Evolution Research - Evomech Forum Posts

New deadline for Yahoo Groups data request

2020-01-11T04:09:00.001+00:00

Hi Yahoo Member,

In recent weeks, we communicated the latest changes to Yahoo Groups and explained how to request a download of any content you've previously posted to the platform. Some Groups users asked us for more time, and in response to these requests, we have decided to extend the deadline. Groups users now have until Friday, January 31, 2020 at 11:59pm PST to submit a request for their data.

We have now taken down all user content from the Yahoo Groups website. However, we will continue to accept users' requests for their data until January 31, 2020, and will ensure these have been fulfilled prior to deleting the data.

For additional support, users can email YahooGroupsEscalations@verizonmedia.com and our team will troubleshoot any issues.

Best,
The Yahoo Groups team

Next Steps: The Evolution of Yahoo Groups (Final Notification)

2019-12-10T04:55:00.001+00:00

Dear Group Moderators and Members,

Last month we notified you of the changes coming to Yahoo Groups that better align with user habits, and today we are providing an update to guide you through the next steps of the transition. Yahoo Groups is not going away - but we are making adjustments to ultimately serve you better. We are amazed at the vibrant community you've created through Yahoo Groups and we want to make sure you feel supported as we introduce these changes.

The following changes were made since our last communication:

   •   Users can now only join a Yahoo Group through an invite or group request approval by the Group Moderator.
   •   New Groups can't be public. They can only be private (not listed in Groups directory, membership by invitation only) or restricted (listed in Groups directory, membership requests must be approved by a Group Moderator).
   •   Members must share all content via email, and can no longer upload or host new content on the Yahoo Groups website itself.

The following changes will be made on December 14, 2019:

   •   Public groups will no longer exist. All existing public Groups will become restricted Groups that require Group Moderator approval to join.
   •   Any content that was previously uploaded via the website will be removed.

If you would like to keep any of the content you've posted or stored within your Yahoo Group, please download it by December 14 by accessing the Groups Download Manager at this link. Once you provide your preferred email address, we will send you a confirmation of your download request and notify you once the download is complete.

You will receive a link to a downloadable zip file via email for each of your Groups organized into a separate folder. Download time varies depending on the amount of information and file size.

If your download request is made by 11:59pm PST on Saturday, December 14, 2019, your content will not be deleted until your download is complete. We are unable to accommodate any download requests made after this deadline.

This is the final reminder to download your content. You can find additional information about the upcoming changes here.

We have worked extensively with our customer support team to develop recommendations for tools that can help you with any download issues. See help article here.

We have watched the evolution of Yahoo Groups with awe, as we grew to a community of millions with over 10 million Groups. Every day, we witness the power of community and shared passions, and our mission is to provide a platform for the strong connections people make with each other around their interests.

We thank you for being part of the Yahoo Groups community and look forward to continuing to provide ways for you to connect with one another about your shared interests and passions.

Sincerely,
The Groups Team

Evolution of Yahoo Groups

2019-11-02T00:51:00.001+00:00

Dear Group Moderators and Members,

Thank you for your commitment to Yahoo and for helping us define the power of digital communities. Eighteen years ago, we combined the functionality of a site called eGroups.com with a precursor community platform called Yahoo Clubs to launch Yahoo Groups. Since then, you and millions of others have helped prove our hypothesis, by creating and joining more than 10 Million groups.

A lot has changed about the Internet since 2001, including the ways most people now use Yahoo Groups. Today, most Yahoo Groups activity happens in your email inbox, not on the bulletin boards where Yahoo Groups started in the pre-smartphone age. Increasingly, people want content and connections coming directly to them, and this is why we continue to invest in Yahoo Mail -- including the recent launch of a new Yahoo Mail app that is currently the highest-rated email app in the App Store and Google Play.

So, as our users' habits have evolved, we have begun the process of evolving our approach to help active Yahoo Groups thrive and migrate to our email platform. To help you plan for these changes, below is the schedule of how this transition will happen.

Beginning October 28, 2019:

Users will be able to join a Yahoo Group only through an invite from the Group Moderator or by submitting a request to join a Group, which requires approval by the Group Moderator.
Since we are moving Group communication from posting on message boards to email distribution, uploading and hosting of new content will also be disabled on the Yahoo Groups website.

Beginning December 14, 2019:

All Groups will be made private and any content that was previously uploaded via the website will be removed. We believe privacy is critical and made this decision to better align with our overall principles.
If you would like to keep any of the content you've posted or stored in the past within your Yahoo Group, please download it by December 14 by accessing this link.

