Re: A SCI-FI fantasy 21st Century view of evolution
Posted by Ben on Jan 31, 2002 at 15:50
(170.215.59.155)Re: A 21st Century view of evolution (GeckoFuel78)
A brief look at this article gives me the impression that the author is attempting to describe a kind of GAIA type process for genetic evolution. In other words, the systems in a cell "design themselves" via a complex set of genetic modular machinery that behaves in a systematic way to respond to stress.
Unfortunatly, I think this is basically nonsense. Genetic mutations drive evolution, and they are not programmed or part of any genetic system. Likewise there is no evidence that I am aware of that indicates that the genetic structures in cells are modularly configured to systematically change themselves.
There is something to this article, in the sense that evolvable sets of genes that can mutate and change based on environmental change are more likely to be part of the genome, but that's about it.