Evolution as a pachinko history: what is 'random'?

W e discussed a Japanese pachinko machine in an earlier post , a pinball machine, as an example of the difference between randomness and det...

adaptationchanceevolutionnatural selectionpachinko machines

Causal complexity in life

E volution is the process that generates the relationships between genomes and traits in organisms.  Although we have written extensively an...

adaptationaltitudecomplex causalitycomplexityevolutionevolution by phenotypephenogenetic drift

They were all my future specimens. And they died.

Without skeletal collections we'd struggle to do much evolutionary biology, especially when it comes to studying fossils. We'd hate ...

adaptationbioarchaeologyevolutionevolutionary anthropologyfitnessholly dunsworthnatural selectionosteological paradoxosteologyskeletal samples

Imagine no mutation.

Imagine no mutation. I wonder if you can. No means for new variation. A creationist's view of Man. Imagine all the people learning it th...

adaptationcurriculumde novo mutationseducationevolutionevolution educationgenetic driftholly dunsworthmutationnatural selectionpedagogy

Fairy stories and evolutionary medicine

Plausible does not mean probable Nothing in medicine makes sense except in the light of evolution!  So goes a modification of the great 20th...

adaptationevolutionevolutionary medicine

Natural selection and the human genome -- the last 10,000 years

Many researchers have been interested in combing the human genome for evidence that natural selection shaped modern humans. The idea is tha...

adaptationhuman population historyJonathan Pritchardnatural selection in humansselective pressure