Re: [FRIAM] Daphnia's jeans
Perhaps it is the other way around. That more complex structures and processes evolve as a consequence of some developmental ability to do ever more with less (where 'less' may mean less pre-specification). While it may be an understatement that that would be kind of cool if it were so in general, it's also somewhat pejorative-worthy and it posits a mechanism for the emergence of such linkage, the explanation of which may lie beyond my pay grade, in one direction or another. Notice that framing things this way might change the questions at hand away from how I get some selection-advantage at a lower-level form of algorithmic complexity from having a smaller (or more compressed) genome. Carl On 2/4/11 2:33 PM, Nicholas Thompson wrote: I bet you somebody will post something in the next day claiming that humans have fewer genes because they have a larger brain “instead”. I will pre-perjoratize that idea as crap. Nick From: friam-boun...@redfish.com [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Parks, Raymond Sent: Friday, February 04, 2011 10:18 AM To: 'friam@redfish.com' Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Daphnia's jeans That raises a number of interesting questions. 1. Is there more survival advantage in a higher number of genes or in a lower number of genes? On the one hand Daphnia has a 50% greater chance of random mutation from external factors - on the other hand, Daphnia has a 50% greater chance of absorbing damage without mutation. 2. Since Daphnia is a non-vertebrate I'm going to assume it's ancestors evolved long before man. Does this mean life has evolved from more genes to less? 3. I believe that good engineering is as much about removing what is unnecessary as adding to a design. Is this proof of good engineering in evolution? 4. Alternately (and this gets into complexity), is the _expression_ of genes in the living creature an emergent process? Does the number of genes have an effect on that emergence? Ray Parks From: Nicholas Thompson [mailto:nickthomp...@earthlink.net] Sent: Friday, February 04, 2011 08:33 AM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group friam@redfish.com Subject: [FRIAM] Daphnia's jeans Message: 2 From: National Science Foundation Update nsf-upd...@nsf.gov Date: Thu, 3 Feb 2011 14:47:36 -0600 (CST) Subject: The Most Genes in an Animal? Tiny Crustacean Holds the Record The Most Genes in an Animal? Tiny Crustacean Holds the Record Thu, 03 Feb 2011 13:12:00 -0600 Scientists have discovered that the animal with the most genes--about 31,000--is the near-microscopic freshwater crustacean Daphnia pulex, or water flea. By comparison, humans have about 23,000 genes. Daphnia is the first crustacean to have its genome sequenced. The water flea's genome is described in a Science paper published this week by members of the Daphnia Genomics Consortium, an international network of scientists led by the Center for Genomics ... More at http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=118530WT.mc_id=USNSF_51WT.mc_ev=click Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ http://www.cusf.org FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] Daphnia's jeans
work that sound as if he knew exactly how to arrange various Agents to achieve social transformations. There is a curious mention of Groups requiring an external member loosely associated for the purpose of a global perspective while the majority are focused on tasks at hand. The loosely associated agent can steer the group and deliver it new knowledge(Memes) which the group can rapidly assimilate and manifest as concrete reality through action. There is some acknowledgement about the instability and lifespan perhaps someone has more insight into these issues. I am not a philosopher and venture to say that nothing I say could be trusted in the least. But if others in this group poke around a bit perhaps we can build some understanding( I hope deeply). I appreciate your tolerance of my musings, I would prefer sitting beneath a Linden tree and drinking German beer. Bertrand Russell never quite knew how to regard the Heidegger line of thinking and mentions them almost dismissivly and quickly moves on to beating upon Existentialists, but that was a different era. I suspect that if Complexity Theory had been around earlier the entire line of Western Philosophy would have changed. -Original Message- From: friam-boun...@redfish.com [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Jochen Fromm Sent: February-04-11 3:25 PM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Daphnia's jeans How many memes does a mind have? What would be needed to reconstruct a mind? -J. FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] Daphnia's jeans
Fascinating! Does this take us arrogant human's down a notch?
I must object though to the conclusion that the water flee has the most genes,
followed almost immediately by the admission that we don't know much about the
genome of most organisms. Why can't they just say The most gene of any known
species? (or species we know about the genes of)
Eric
On Fri, Feb 4, 2011 10:33 AM, Nicholas Thompson
nickthomp...@earthlink.net wrote:
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Message: 2
From: National Science Foundation Update #
Date: Thu, 3 Feb 2011 14:47:36 -0600 (CST)
Subject: The Most Genes in an Animal? Tiny Crustacean Holds the Record
http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=118530WT.mc_id=USNSF_51WT.mc_ev=click
Thu, 03 Feb 2011 13:12:00 -0600
Scientists have discovered that the animal with the most genes--about
31,000--is the near-microscopic freshwater crustacean Daphnia pulex, or water
flea.
By comparison, humans have about 23,000 genes. Daphnia is the first crustacean
to have its genome sequenced.
The water flea's genome is described in a Science paper published this week by
members of the Daphnia Genomics Consortium, an international network of
scientists led by the Center for Genomics ...
