Re: specialization momentum
- From: "g" <gillawton@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 27 Jun 2005 01:44:15 -0400 (EDT)
"g" <gillawton@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:...
>> The Concept of Momentum of Specialization
>> By Gil Lawton
>> June 25, 2005
Title: Part II, MoS and the 'differentiation dilemma' in current stem cell
research
By: Gil Lawton
Date; June 26, 2005
In Part One, an attempt was made to introduce you, at the simplest level, to
the concept of MoS (Momentum of Specialization) and how it seems (to me, at
least) to be an essential part of the game (as it were) of evolutionary
change.
Upon finishing that, I was anticipating Part Two as the place to begin
discussing the way MoS can serve to explain
some very real and present issues facing stem cell research. I'm itching
like crazy to get on into that... but in reading back over Part One, I see
that I have made MoS look far to simple and obvious and easy to understand
than it really is. In a conceptual pyramid, each concept can be simple and
easy and obvious by itself alone, but less the task of APPLYING many such
seemingly simple things into a larger synthesis, let us remind ourselves
that the most difficult of all mathematical problems and solutions ALSO are
nothing more than skillful application of what, at the roots, are simple,
easy and obvious ideas.
So, however, simple it seems at first, I ask the reader to bear with me, and
to get a firm grip at the simple and obvious level, because there will come
a point at which the application can get a bit rigorous. Please hang in, if
the challenge seems too light just yet.)
To further clinch the idea of MoS, let me reiterate a few points that were
offered there, and add some that you may need to know from other messages
from this writer. Let me enumerate a few:
a. A mutation providing a sensory detection function, in an early ancestor
to one or more subsequent organisms, may
have been as primitive as a single axon which fired and caused a cellular
contraction that yielded the slightest advantage to an organism in the
ecology in which it was located. Say, for example, that primitive organism
(or pre-organism, capable of reproducing itself) were at the edge of a wet
rock that dried out between tides, and if it dried
out, it would lose its essential existence or reproduction capacity, so that
members of its kind that stayed wet got to
reproduce, and those that dried out, were eliminated from the game. Now let
a mutation occur in the form of something of the nature of an axon which,
when it began to dry out, twitched, and caused the organism to increase its
likelihood of rolling, or falling, onto a wet area. Although totally
speculative as to detail, it is not unlikely that such
a scenario may have occurred. If so, then the mutated progeny with the
twitch mechanism had a slightly improved
chance of continuing in the game, while those without it did not. We can
refer to the function of the twitch as a
characteristic, and to the wet versus dry scenario as a "yes" or "no" filter
(a YN filter). Just as a gambling casino only needs 51:49 odds to end up in
a sufficient number of customer gambling events, an "edge" even slighter
than
that is nonetheless an edge.
b. Let some time pass (say, a 100,000 years or so), as the members with
this characteristic far outnumber those without it and let a mutation be
imagined to occur in which whoops ! one of the offspring is born with two of
the axons, or whatever they were. (It is not important at this point to
consider whether mutations occur, since that is well established today. So
let us assume they also occurred then, and for much the same kinds of
reasons.) Let this
doubled axon (or whatever) get merely doubled.
c. Keep in mind that the reason the characteristic is advantageous is
because it gets the equivalent of a "yes-you-may-continue-as-a-player"
status at a YN filter (comparable to what occurs when circuit is "closed"
through a YN logic gate in an electronic circuit). In a later part of this
conceptual model, I shall introduce another kind of filter --
one offering three choices "yes-with-a-bonus-advantage" or
"yes-it-will-be-tolerated-but-to-no-advantage" or "no-way-Jose." For now
that is not essential to this level of the building of the conceptual
hierarchy. Am only cluing as
to what lies ahead. At this juncture, the gate opened, and that is a "Y."
d. So far, let us assume (although we could establish a different
scenario) that the fate of the organism as a whole,
is equal to the fate of the now-enhanced axon (pre-axon, ticklish spot...
whatever).
