5 ms·

It also probably works both ways - the termites evolve to better detect parasites, so simple mimicry that worked thousands of years ago wouldn't work today. Si

It also probably works both ways - the termites evolve to better detect parasites, so simple mimicry that worked thousands of years ago wouldn't work today. Similar to the relationship of AV and malware.

satvikpendem 3y ago
Or how GANs work, two networks competing between the generator and the discriminator.
astrange 3y ago
You can also evolve the ability to evolve rapidly, eg by having areas of "configuration" genes and then "code" genes with more error correction.
- gus_massa 3y ago
  It's not exactly what you described, but there are a few weird things. For example microsatelites https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsatellite https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsatellite that are small repeated regions in genes, that are difficult to copy, so they have a bigger mutation rate. They can function as tweaking knots when you consider times that involve many generations.
thaumasiotes 3y ago
> It also probably works both ways - the termites evolve to better detect parasites, so simple mimicry that worked thousands of years ago wouldn't work today. This might or might not be true. Birds are a good example - they are subject to parasitic mimicry. One problem that a bird might have is that another bird lays one or more eggs in the first bird's nest. Theoretically, the victim bird will then incubate the egg and potentially feed and rear the nestling as if that nestling were the bird's own child. There are several points in this process where the victim has the opportunity to defend itself: - Ducks (at least some kinds) recognize the threat that another duck will lay an egg in their nest, and will fight approaching ducks to prevent them from doing this. But once the parasitic duck manages to get an egg into a victim's nest, the victim is not able to detect the foreign egg, and is stuck incubating and raising the adoptive duckling. - Some birds learn to recognize their own eggs. If they come home and find a foreign egg in their nest, they will dump that egg onto the ground. - Birds could theoretically be able to recognize nestlings of their own species. This would not help the ducks from the first example, who are victimized by their own kind. But it would help birds to defend themselves against cuckoos (and similar parasites), who lay their eggs in the nests of other species of bird. I am not aware that any species of bird has actually developed this defense, though I wouldn't be surprised if some have. Anyway, what's relevant here is that all of these defenses have failed to develop in large numbers of birds that are subject to the relevant pressures. It's definitely possible that the same simple mimicry that worked 100,000 years ago works just as well today. But it's also possible that there's been an arms race.
- mojo74 3y ago
  > Some birds learn to recognize their own eggs. If they come home and find a foreign egg in their nest, they will dump that egg onto the ground. It can also works the other way round. Remove an albatross chick from its nest and the parent doesn't recognise them and the chick will starve https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7619547/Fans-Sir-David-Attenborough-left-tears-baby-Albatross-weathers-70mph-storm.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7619547/Fans-Sir-Da... Nature eh? (Apologies for the Daily Mail link)
  - zzbzq 3y ago
    I can't make sense of what you're saying but I'm pretty sure the article you linked says the opposite
    - thaumasiotes 3y ago
      Quoting the article: > Grown Albatrosses are unable to recognise their babies by sight and only know its [sic] them if they are settled in the nest.
- shellfishgene 3y ago
  It's important to keep in mind that selective pressure dictates how fast a beneficial mutation spreads in the population. If the terminte parasites were very rare, and there are only ever one or two per termite colony that eat a very small percentage of the food, any termite queen wo evolves the ability to recognize the parasite just a bit better would not have much of advantage compared to the other colonies. The positive mutation may be lost by chance again. However if the parasites were everywhere and take 50% of a colonies food, the small improvement in detection would lead to a significant advantage in reproduction of that termite colony, and thus the mutation would spread faster.
- RoyalHenOil 3y ago
  If you are curious, there is at least one bird species (the superb fairy wren) that has been observed to abandon its nest if a cuckoo chick hatches. They sing to their eggs, and fairy wren chicks later repeat a part of that song back to the parents, while cuckoo chicks do not: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/fairy-wrens-teach-secret-passwords-to-their-unborn-chicks-to-tell-them-apart-from-cuckoo-impostors https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/fairy-wre... Only about 40% of fairy wrens abandon cuckoo chicks, which suggests that this may be a relatively new development in these birds' evolutionary arms race.

