Re: pre-tuning to baldwin effect
- From: Stephen Harris <cyberguard-1048@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 22 May 2006 13:20:26 -0400 (EDT)
dkomo wrote:
bob the builder wrote:
When you look at evolution like this then there is much less stress on
mutation to come with novel idea's. New solutions are basicly old ones.
The novel idea has already happened. Evolution has discovered that
phenotypic plasticity is a good ability for organisms to have. That
allows them to somatically adapt to changed environments much faster
than waiting around for mutation to solve the problem of those changed
environments.
The common example is big-billed finches I think in the Canary Islands.
There was a drought and fewer seeds were produced. Finches with bigger
bills were able to crack larger nuts and survive to reproduce better.
However, the gene for a bigger bill was already in the genepool, the
big bill gene didn't mutate into existence in response to the drought.
Just about all genes fixed in the genepool were at one time mutations.
Some neutral and even harmful gene mutations become fixed and not all
beneficial mutations are fixed into the genepool, it is a propensity.
"Among philosophers of biology there has been a wide consensus that the
solution to problem of defining 'fitness' is given by treating it as a
probabilistic disposition. As such it causally intervenes between the
relationship of environments to organisms that cause it, and the actual
rates of reproduction which are its effects." From plato.stanford.edu
.
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