As these dates get closer, we will send follow-up reminders. More information about the upcoming changes can be found here.

While this evolution of Yahoo Groups is inspired by how we see the platform being used today, we know change can be difficult. Here are a few important facts as we make this transition:

1. Yahoo Groups is not going away - We know that our users are deeply passionate about connecting around shared interests, and we are evolving Groups to better align with how you use it today.

2. New groups can still be formed - Users can continue to connect with others around their common bonds and interests. From animal rescues to sporting and activity groups, civic organizations to local PTAs, members of our Yahoo Groups will remain connected and able to share their activities and interests. All of the content that you have shared previously on the website, can continue to be shared via email.

We know that Yahoo Groups is an important online extension of your real-life group of friends, interests and communities, and we are committed to supporting communities that rely on Yahoo Groups. Thanks for coming along with us this far. We look forward to seeing where the technology -- and you -- take us in the decades to come.

Sincerely,
The Groups Team

[evomech] New theory of environmental inheritance ('05 Press Release)

2006-08-11T15:09:00.000+01:00

New research has provided evidence for 'environmental inheritance', a radical theory of transgenerational genetic adaptation proposed by Professor Marcus Pembrey of the Institute of Child Health, UCL in the mid 1990's

The latest evidence challenges accepted thinking on genetic inheritance, suggesting that historic events can contribute to some common modern illnesses.

The research, published by the Children of the 90s study based at the University of Bristol in collaboration with Umea University, Sweden, could have far-reaching implications for our understanding of modern health epidemics - such as obesity or cardiovascular disease.

Conventionally scientists believe that how we develop as adults depends on two factors - the genes (DNA) we inherit from our parents, and the environmental influences, such as diet, lifestyle, exposure to pollution from conception onwards.

Professor Marcus Pembrey, who is also head of Genetics at Children of the 90s, says that over the long term, the process of Darwinian evolution by random errors in DNA followed by natural selection ensures that the human race adapts to changes in our environment. But it takes very many generations.

Now there is evidence for another mechanism which no-one had considered... some of the father's own experiences in his childhood are captured in some way by his sperm, so affecting the genes that he bequeaths to his descendants.

Also see:

'Cardiovascular and diabetes mortality determined by nutrition'

John Latter / Jorolat

Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism (based on an extension to homeostasis) linking Adaptive Mutations to the Baldwin Effect:
http://members.aol.com/jorolat/index.html

Evolution Research Blog:
http://evomech.blogspot.com/

technorati tags: research, theory, adaptation, marcus+pembrey, obesity, cardiovascular, disease, genes, dna, parents, diet, lifestyle, pollution, genetics, darwinian, evolution, natural+selection, environment, mechanism, sperm

Please Note: If you are reading this in a Blog then replying directly to this message (as opposed to making a 'blog comment') requires membership of the 'Evolution: Where Darwin meets Lamarck?' Egroup at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/evomech/

[evomech] UF scientists discover evolutionary origin of fins, limbs

2006-07-27T16:20:00.000+01:00

Gainesville, Florida: - Performance on the dance floor may notalways show it, but people are rarely born with two left feet. We havegenes that instruct our arms and legs to grow in the right places andpoint in the right directions. They also provide for the spaces betweenour fingers and toes and every other formative detail of our limbs.

Evolutionarilyspeaking, the genetic instructions used to construct and position ourlimbs were being perfected more than half a billion years ago infishes, not along the sides of the body where the fins that precededhuman arms and legs sprouted, but at the midline that runs along thebackbone and belly.

This midline - think of the dorsal, tail andanal fins of a fish - is where the genetic template to produce finsoriginated, about 100 million years before paired fins evolved andabout 200 million years before paired fins evolved into limbs,according to University of Florida genetics researchers. The findings,published online today in the journal Nature, also provide insight intothe evolutionary history of genes involved in human birth defects.[evolution, origin]

[The Nature paper is currently available here but the link won't work for long because it's an advance publication - email if you have any problems.]

technorati tags: florida, genes, limbs, fishes, fins, body, midline, template, nature, evolution, history, origin

John Latter / Jorolat

Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism (based on an extension to homeostasis) linking Adaptive Mutations to the Baldwin Effect:
http://members.aol.com/jorolat/index.html

