Re: The "fuel" of evolution

From: John Edser (edser_at_tpg.com.au)
Date: 12/07/04 

Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 21:25:32 +0000 (UTC)

Guy Hoelzer <hoelzer@unr.edu>
> >>> PS:-
> >>> In other words fitness is not a property of individuals ?

> >> GH:-
> >> Of course. I don't know of any claim to the contrary.

> > JE:-
> > Incorrect.
> > Total Darwinian fitness which at the gene level represents
> > just one epistatic fitness which remains the only scientific
> > concept of fitness within evolutionary theory
> > because it can be tested to refutation. I have
> > outlined an experiment (not just a model) that can
> > do so. Total Darwinian fitness is: the total number of
> > fertile forms reproduced into one population by
> > a parent. It is finite and not infinite and is
> > calculated as an _independent_ parental fitness.

> GH:-
> None of this relates directly to the question of whether fitness is a
> (inherent) property of individuals. As I went on to point out in the post
> from which the comment above was taken, it is a property of the
> interaction
> between individuals (at any level of organization exhibiting reproduction)
> and their environments.

JE:-
Dr Hoelzer is mistaking just a relative fitness
comparison for the totals that must exist _before_
any such comparison can become logically possible. These
totals are absolutely the property of the individual/
individuals who produced them.

> GH:-
> For example, " the total number of fertile forms
> reproduced into one population by a parent" depends on the
> qualities of the
> environment in which the individual exists.

JE:-
The environment does not produce this total
the parents do, on a fitness independent basis.
This being the case the environment can only limit
these totals. Parents attempt to maximise their
Darwinian Fitness Total no matter what environment
they may find themselves within, no exceptions.
This is because those that do not are selected
against over those that do.

> > JE:-
> > Of course none of this matters because Dr Hoelzer
> > has thrown out the Popperian process of refutation
> > for his own convenience.

> GH:-
> It would have been far more convenient to hold onto the Popperian
> notion of
> refutation, but logic demanded otherwise.

JE:-
Please provide your (so far) missing
rational for deleting Popper's entirely _basic_
requirement of providing a point of refutation
for any valid scientific theory.

Regards,

John Edser
Independent Researcher

PO Box 266
Church Pt
NSW 2105
Australia

edser@tpg.com.au

Relevant Pages

  • The Founder Selection Effect
    ... ``The founders may represent a non-random sample of the ... may indeed require special qualities to be able to enter a new environment. ... The Darwinian fitness of each parent ...
    (sci.bio.evolution)
  • Re: Hamiltons Nonsense
    ... >> totals of the altruistic allele and the ... because without any absolute fitness supposition ... > favored by selection in the extreme case in which the donor ... > rule correctly predicts that the gene will not increase ...
    (sci.bio.evolution)
  • Re: Integrity
    ... >> organism units of fitness. ... This is because Mad Hatter Mathematics within ... _fitness totals_ for the same ...
    (sci.bio.evolution)
  • Re: Absolute or just relative fitness?
    ... >> The total number of fertile forms reproduced into ... >> completed until well after that parent has died. ... I defined Darwinian fitness in box 1. ... The totals remains ...
    (sci.bio.evolution)
  • Re: Hamiltons Nonsense
    ... > totals of the altruistic allele and the ... It is only sacrificing some of its fitness ... favored by selection in the extreme case in which the donor ... rule correctly predicts that the gene will not increase ...
    (sci.bio.evolution)