Kleinman: Four Questions About Evolution

[swamidass (S. Joshua Swamidass)]

@kleinman

As far as (3) goes I see a mixed bag in the literature. When I first read that question I immediately thought of this paper:
http://post.queensu.ca/~biol440/Erwin%20EvolutionDevelopment%202000.pdf

To answer this question correctly, you first have to recognize what a microevolutionary event is, in particular, a beneficial microevolutionary event. Your link does not address this. What I’m going to explain is what a beneficial microevolutionary event is and how two or more of these events are linked and the mathematics which governs these joint events.

Why would we focus on the rare case? The most common microevolutionary event is a neutral mutation. That makes up the majority of microevolutionary and macroevolutionary change. There is a immense amount of work that shows how this takes place. I’ll point you to two:

1. The Neutral Theory of Evolution

2. Constructive Neutral Evolution