Re: Understanding and Testing TDF (Total Darwinian FItness)


"John Edser" <edser@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:dc1enk$1g69$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> JE:-
> If a high fecund species that normally reproduces 100 immature forms in
> which only about 1.something survive to fertile adulthood then intense
> sub selection for survival must be operating at the sterile immature
> level, i.e. these sterile forms will be sub selected to be very hardy.

Hmmm. You seem to be saying that highly fecund species have intense
(sub) selective pressure on immatures, and hence that the immatures
are well adapted.

> The chance that 1 of them which is randomly selected cannot reproduce
> would depend on random mutation than just about anything else.

I would be more likely to suspect a homozygous deleterious recessive,
rather than a new mutation.

> If this
> mutation happened 1 in 100 times (which is much too high a mutation rate
> for sterility within a normal environment) then you only have a 1/100
> chance of randomly picking that mutated individual to attempt to
> maintain an equal TDF. Any high fecund species that must firstly pass an
> intense level of survival sub selection but then pass the one definitive
> selective level which maximises the reproduction of fertile forms per
> parent per population, must be highly canalised for survival and
> fertility (be highly buffered to maintain a viable fertile phenotype no
> matter what). Low fecund species can also employ survival sub selection
> but at much earlier stages of development. In humans I think it is about
> 5 fertilised eggs are naturally aborted before one of them is allowed to
> develop. The earlier a sterile form is sub selected against the cheaper
> the cost to the selected parent so the more strategy options that parent
> retains. Darwinism predicts that low fecundity parents are selected to
> be ruthless in attempting to weed out their own low in Darwinian fitness
> reproductives and do so as soon as soon as possible.

Hmmm. You seem to be saying that non-fecund species have intense
(sub) selective pressure on immatures. This seems to be the same
thing you said about fecund species. But in this case, it appears
that the selection has been ineffective, since there is still so
much spontaneous abortion.

I wish I understood evolution as well as you do so that I could see
what "Darwinism predicts".


.

Relevant Pages

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