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I don’t know much about this subject, but logically that seems to only be a good explanation if the long giraffe neck happened in a single lucky coin flip, ie i
by tobr 5y ago
I don’t know much about this subject, but logically that seems to only be a good explanation if the long giraffe neck happened in a single lucky coin flip, ie in one mutation in one individual. That goes against my intuition of how evolution works, through many small steps over many, many generations. Happy to be corrected by someone who knows more.
- naasking 5y agoIt's an arm's race. A lucky coin flip evolved a longer neck, they survived better and bred more, but then trees evolved to be taller because of the proliferation of longer necks, then a luck coin flip evolved an even longer neck, etc. Long necks aren't the only possible adaptations to get to taller trees though. For instance, tree climbing is another.
- eurasiantiger 5y agoForests are another (competition for sunlight).
- tobr 5y agoSo if it requires multiple lucky coin flips, shouldn’t we expect it to happen in many places, not just in giraffes? What explanatory power does “randomness” really have, then?
- saalweachter 5y agoIt depends how common the niche is and how accessible the body-plan is in the genetic search-space. We do see convergent evolution into the "tree" and "crab" body-plans. Dozens of unrelated species have evolved along similar lines, filling similar niches by evolving similar forms. There were long-necked animals in the past -- a well-known type of dinosaur comes to mind -- but the niche isn't so large or successful as the "eat a bunch of grass" niche.
- xbmcuser 5y agolarger the number of coin flip needed the less likely it s to happen not more.
- tobr 5y agoI don’t think so? A larger number just demonstrates that lucky coin flips are common and abundant.
- hliyan 5y agoI think chromosome selection plays a much larger role in generation-to-generation variation than mutations do (which are rare).