Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!oddjob!uwvax!husc6!bloom-beacon!gatech!mcnc!ecsvax!hes
From: hes@ecsvax.uncecs.edu (Henry Schaffer)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: Evolution
Summary: evolutionary theory, selection,  ...
	 hard to explain in a couple of sentences
Keywords: evolution
Message-ID: <5334@ecsvax.uncecs.edu>
Date: 1 Jul 88 13:29:23 GMT
References: <5944@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU> <112@feedme.UUCP>
Distribution: sci.bio
Organization: NC State Univ.
Lines: 45

In article <112@feedme.UUCP>, doug@feedme.UUCP (Doug Salot) writes:
> In article <5944@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU> orwant@athena.mit.edu (Jonathan L Orwant) writes:
> >I'm a bit confused about how special-purpose anatomical parts can evolve, ...
> >-Jon Orwant (orwant@wheaties.ai.mit.edu)
> >Pity me.  I'm a computer scientist. 
> 
> As a fellow pitiful CS-type, I present my own uninformed opinion (all
> sentences have an implied "I think" prefix):
> 
> The selection aspect of evolution is highly overrated.  I'd bet
> that neutral mutations ...
> 
> What I want to know is how did the cell and its organelles evolve?

So do I.  (Seriously.)  However the whole story is not known, even 
though there is much research in this area, and we may never know all
of the details.  The thing to keep in mind is that the cell and its
organelles is a *very* complicated entity.  Its organization and
functions are orders of magnitude beyond that of, e.g. a NOR gate.
It is not easy to explain to a layman how an expert system is made
of NOR gates - but at least we do know *all* of the steps in between.

> I can imagine cell populations evolving into multicelled organisms,
> but its quite a feat to go from primordial soup to an autonomous
> factory.  There appear to be no selective forces, so an entire functional
                  ^^^^^^
Appearances can be deceiving - but this is an area in which there has
been much research (and speculation.)  There is an old book by Oparin,
"Origin of Life" which goes into some of this.

> cell has to organize pretty much by happenstance, right?
> -- 
> Doug Salot || doug@feedme.UUCP || ...{trwrb,hplabs}!felix!dhw68k!feedme!doug

  In order to understand evolution, one must also understand biology.
People can spend whole careers in just one small area of evolutionary
biology.  I have been personally interested in the population aspects
of evolution.  A book in this area which covers a broad sweep of the
population/speciation subject is "Population Genetics and Evolution,
2nd ed. by Mettler, Gregg and Schaffer" and it should be readable by
people who have had a course in biology and one in genetics.  Without
the genetics much should be understandable, but you would be one step
further away from understanding the mechanisms.

--henry schaffer  n c state univ