Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 UW 5/3/83; site uw-june Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!tektronix!uw-beaver!uw-june!gordon From: gordon@uw-june (Gordon Davisson) Newsgroups: net.origins Subject: Re: So simple, even a creationist can understand! Message-ID: <44@uw-june> Date: Fri, 12-Jul-85 06:28:20 EDT Article-I.D.: uw-june.44 Posted: Fri Jul 12 06:28:20 1985 Date-Received: Tue, 16-Jul-85 20:56:13 EDT References: <2156@ut-sally.UUCP> <347@scgvaxd.UUCP> Organization: U of Washington Computer Science Lines: 32 Keywords: Re: A new voice. >>>[Stanley Friesen] >>>So *most*, mutations are "harmful", this is where N[atural].S[election]. >>>comes in, it amplifies the few "beneficial" ones that do occur. >>[Paul Torek] >>Exactly. One creationist expressed bafflement at the idea that mutation >>could result in evolutionary chains that "go so far" as the "distance" >>between radically different organisms. But try this experiment: flip >>several (many) coins, and move to the right on a number line (start >>at zero) only when you get all coins coming up heads. This represents >>movement toward an adapted complex species. Move to the left every >>time you get any result other than all heads. Only there's one catch: >>you don't get to move to the left. >[Paul Dubuc] >*How* do the beneficial mutations get amplified by Natural Selection? >How does that "catch" in Paul's experiment relate to N.S.? Why don't >some trials cause us to move to the left, or even cause us to start >again from the beginning? Why must natural selection work the way Paul >says it does? Harmful mutations have no lasting bad influence on a population because their carriars tend not to have many decendants. Thus, after a while, the mutation dissapears from the population. Beneficial mutations, on the other hand, cause their carriers to tend to have more decendants than the non-carriers, so after a while, most of the population carries the mutation, and the population has taken a step to the right (so to speak). -- Human: Gordon Davisson ARPA: gordon@uw-june.ARPA UUCP: {ihnp4,decvax,tektronix}!uw-beaver!uw-june!gordon