Is it natural for humans to make war ​…

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Mustard M
Mustard Jul 31, 2013 19:25:30
Replying to Rhiannon

Rhiannon wrote:
The mutations don't know anything, but they're produced randomly and there's potentially a wide variety of them. Say I'm a plant and some of my seedlings have mutations that make them good at surviving in the wet. Whilst others would be good at surviving in the dry. Suddenly there's a flood. Only the 'wet' mutations survive to breed. The 'dry' mutations die and don't breed. That's what Darwin meant by natural selection.
That's why I put "know" inside quotation marks ;)

The problem is though, the mutations that allow a plant to survive in the wet don't start out fully-formed, and before that they have no survival advantage.

R Rhiannon
Rhiannon Jul 31, 2013 19:45:10
Replying to Mustard

But isn't that just a variation on the 'eye' argument, where people say you can't get a whole eye in one go, in one mutation? Cos eyes aren't like that - in nature there is everything from a dob of flat light-reacting pigment (like a flatworm?) to a cupshape (that helps with direction) to full blown eyes like mine or a cuttlefish's. And as they say, every little helps. So likewise it won't be the difference between a massive flood and a dry desert (despite my example). It'll be the difference between surviving in a little bit of rain and surviving in a tiny little bit more rain. And maybe a little mutation could do that. Then the offspring of that better adapted creature go on to have more offspring with a range of features. And again the best fit survive better and go on to produce more offspring.