So to play compulsive editor, I suggest the following slight adjustment to Chuck's list of 2:
1) Organisms vary in many ways that can be inherited.
2) These variations can be selected to produce large changes in populations over many generations.
Paul Smith
Alverno College
Milwaukee
On 12/28/05, Chuck Huff <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Paul Smith amended Stephen Black's excellent "evolution forest" as follows:
>I would add to the end of Stephen's list a conclusion - something on
>the order of
>
>6) and therefore the characteristics of populations change over generations.
>
>I'd also amend #5 to read
>
>5) those which do are therefore able to pass their genes down to the next
>generation, and with those genes, some of those variations.
I would like to reduce the list, to get more forest. I would
eliminate (1) below, since it does not seem essential (it gets large
numbers working for selection, but selection can work with small
numbers, it is just more risky).
I would also eliminate reference to genes in (5). Genes provide the
biological mechanism for inheritance of characteristics, but Darwin
did not need then to get to selection.
To me, the forest is really two points, putting them together (among
other things) was Darwin's genius:
1) Organisms vary in many ways that can be inherited.
2) These variations can be selected to produce large changes over time.
This is why Darwin's beginning with selective breeding in "Origin"
works so well rhetorically. Asking HOW selection works gets more to
trees, and thus to Stephen's list.
But then, philosophically I am a "lumper" rather than a "splitter."
-Chuck
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