John ShirleyJul 6, 2023

EVOLUTION WITHOUT ACCIDENTS

"To support his random mutation ideas, Darwin quoted Carl Linnaeus’s dictum ‘Natura non facit saltum’ (nature does not make jumps) several times in On the Origin of Species, but molecular genetics proved that nature does indeed make jumps in cellular genomes – and they’re not random. Nature has invented multiple biochemical mechanisms for those jumps to take place....Cells can cut and splice their own DNA molecules..."

https://aeon.co/essays/why-did-darwins-20th-century-followers-get-evolution-so-wrong?utm_source=rss-feed #science #genetics

Why did Darwin’s 20th-century followers get evolution so wrong? | Aeon Essays

Despite advances in molecular genetics, too many biologists think that natural selection is driven by random mutations

Aeon
Show threadDr.Implausible

@JohnShirley2023 Interesting article, thanks for sharing. I spent a lot of time looking at at Margolis' work on #symbiogenesis in the late aughts, directed there by looking at #memetics and #evolutionaryeconomics (separately) and the mechanisms thereof, and it really influenced my work.

Watson's /Compositional Evolution/ (2006) was helpful, though sadly no longer on the bookshelf.

Jul 6, 2023 at 8:22pmWeb