Evolution Research Blog:
http://evomech3.blogspot.com/

[evomech] [Update] Re: The Spandrels of San Marco and the Panglossian Paradigm

2006-07-19T21:50:00.000+01:00

--- In evomech@yahoogroups.com, "John Latter" <jorolat@...> wrote:
>
>
> --- In evomech@yahoogroups.com, "jorolat" jorolat@a... wrote:
> >
> > [Gould & Lewontin, Royal Society of London, '78]
> >
> > Abstract:
> >
> > "An adaptationist programme has dominated evolutionary thought in
> > england and the United States during the past forty years. It is
> > based on faith in the power of natural selection as an optimizing
> > agent. It proceeds by breaking an organism into unitary "traits" and
> > proposing an adaptive story for each considered separately. Trade-
> > offs among competing selective demands exert the only brake upon
> > perfection; nonoptimality is thereby rendered as a result of
> > adaptation as well. We criticize this approach and attempt to
> > reassert a competing notion (long popular in continental Europe) that
> > organisms must be analyzed as integrated wholes, with baupläne so
> > constrained by phyletic heritage, pathways of development, and
> > general architecture that the constraints themselves become more
> > interesting and more important in delimiting pathways of change than
> > the selective force that may mediate change when it occurs. We fault
> > the adaptationist programme for its failure to distinguish current
> > utility from reasons for origin (male tyrannosaurs may have used
> > their diminutive front legs to titillate female partners, but this
> > will not explain why they got so small); for its unwillingness to
> > consider alternatives to adaptive stories; for its reliance upon
> > plausibility alone as a criterion for accepting speculative tales;
> > and for its failure to consider adequately such competing themes as
> > random fixation of alleles, production of nonadaptive structures by
> > developmental correlation with selected features (allometry,
> > pleiotropy, material compensation, mechanically forced correlation),
> > the separability of adaptation and selection, multiple adaptive
> > peaks, and current utility as an epiphenomenon of nonadaptive
> > structures. We support Darwin's own pluralistic approach to
> > identifying the agents of evolutionary change."
> >
> > Full text at:
> >
> > http://www.aaas.org/spp/dser/evolution/science/spandrel.htm
> >
> > [Bookmarked]
> >
> > Jorolat
>
> Now available at:
>
> http://www.aaas.org/spp/dser/evolution/history/spandrel.shtml
>
> John
> -- Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism (based on an extension to homeostasis) linking Adaptive Mutations to the Baldwin Effect:
> http://members.aol.com/jorolat/index.html Evolution: Where Darwin meets Lamarck? Discussion Forum:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/evomech/
>

Now available at:

http://www.aaas.org/spp/dser/03_Areas/evolution/perspectives/Gould_Lewontin_1979.shtml

Wish they would stop moving it! :)

John Latter / Jorolat

technorati tags: gould, lewontin, spandrels, san+marco, paradigm

[evomech] Re: Origin of Instincts

2006-06-15T07:53:00.000+01:00

--- In evomech@yahoogroups.com, "alexbertoglio" <alexbertoglio@...> wrote:
>
> I have searched the internet, talkorigins, Baldwinian explanations,
> and the post archive here and been unable to find a good explanation
> of how instincts (not reflexes) originate.
>
> My dad is reading the book "Improbable" by Adam Fawer, and apparently
> it makes a case for a "shared consciousness" to explain instincts that
> are not coded for in DNA. I have tried to explain the Baldwinian
> effect to him but I cannot explain how exactly the DNA itself passes
> instincts.
>
> According to the book, Biologists have been unable to explain how
> babies have the instinct (or skills) to walk, without ever seeing
> walking in action.
>
> I plan on reading "Improbable" to find out exactly what it says, but
> can anyone explain how instincts are formed?
>
> And can anyone explain why the concept of "shared consciousness" is
> used in this regard? I havn't read the book yet, but apparently the
> point is that some things that don't pass by DNA are instead contained
> in everyone, in some meta-physical sense. I don't buy it, but maybe
> someone with more education in meta-physics can explain it better.
>

Hi Alex,

Perhaps someone more knowledgeable than I could give you anexplanation in terms of conventional theory but I doubt one exists.

Personally, I'm interested in the possibility of an homeostaicinternal evolutionary mechanism. The phenomena of instinct issupportive of this proposal but a coherent explanation from thisperspective is a bit further down the line at the moment.

I'm slightly intrigued by what 'shared conciousness' may mean althoughI'm not particularly interested in anything that can't be tested.

John Latter / Jorolat

technorati tags: internal, evolutionary, mechanism, metaphysics, dna, improbable, instinct, consciousness

[evomech] Origin of Instincts

2006-06-14T07:38:00.000+01:00

I have searched the internet, talkorigins, Baldwinian explanations,
and the post archive here and been unable to find a good explanation
of how instincts (not reflexes) originate.