e. Let some more (evolutionary scale) time go by, within which the
characteristic encounters more Ys than its single axon contemporaries. Do
we have specialization momentum going yet? Not necessarily. To understand
"not necessarily" we have to remember that if there were only one piece of
mass in the entire universe, it could not be described as in motion. Only
if there are two such entities can they be said to be going anywhere at all,
or approaching or separating in space. Similarly, what will have to occur
is for ANOTHER mutation to occur that relates to ANOTHER kind (or other
kinds) of YN gates. We've seen how slow that can be, for the physiological
thingy that yielded a flinch reaction, so let's let this one be, say, a
quivering action that causes impurities to be pushed out, that have been
absorbed along with whatever in the environment the creature has been able
to absorb and convert some of it into energy. Because this progeny can get
rid of those impurities, it has a resultant increase in
ability to absorb what it can convert to energy, because there is more room
in there.
f. Jumping some tiny gaps in the story, we can see that we now have a
pre-primordial pre-organ spot and a quivering area and the entirety of the
organism. These three are interdependent (symbiotic). Also, the organism
as
a whole will encounter YN gate peculiar to it (such as the whole body's
being able to get through cracks, or pass
in between grains of wet sand, to encounter food), PLUS an ability to flinch
if it gets marooned and begins to dry out, PLUS a pre-pre-pre-alimentary
method (osmotic, or by way of an orifice, or whatever... makes no
difference,
since we are only acquainting with a concept for now.
g. The YN gates that will select for any future Ys or Ns will be one set
for what might change the whole body, a different set for any mutations
effecting the flinch sensor, and another set effecting the disposal of waste
products.
And, since each of these is a different "player" in the game, there will be
some YN filters with regard to how well the three can get along together.
Any one of the three, if it mutates in a way that corrupts or defeats the
function of one or both of the others, jeopardizes the capacity of the whole
team to stay in the game.
h. The possibilities for increasing the number of Ys over the number of
Xs for, say, the waste disposal function may be greater or fewer, compared
to the whole organ or to the flinch function, in direct proportion to how
many mutations would be needed to achieve a critical minimum advantage at
any given interstitial increment of change.
Also, the number of mutations which could yield advantage is dependent upon
how many variables there are in the milieu, for advantages. That is, there
may be far more complexity that can yield increments of advantage in the
processing of a sensory area for light, and a corresponding system for
INTERPRETATION of light-related stimuli,
and a corresponding system for doing some appropriate thing with the
INTERPRETED data... as compared to how many refinements might be
advantageous to absorbing or taking inside nutriment, converting some of it
to energy, and disposing of the resultant waste. Also, the organism as an
entirety, at any given time, may be in a very convenient place in the
overall continuum of the food chain at one time, but find that niche getting
grossly over-populated in another. So, not only is it unlikely that any one
of the players (full organ or clinch system or waste disposal system) will
encounter the same number of opportunities over a given span of time but
ALSO it is unlikely
each will encounter the exact same number of N gates simultaneously. And
what is more, there is NO
statistical likelihood that AS THE EXTERNAL MILIEU changes, the comparative
going as between whole, flinch, and waste characteristics will be constant.
i. What we have to consider then is that the milieu will not remain the
same, nor change at the same drumbeat pace
as time marches on, nor will the whole organism (progeny, progeny's progeny,
etc...) cease to mutate, nor will the waste disposal challenge, nor the food
internalization challenge, no the twitch challenge remain constant.
j. What we have at this point then is equivalent to a specialization
momentum dance. Morphological change would follow the classical law of
physics relating to momentum of an object of mass, provided it is not
influenced by any internal influences. But in the case of evolution we have
things changing externally ALL the time (and, more subtly perhaps, in
respect to any piece of mass in the universe. Let us assume (although it is
not a certainty) that we
would not get mutations if it were not for our little organism's getting
struck by a muon coming in from outer space, or a beta particle from radio
active decay in a rock. Again, the point here is not to answer every
question that could be asked about everything, but to construct a possible
conceptual base for going on to examine those questions in a way such that
two people are referring to the same concepts when they share knowledge (or
creative speculation) with one another.
.
- Prev by Date: Re: specialization momentum
- Next by Date: Re: specialization momentum
- Previous by thread: Re: specialization momentum
- Next by thread: Re: specialization momentum
- Index(es):
Relevant Pages
|