More at
http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=118530WT.mc_id=USNSF_51WT.mc_ev=click
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/%7Enickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org/
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Eric Charles
Professional Student and
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Penn State University
Altoona, PA 16601
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] Daphnia's jeans
That raises a number of interesting questions. 1. Is there more survival advantage in a higher number of genes or in a lower number of genes? On the one hand Daphnia has a 50% greater chance of random mutation from external factors - on the other hand, Daphnia has a 50% greater chance of absorbing damage without mutation. 2. Since Daphnia is a non-vertebrate I'm going to assume it's ancestors evolved long before man. Does this mean life has evolved from more genes to less? 3. I believe that good engineering is as much about removing what is unnecessary as adding to a design. Is this proof of good engineering in evolution? 4. Alternately (and this gets into complexity), is the expression of genes in the living creature an emergent process? Does the number of genes have an effect on that emergence? Ray Parks From: Nicholas Thompson [mailto:nickthomp...@earthlink.net] Sent: Friday, February 04, 2011 08:33 AM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group friam@redfish.com Subject: [FRIAM] Daphnia's jeans Message: 2 From: National Science Foundation Update nsf-upd...@nsf.govmailto:nsf-upd...@nsf.gov Date: Thu, 3 Feb 2011 14:47:36 -0600 (CST) Subject: The Most Genes in an Animal? Tiny Crustacean Holds the Record The Most Genes in an Animal? Tiny Crustacean Holds the Recordhttp://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=118530WT.mc_id=USNSF_51WT.mc_ev=click Thu, 03 Feb 2011 13:12:00 -0600 [cid:image001.jpg@01CBC446.3D1C22C0]Scientists have discovered that the animal with the most genes--about 31,000--is the near-microscopic freshwater crustacean Daphnia pulex, or water flea. By comparison, humans have about 23,000 genes. Daphnia is the first crustacean to have its genome sequenced. The water flea's genome is described in a Science paper published this week by members of the Daphnia Genomics Consortium, an international network of scientists led by the Center for Genomics ... More at http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=118530WT.mc_id=USNSF_51WT.mc_ev=click Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ http://www.cusf.orghttp://www.cusf.org/ inline: image001.jpg FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] Daphnia's jeans
How many memes does a mind have? What would be needed to reconstruct a mind? -J. FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] Daphnia's jeans
I bet you somebody will post something in the next day claiming that humans have fewer genes because they have a larger brain “instead”. I will pre-perjoratize that idea as crap. Nick From: friam-boun...@redfish.com [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Parks, Raymond Sent: Friday, February 04, 2011 10:18 AM To: 'friam@redfish.com' Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Daphnia's jeans That raises a number of interesting questions. 1. Is there more survival advantage in a higher number of genes or in a lower number of genes? On the one hand Daphnia has a 50% greater chance of random mutation from external factors - on the other hand, Daphnia has a 50% greater chance of absorbing damage without mutation. 2. Since Daphnia is a non-vertebrate I'm going to assume it's ancestors evolved long before man. Does this mean life has evolved from more genes to less? 3. I believe that good engineering is as much about removing what is unnecessary as adding to a design. Is this proof of good engineering in evolution? 4. Alternately (and this gets into complexity), is the expression of genes in the living creature an emergent process? Does the number of genes have an effect on that emergence? Ray Parks From: Nicholas Thompson [mailto:nickthomp...@earthlink.net] Sent: Friday, February 04, 2011 08:33 AM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group friam@redfish.com Subject: [FRIAM] Daphnia's jeans Message: 2 From: National Science Foundation Update nsf-upd...@nsf.gov Date: Thu, 3 Feb 2011 14:47:36 -0600 (CST) Subject: The Most Genes in an Animal? Tiny Crustacean Holds the Record The Most Genes in an Animal? Tiny Crustacean Holds the Record http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=118530WT.mc_id=USNSF_51WT.mc_ev=click Thu, 03 Feb 2011 13:12:00 -0600 Description: Image of a Daphnia or water flea.Scientists have discovered that the animal with the most genes--about 31,000--is the near-microscopic freshwater crustacean Daphnia pulex, or water flea. By comparison, humans have about 23,000 genes. Daphnia is the first crustacean to have its genome sequenced. The water flea's genome is described in a Science paper published this week by members of the Daphnia Genomics Consortium, an international network of scientists led by the Center for Genomics ... More at http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=118530 http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=118530WT.mc_id=USNSF_51WT.mc_ev=click WT.mc_id=USNSF_51WT.mc_ev=click Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ http://www.cusf.org http://www.cusf.org/ image002.jpg FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] Daphnia's jeans
I should be quiet because this is not my area. But the evo-devo people around me seem very often to say that, in the domain of large multicellular organisms, much of the change between species comes from altering regulatory pathways and systems, not generally from altering (numbers of) genes, or the overt things that genes code for. I assume that a valid way to put some of these questions would be to suppose that adaptation to environments, filtered through the complexity and pre-commitments that constitute development, can be carried on structures of many kinds. The algorithmic complexity of regulation or response may not be easily tracked by numbers of genes, to the extent that more structural adaptations such as catalysts or transporters are. We then wonder what determines the apportioning of the information representations that constitute adaptation, or of control functions. Why some adaptations through duplication, divergence, and specialization of genes. Why other adaptation through changing the combinatorics with which regulatory proteins respond to signals or determine expression levels? Why some controls through protein regulators, other controls through small RNA regulators? Perhaps other controls through epigenetic modifications of either DNA or its structuring proteins. Why some adaptation through changing hard-wired internal representations of the environment, and other adaptation implicit in algorithms for responding to environmental states as signals? I think these are ways of putting the questions that allow us to look for characteristics of the environment and of the material an organism has available to build with, which can acknowledge evidence like gene counts, but not pre-interpret it (?). Eric FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] Daphnia's jeans
On 4 Feb 2011 at 14:33, Nicholas Thompson wrote: I bet you somebody will post something in the next day claiming that humans have fewer genes because they have a larger brain instead. As the saying goes, what counts isn't the size of your genome, it's how you use it. To a first order approximation, if you (a species) are making a living, you're using your genome just fine. To second order, perhaps, how *long* (in years? generations?) you've been makiung a living might come in. But to first order, humans and Daphnia are tied (along with a bunch of other stuff). FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