My dad is reading the book "Improbable" by Adam Fawer, and apparently
it makes a case for a "shared consciousness" to explain instincts that
are not coded for in DNA. I have tried to explain the Baldwinian
effect to him but I cannot explain how exactly the DNA itself passes
instincts.

According to the book, Biologists have been unable to explain how
babies have the instinct (or skills) to walk, without ever seeing
walking in action.

I plan on reading "Improbable" to find out exactly what it says, but
can anyone explain how instincts are formed?

And can anyone explain why the concept of "shared consciousness" is
used in this regard? I havn't read the book yet, but apparently the
point is that some things that don't pass by DNA are instead contained
in everyone, in some meta-physical sense. I don't buy it, but maybe
someone with more education in meta-physics can explain it better.

[evomech] Self-Organization, Emergence and the Architecture of Complexity

2006-03-20T07:57:00.000+00:00

Heylighen F. (1989): "Self-Organization, Emergence and the Architecture of Complexity", in:
Proceedings of the 1st European Conference on System Science, (AFCET, Paris), p. 23-32.

Abstract:

It is argued that the problems of emergence and the architecture of complexity can be solved by analysing the self-organizing evolution of complex systems. A generalized, distributed variation selection model is proposed, in which internal and external aspects of selection and variation are contrasted. "Relational closure" is introduced as an internal selection criterion. A possible application of the theory in the form of a pattern directed computer system for supporting complex problem-solving is sketched.

Full text at:

http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/Papers/SelfArchCom.pdf

John Latter

Evolution: Research Blog | Website | Blog Mad | Webring

technorati tags: self-organization, complexity, evolution

Re: [evomech] Re: Darwin on trial (online book)

2006-03-20T05:24:00.000+00:00

On 19/03/2006 johnhewitt22 wrote:
> Dear All,
>
> I have never seen this book, by Phillip E. Johnson, but I have to say
> that, at a cursory reading, it seems rather good.
>
> Perhaps we could have an update on the author. Who is he? What is the
> backgound of the e-book?
>
> Sincerely
>
> John Hewitt

Hi John,

The last I heard of Johnson he was an IDist law professor at Berkeley. Here are a couple of links:

"Welcome. This page presents Professor Johnson's works, primarily
in the area of origins. On this page, you will also find his speaking schedule."
http://www.origins.org/pjohnson/pjohnson.html

"Articles by Phillip Johnson"
http://www.arn.org/authors/johnson_articles.html

I first came across Johnson in my search for more information about Grasse:

"MY STARTING POINT is a book review that Theodosius Dobzhansky published in 1975, critiquing Pierre Grasse's The Evolution of Life.{1} Grasse, an eminent French zoologist, believed in something that he called "evolution." So did Dobzhansky, but when Dobzhansky used that term he meant neo-Darwinism, evolution propelled by random mutation and guided by natural selection. Grasse used the same term to refer to something very different, a poorly understood process of transformation in which one general category (like reptiles) gave rise to another (like mammals), guided by mysterious "internal factors" that seemed to compel many individual lines of descent to converge at a new form of life."

From "Darwin's Rules of Reasoning" at:
http://www.leaderu.com/orgs/fte/darwinism/chapter1.html

Hope this helps!

John Latter

--

Evolution: Research Blog | Website | Blog Mad | Webring

technorati tags: internal+factors, natural+selection, random+mutations, grasse, johnson, berkeley, dna, dobzhansky, evolution

[evomech] Re: Darwin on trial (online book)

2006-03-19T11:53:00.000+00:00

Dear All,

I have never seen this book, by Phillip E. Johnson, but I have to say
that, at a cursory reading, it seems rather good.

Perhaps we could have an update on the author. Who is he? What is the
backgound of the e-book?

Sincerely

John Hewitt

[evomech] Regulating General Mutation Rates: Examination of the Hypermutable State Model for Cairnsian Adaptive Mutation

2006-03-19T07:47:00.000+00:00

Genetics, Vol. 163, 1483-1496, April 2003, Copyright 2003
Regulating General Mutation Rates: Examination of the Hypermutable State Model for Cairnsian Adaptive Mutation
John R. Rotha, Eric Kofoid, Frederick P. Roth, Otto G. Bergc, Jon Segera, and Dan I. Andersson

Abstract:

