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It's hardly semantics. Many people over the past few hundred years have found it mind-bogglingly unlikely that organisms can evolve to be so purpose-built to su

It's hardly semantics. Many people over the past few hundred years have found it mind-bogglingly unlikely that organisms can evolve to be so purpose-built to survive in their environments if the only input driving that forward is the circumstances of their birth and the sheer number of organisms being produced. This study suggests that's not the only way these genetic changes happen, which makes the premise of evolution much less unlikely.

flobosg 6y ago
The structural mutation described in the study likely happened as “circumstances of their birth”: a gene insertion in the germline genome. > This study suggests that's not the only way these genetic changes happen The study says nothing about the transfer mechanism, only that it took place.
webmaven 6y ago
> It's hardly semantics. Many people over the past few hundred years have found it mind-bogglingly unlikely that organisms can evolve to be so purpose-built to survive in their environments if the only input driving that forward is the circumstances of their birth and the sheer number of organisms being produced. That's really just a failure of imagination. Also, it ignores that the mechanisms of evolution have themselves evolved. Sure, evolution seems unlikely if you assume discrete genes have to change in lockstep to adjust traits successfully (eg. if you assume that separate changes are needed to adjust bones, muscles, skin, nerves, etc. to lengthen a limb), but that isn't how our bodies wirk (if it was, it would be nearly impossible to heal from an injury), nor is it how genes control that development. Instead, you have genes that control things in less direct ways, such as body to limb ratio, and other genes that direct development of things like muscles in relation to bones and joints don't have to change at the same time for everything to keep working. Even that's an overly simplified model, but you should get the general idea. You might like to read the book "The Plausibility of Life", which goes into more detail.

flobosg 6y ago

The structural mutation described in the study likely happened as “circumstances of their birth”: a gene insertion in the germline genome. > This study suggests that's not the only way these genetic changes happen The study says nothing about the transfer mechanism, only that it took place.

webmaven 6y ago

> It's hardly semantics. Many people over the past few hundred years have found it mind-bogglingly unlikely that organisms can evolve to be so purpose-built to survive in their environments if the only input driving that forward is the circumstances of their birth and the sheer number of organisms being produced. That's really just a failure of imagination. Also, it ignores that the mechanisms of evolution have themselves evolved. Sure, evolution seems unlikely if you assume discrete genes have to change in lockstep to adjust traits successfully (eg. if you assume that separate changes are needed to adjust bones, muscles, skin, nerves, etc. to lengthen a limb), but that isn't how our bodies wirk (if it was, it would be nearly impossible to heal from an injury), nor is it how genes control that development. Instead, you have genes that control things in less direct ways, such as body to limb ratio, and other genes that direct development of things like muscles in relation to bones and joints don't have to change at the same time for everything to keep working. Even that's an overly simplified model, but you should get the general idea. You might like to read the book "The Plausibility of Life", which goes into more detail.