satvikpendem 3y ago

Or how GANs work, two networks competing between the generator and the discriminator.

astrange 3y ago

You can also evolve the ability to evolve rapidly, eg by having areas of "configuration" genes and then "code" genes with more error correction.

gus_massa 3y ago
It's not exactly what you described, but there are a few weird things. For example microsatelites https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsatellite https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsatellite that are small repeated regions in genes, that are difficult to copy, so they have a bigger mutation rate. They can function as tweaking knots when you consider times that involve many generations.

thaumasiotes 3y ago

> It also probably works both ways - the termites evolve to better detect parasites, so simple mimicry that worked thousands of years ago wouldn't work today. This might or might not be true. Birds are a good example - they are subject to parasitic mimicry. One problem that a bird might have is that another bird lays one or more eggs in the first bird's nest. Theoretically, the victim bird will then incubate the egg and potentially feed and rear the nestling as if that nestling were the bird's own child. There are several points in this process where the victim has the opportunity to defend itself: - Ducks (at least some kinds) recognize the threat that another duck will lay an egg in their nest, and will fight approaching ducks to prevent them from doing this. But once the parasitic duck manages to get an egg into a victim's nest, the victim is not able to detect the foreign egg, and is stuck incubating and raising the adoptive duckling. - Some birds learn to recognize their own eggs. If they come home and find a foreign egg in their nest, they will dump that egg onto the ground. - Birds could theoretically be able to recognize nestlings of their own species. This would not help the ducks from the first example, who are victimized by their own kind. But it would help birds to defend themselves against cuckoos (and similar parasites), who lay their eggs in the nests of other species of bird. I am not aware that any species of bird has actually developed this defense, though I wouldn't be surprised if some have. Anyway, what's relevant here is that all of these defenses have failed to develop in large numbers of birds that are subject to the relevant pressures. It's definitely possible that the same simple mimicry that worked 100,000 years ago works just as well today. But it's also possible that there's been an arms race.

mojo74 3y ago
> Some birds learn to recognize their own eggs. If they come home and find a foreign egg in their nest, they will dump that egg onto the ground. It can also works the other way round. Remove an albatross chick from its nest and the parent doesn't recognise them and the chick will starve https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7619547/Fans-Sir-David-Attenborough-left-tears-baby-Albatross-weathers-70mph-storm.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7619547/Fans-Sir-Da... Nature eh? (Apologies for the Daily Mail link)
- zzbzq 3y ago
  I can't make sense of what you're saying but I'm pretty sure the article you linked says the opposite
  - thaumasiotes 3y ago
    Quoting the article: > Grown Albatrosses are unable to recognise their babies by sight and only know its [sic] them if they are settled in the nest.
shellfishgene 3y ago
It's important to keep in mind that selective pressure dictates how fast a beneficial mutation spreads in the population. If the terminte parasites were very rare, and there are only ever one or two per termite colony that eat a very small percentage of the food, any termite queen wo evolves the ability to recognize the parasite just a bit better would not have much of advantage compared to the other colonies. The positive mutation may be lost by chance again. However if the parasites were everywhere and take 50% of a colonies food, the small improvement in detection would lead to a significant advantage in reproduction of that termite colony, and thus the mutation would spread faster.
RoyalHenOil 3y ago
If you are curious, there is at least one bird species (the superb fairy wren) that has been observed to abandon its nest if a cuckoo chick hatches. They sing to their eggs, and fairy wren chicks later repeat a part of that song back to the parents, while cuckoo chicks do not: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/fairy-wrens-teach-secret-passwords-to-their-unborn-chicks-to-tell-them-apart-from-cuckoo-impostors https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/fairy-wre... Only about 40% of fairy wrens abandon cuckoo chicks, which suggests that this may be a relatively new development in these birds' evolutionary arms race.