In the lac adaptive mutation system of Cairns, selected mutant colonies but not unselected mutant types appear to arise from a nongrowing population of Escherichia coli. The general mutagenesis suffered by the selected mutants has been interpreted as support for the idea that E. coli possesses an evolved (and therefore beneficial) mechanism that increases the mutation rate in response to stress (the hypermutable state model, HSM). This mechanism is proposed to allow faster genetic adaptation to stressful conditions and to explain why mutations appear directed to useful sites. Analysis of the HSM reveals that it requires implausibly intense mutagenesis (105 times the unselected rate) and even then cannot account for the behavior of the Cairns system. The assumptions of the HSM predict that selected revertants will carry an average of eight deleterious null mutations and thus seem unlikely to be successful in long-term evolution. The experimentally observed 35-fold increase in the level of general mutagenesis cannot account for even one Lac+ revertant from a mutagenized subpopulation of 105 cells (the number proposed to enter the hypermutable state). We conclude that temporary general mutagenesis during stress is unlikely to provide a long-term selective advantage in this or any similar genetic system.

Full text at:

http://www.genetics.org/cgi/content/full/163/4/1483

John Latter

technorati tags: adaptive, cairns, mechanism, e.coli

Evolution: Research Blog | Website | Blog Mad | Webring

[evomech] Darwin on trial (online book)

2006-03-18T07:24:00.000+00:00

LIBRARY OF THE FUTURE (R) Series Third Edition Ver. 4.3

1991 DARWIN ON TRIAL by Phillip E. Johnson
(C) Copyright 1991, Phillip E. Johnson
Used with permission of Phillip E. Johnson and Regnery Gateway Publishing Co.
Electronically Enhanced Text
(c) Copyright 1993 World Library, Inc.

CONTENTS:

Chapter One: The Legal Setting

Chapter Two: Natural Selection As a Tautology As a Scientific Hypothesis As a Deductive Argument As a Philosophical Necessity

Chapter Three: Mutations Great and Small

Chapter Four: The Fossil Problem

Chapter Five: The Fact of Evolution

Chapter Six: The Vertebrate Sequence Fish to Amphibians Amphibians to Reptiles Reptiles to Mammals Reptile to Bird From Apes to Humans

Chapter Seven: The Molecular Evidence

Chapter Eight: Prebiological Evolution

Chapter Nine: The Rules of Science

Chapter Ten: Darwinist Religion

Chapter Eleven: Darwinist Education

Chapter Twelve: Science and Pseudoscience Research Notes

Full text at:

http://www.geocities.com/kubyimm2/darwin-on-trial-phillip-johnson.txt

John Latter

--

Evolution: Research Blog | Website | Blog Mad | Webring

technorati tags: research, evolution, reptiles, amphibians, mammals, apes, science, johnson

[evomech] At Berkeley: Intelligently Designed Molecular Evolution (Research

2006-03-17T07:56:00.000+00:00

BERKELEY, CA - Evolutionary paths to new therapeutic drugs, as well as a wide assortment of other enzyme products, have been created through, of all things, intelligent design. A team of researchers with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the University of California at Berkeley have developed a technique in which the evolution of an important class of proteins is steered towards a desired outcome.

"We've taken enzymes that are promiscuous, meaning they have the capacity to evolve along many different functional lines, and trained them to become specialists," said chemical engineer Jay Keasling, who led this study.

Full text at:

http://www.lbl.gov/Science-Articles/Archive/PBD-molecular-evolution.html

John Latter

--

Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism:

http://members.aol.com/jorolat/index.html

technorati tags: intelligent+design, evolution, berkeley, study

[evomech] Function and the Evolution of Phenotypic Stability: Connecting Pattern to Process

2006-03-16T07:27:00.000+00:00

American Zoologist: Vol. 41, No. 3, pp. 552 - 563.
Function and the Evolution of Phenotypic Stability: Connecting Pattern to Process
Kurt Schwenk and Gunter P. Wagner

Abstract:

Phenotypes manifest a balance between the inherited tendency to remain the same (phenotypic stability) and the tendency to change in response to current environmental conditions (adaptation). This paper explores the role of functional integration and functional trade-offs in generating phenotypic stability by limiting the responses of individual characters to environmental selection. Evolutionarily stable configurations (ESCs) are systems of functionally interacting characters within which characters are 'judged' by their contribution to system-level functionality. This 'internal' component of selection differs from traditional 'external' selection in that it travels with the organism wherever it goes and is maintained across a wide range of environments. External selection, in contrast, is by definition environment-dependent. The temporal and geographic constancy of internal selection therefore acts to maintain phenotypic stability even as environments change. Functional trade-offs occur when one character participates in more than one function, but can only be optimized for one. Participation of certain ('keystone') characters in a trade-off potentially causes stabilization of an entire system owing to a cascade of functional dependencies on that character. Phylogenetic character analysis is an essential part of elucidating these processes, but patterns cannot be used as prima facie evidence of particular processes.

