were
their usefulness derived from first principles by Darwin ?

They were not. This particular bit of argument was purely theoretical
and was not a reference to any particular variations. However, unless
it's your position that no variations are useful, Darwin's argument must
be valid. Is that your position?

backspace seem to be close to arguing that variations don't even
exist. he asserts that the idea of 'alleles' is useless. kind of like
saying that brown eyes are no different than blue eyes.

JH:

Brown and blue (eyes) are ... different color. You know, that frequency
thing, or if you insist, qualia. OTOH "alleles" is a dummy variable for
cell_related sets of poly-acids. Big difference, eh, unless you're
playing the 'village Darwinist'?

believe it or not, genes determine phenotype. i know creationists dont
accept that but it's a fact.

Well..... It is a little bit more complicated than that. Sometimes
genes determine phenotype rather directly. Other times genes
determine a range of possibilities and environment influences
phenotype. In yet others environment plays a major role and genes are
minor actors. And then there are phenotypes that are the result of
chance and/or the environment with no genetic influence at all.

NS, differential reproductive success, affects, directly, the relative
reproductive success of phenotypes and only indirectly affects
genotype. The dumb, blind, insensitive, uncaring environment does not
care why you have no legs. Accident, bad genes, a combination of
factors. All that matters is whether the presence or absence of legs
makes it more or less likely that you will have reproductive success
in that environment.

NS (differential reproductive success) has *evolutionary* impact and
importance only to the extent that the phenotypes interacting with the
environment has a genetic component.

.

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