Darwin’s methods were not so mathematically sophisticated, of course, and he was constructing a tree of organisms rather than genes, but he was all over the idea that the patterns generated by evolutionary processes are scale invariant. 🐋🌱🦋🦫🧪 #EvoBio #PhilSci #HistSTM - ThreadSky

gregpriest.bsky.social • 115 days ago

Darwin’s methods were not so mathematically sophisticated, of course, and he was constructing a tree of organisms rather than genes, but he was all over the idea that the patterns generated by evolutionary processes are scale invariant.

🐋🌱🦋🦫🧪 #EvoBio #PhilSci #HistSTM

Comments

nigelgoldenfeld.bsky.social•114 days ago

That's very cool. Thank you for pointing that out.

johngordon.bsky.social•115 days ago

“phylogenetic tree topology is scale-invariant due to a singularity arising from large niche construction fluctuations that follow extinction events”

This is almost readable by a non-expert. I hope Quanta does an essay on it.

momo-randy.bsky.social•115 days ago

Phylogenetic or phylogenic? Is it different?

gregpriest.bsky.social•115 days ago

Phylogenetic means relating to evolutionary processes. AFAIK phylogenic is not a word.

momo-randy.bsky.social•115 days ago

the-murderhobos.bsky.social•114 days ago

Darwin was aware of the relationship between surface area and volume!

wewereright.org•114 days ago

wewereright.org•115 days ago

what about behavior affecting gene construction?

gregpriest.bsky.social•115 days ago

Well, he had no conception of genes. But he certainly understood agential behavior to have important evolutionary consequences. And he had a version of what we now understand as niche construction. That was one of the central subjects of his earthworm book, for example.

🌱🐋🦫🦋🧪 #EvoBio #HistSTM

cepaea.bsky.social•114 days ago

Or, why it makes no sense to contrast natural selection with niche construction, as some do.

gregpriest.bsky.social•114 days ago

Yes. For D, the causal processes leading to NS (and those leading to sexual selection too) implicate organismal agency. He would not have seen niche construction as an alternative process. But the modern synthesis is less attuned to organismal agency than D was.

🌱🐋 #EvoBio #PhilSci #HistSTM

cepaea.bsky.social•114 days ago

Less attuned to, or less focused on?

gregpriest.bsky.social•114 days ago

Not sure I see any significant difference between the two terms in this context. But focused on works for me too.

wewereright.org•114 days ago

I don't much care about the personalities involved

The discovery of epigenetics was a good start, but it really feels like the mechanistic models are vastly inadequate

msrage.bsky.social•115 days ago

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