Full text at: http://icb.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/41/3/552

John Latter

--

Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism:
http://members.aol.com/jorolat/index.html

technorati tags: environmental, systems, adaptation, selection, patterns, phenotypes

[evomech] From Epigenesis to Epigenetics: The Case of C. H. Waddington

2006-03-15T07:48:00.000+00:00

Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 981:61-81 (2002)
2002 New York Academy of Sciences
From Epigenesis to Epigenetics
The Case of C. H. Waddington
Linda Van Speybroeck

Abstract:

One continuous thread in this volume is the name of Conrad H. Waddington (1905-1975), the developmental biologist known as the inventor of the term epigenetics. After some biographical notes on his life, this article explores the meaning of the Waddingtonian equation and the context wherein it was developed. This equation holds that epigenesis + genetics = epigenetics, and refers in retrospect to the debate on epigenesis versus preformationism in neoclassical embryology. Whereas Waddington actualized this debate by linking epigenesis to developmental biology and preformation to genetics, thereby stressing the importance of genetic action in causal embryology, today's epigenetics more and more offers the possibility to enfeeble biological thinking in terms of genes only, as it expands the gene-centric view in biology by introducing a flexible and pragmatically oriented hierarchy of crucial genomic contexts that go beyond the organism.

Full text at:

http://www.uv.mx/evargas/CienciaSagrada/TextosFundamentales/Speybroeck.pdf

John Latter

Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism:
http://members.aol.com/jorolat/index.html

technorati tags: waddington, epigenetics, epigenesis, genetics, embryology, biology

[evomech] The Return of Hopeful Monsters (Stephen Jay Gould)

2006-03-14T08:37:00.000+00:00

"The Return of Hopeful Monsters" Natural History magazine 86 (June 1976): 24, 30.

Big Brother, the tyrant of George Orwell's 1984, directed his daily Two Minutes Hate against Emmanuel Goldstein, enemy of the people. When I studied evolutionary biology in graduate school during the mid-1960s, official rebuke and derision focused upon Richard Goldschmidt, a famous geneticist who, we were told, had gone astray. Although 1984 creeps up on us, I trust that the world will not be in Big Brother's grip by then. I do, however, predict that during this decade Goldschmidt will be largely vindicated in the world of evolutionary biology.

Goldschmidt, a Jewish refugee from Hitler's decimation of German science, spent the remainder of his career at Berkeley, where he died in 1958. His views on evolution ran afoul of the great neo-Darwinian synthesis forged during the 1930s and 1940s and continuing today as a reigning, if insecure, orthodoxy. Contemporary neo-Darwinism is often called the "synthetic theory of evolution" because it united the theories of population genetics with the classical observations of morphology, systematics, embryology, biogeography, and paleontology.

The core of this synthetic theory restates the two most characteristic assertions of Darwin himself: first, that evolution is a two-stage process (random variation as raw material, natural selection as a directing force); secondly, that evolutionary change is generally slow, steady, gradual, and continuous.

Full text at:

http://www.evolutionary.tripod.com/gould_nh_86_22-30.html

John Latter

--

Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism:
http://members.aol.com/jorolat/index.html

technorati tags: gould, natural+selection, george+orwell, 1984, biology, berkeley, evolution

[evomech] Major transitions in animal evolution: A developmental genetic perspective

2006-03-13T07:53:00.000+00:00

American Zoologist, 1998, by Holland, Peter W H

Synopsis

Several phases of animal evolution have undergone radical change in developmental mechanisms. I refer to these as major transitions in animal evolution. The six most important transitions in the lineage leading to humans are proposed to be: the origin of multicellularity, the origin of two-germ layers and radial symmetry, the origin of three-germ layers and bilateral symmetry, dorsoventral axis inversion, the origin of vertebrates, the origin of gnathostomes. Here I discuss the genetic changes that may have underlain these transitions. The last two transitions were accompanied by, and possibly facilitated by, large increases in gene number. This probably occurred by tetraploidy, with some of the duplicate genes being subsequently lost. The origin of three germ-layers, bilateral symmetry and a through gut also probably involved gene duplication; in this case, duplication of an ancestral ProtoHox gene cluster to yield two paralogous homeobox gene clusters, Hox and ParaHox, with roles in patterning different germ layers along the anteroposterior body axis. This event may provide a partial genetic explanation for the Cambrian explosion.

Full text at:

http://www.looksmartscience.com/p/articles/mi_qa3746/is_199812/ai_n8819584

John Latter

Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism:
http://members.aol.com/jorolat/index.html

technorati tags: cambrian, explosion, evolution, vertebrates, gene

[evomech] Natural selection and its limits: Where ecology meets evolution (Pigliucci)

2006-03-12T08:04:00.000+00:00

Pigliucci, M. (2004) Natural selection and its limits: Where ecology meets evolution. In: Casagrandi, R. & Melià, P. (Eds.) Ecologia. Atti del XIII Congresso Nazionale della Società Italiana di Ecologia (Como, 8-10 settembre 2003). Aracne, Roma, p. 29-34.

Abstract:

Natural selection [Darwin 1859] is perhaps the most important component of evolutionary theory, since it is the only known process that can bring about the adaptation of living organisms to their environments [Gould 2002]. And yet, its study is conceptually and methodologically complex, and much attention needs to be paid to a variety of phenomena that can limit the efficacy of selection [Antonovics 1976; Pigliucci and Kaplan 2000]. In this essay, I will use examples of recent work carried out in my laboratory to illustrate basic research on natural selection as conducted using a variety of approaches, including field work, laboratory experiments, and molecular genetics. I also discuss the application of this array of tools to questions pertinent to conservation biology, and in particular to the all-important problem of what makes invasive species so good at creating the sort of problems they are infamous for [Lee 2002].

Full text at:

http://www.xiiicongresso.societaitalianaecologia.org/articles/Pigliucci.pdf

John Latter

--

Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism:
http://members.aol.com/jorolat/index.html

technorati tags: natural+selection, ecology, evolution, darwin, gould, research, genetics, complex

[evomech] Separation of Man and Ape Down to Gene Expression (PR + Article)

2006-03-11T06:21:00.000+00:00

Contents:

1) Separation of Man and Ape Down to Gene Expression

Humans and chimpanzees have in common more than 98 percent of DNA and 99 percent of genes. Yet, in looks and behavior we are very different from them. For more than 30 years--well before either the human or chimpanzee genome had been sequenced--scientists have speculated that this might be due to the way that the common genes express themselves rather than differences in the genes themselves. A new comparison published in Nature seems to prove that theory.

Full text at:

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?chanID=sa003&articleID=0005FB4D-6102-140F-A10283414B7F0000

2) Expression profiling in primates reveals a rapid evolution of human transcription factors

[Gilad et al, Nature, March '06]

Although it has been hypothesized for thirty years that many human adaptations are likely to be due to changes in gene regulation1, almost nothing is known about the modes of natural selection acting on regulation in primates. Here we identify a set of genes for which expression is evolving under natural selection. We use a new multi-species complementary DNA array to compare steady-state messenger RNA levels in liver tissues within and between humans, chimpanzees, orangutans and rhesus macaques. Using estimates from a linear mixed model, we identify a set of genes for which expression levels have remained constant across the entire phylogeny (approx70 million years), and are therefore likely to be under stabilizing selection. Among the top candidates are five genes with expression levels that have previously been shown to be altered in liver carcinoma. We also find a number of genes with similar expression levels among non-human primates but significantly elevated or reduced expression in the human lineage, features that point to the action of directional selection. Among the gene set with a human-specific increase in expression, there is an excess of transcription factors; the same is not true for genes with increased expression in chimpanzee.

Full text at:

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v440/n7081/full/nature04559.html

PDF:

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v440/n7081/pdf/nature04559.pdf

[Evolution] Contact me if you have any problems.

John Latter

--

Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism:
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technorati tags: natural+selection, dna, human, chimpanzee, evolution, nature, genes, rna

[evomech] Epigenetic vs. Genetic, a story of the evolution of the germline

2006-03-10T08:17:00.000+00:00

[Lachmann & Sella, SFI Working Paper]

Abstract:

Differentiation of multicellular organisms is controlled by epigenetic markers transmitted through cell division. Many of the systems that encode these markers exist also in unicellulars, but in unicellulars these systems do not control differentiation. Thus during the evolution of multicellularity, epigenetic inheritance systems were exapted for their current use in differentiation. During this transition there must have been stages at which epigenetic information passed between generations to an even larger extent than it does now. We show that this can lead to the evolution of cells that do not contribute to the progeny of the organism, and thus to a germline-soma distinction. This hints that an intrinsic instability during a transition from unicellulars to multicellulars may be the reason wide spread of the evolution of germ line.

Full text at:

http://www.santafe.edu/sfi/publications/Working-Papers/03-02-012.pdf

John Latter

--

Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism:
http://members.aol.com/jorolat/index.html

technorati tags: epigenetic, germ, line, inheritance, evolution

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[evomech] Re: Complexity in Biological Signaling Systems (Science)

2006-03-09T08:11:00.000+00:00

--- In evomech@yahoogroups.com, "John Latter" <jorolat@...> wrote:
>
> [Weng, Bhalla, & Iyengar , Science, Apr '99]
>
>
> Introduction:
>
> "Biological signaling pathways interact with one another to form
> complex networks. Complexity arises from the large number of
> components, many with isoforms that have partially overlapping
> functions; from the connections among components; and from the
> spatial relationship between components. The origins of the complex
> behavior of signaling networks and analytical approaches to deal with
> the emergent complexity are discussed here."
>
> Full text (PDF file) at:
>
> http://www.csc.liv.ac.uk/~m1pk/Projects/bhalla%202.pdf
> (begins halfway down the first page)
>
>
> Jorolat

Now available at:

http://www.ncbs.res.in/~faculty/upi_file/upi_papers/weng_bhalla_iyengar_Science1999.pdf

John Latter

Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism:
http://members.aol.com/jorolat/index.html

technorati tags: complex, behavior, complexity

[evomech] The inheritance of features (Biology and Philosophy)

2006-03-08T07:31:00.000+00:00

Mameli, Biology and Philosophy (2005) 20:365–399

Abstract:

Since the discovery of the double helical structure of DNA, the standard account of the inheritance of features has been in terms of DNA-copying and DNA-transmission. This theory is just a version of the old theory according to which the inheritance of features is explained by the transfer at conception of some developmentally privileged material from parents to offspring. This paper does the following things: (1) it explains what the inheritance of features is; (2) it explains how the DNA-centric theory emerged; (3) it clarifies the relation between the DNA-centric theory and the 'unfolding' theory of development; (4) it argues that (given what we now know about developmental processes and genetic activity) the DNA-centric theory should be abandoned in favour of a pluralistic (but not holistic) theory of the inheritance of features. According to this pluralistic theory, the reliable reoccurrence of phenotypes must be explained by appealing not only to processes responsible for the reliable reoccurrence of genetic developmental factors but also to processes responsible for the reliable reoccurrence (or persistence) of nongenetic environmental factors.

Full text at:

http://www.phil.cam.ac.uk/~gmm32/MAMELI_INHERITANCE_2005.pdf

John Latter

--

Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism:
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technorati tags: dna, inheritance, features, theory, phenotypes

[evomech] [News] Stowers Scientists Demonstrate Mechanism of Vertebral Formation

2006-03-07T09:03:00.000+00:00

Kansas City, Mo. (March 6, 2006) - Jacqueline Kim Dale, Ph.D., formerly a Senior Research Associate at the Stowers Institute for Medical Research, and Olivier Pourquie, Ph.D., Stowers Institute Investigator and an investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, have demonstrated that the long-studied family of transcription factors called Snail is expressed in a cyclic fashion during the formation of the vertebral precursors in the mouse and chick embryo.

The findings, which were published in the March 7 issue of Developmental Cell, indicate that the genes governing many cellular properties are downstream of the segmentation clock, the mechanism that controls the formation of the vertebral column.

Full text at:

http://www.stowers-institute.org/WhatsNew/pr2006/PR030606.asp

John Latter

Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism:
http://members.aol.com/jorolat/index.html

technorati tags: research, embryo, genes, mechanism

[evomech] Evolution as context-driven actualization of potential: Toward an interdisciplinary theory of change of state

2006-03-06T09:45:00.000+00:00

Gabora, L. & Aerts, D. (2005). Evolution as context-driven actualization of potential: Toward an interdisciplinary theory of change of state. Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, 30(1), 69-88.

Abstract:

It is increasingly evident that there is more to biological evolution than natural selection; moreover, the concept of evolution is not limited to biology. We propose an integrative framework for characterizing how entities evolve, in which evolution is viewed as a process of context-driven actualization of potential (CAP). Processes of change differ according to the degree of nondeterminism, and the degree to which they are sensitive to, internalize, and depend upon a particular context. The approach enables us to embed phenomena across disciplines into a broad conceptual framework. We give examples of insights into physics, biology, culture and cognition that derive from this unifying framework.

Full text at:

http://www.vub.ac.be/CLEA/liane/papers/cap.htm

John Latter

Model of an Internal Evolutionary Mechanism:
http://members.aol.com/jorolat/index.html

technorati tags: evolution, natural+selection, biology, physics, culture