On 03/14/07 11:39, Kent West wrote:
Not to rain on Darwin's parade, but, um, the death of the unfit does not
mean that the survivors have automagically improved. They're still the
same ol' critters they were before the unfit died off.
(It might can be argued that the improvement came to the fit population
_before_ the unfit died off, but it can just as equally be argued that
the entire population originally started out as fit, and then the
sub-population degenerated into the unfit. And I'm not trying to argue
one side or the other; I'm just pointing out that there's a disconnect
in the thinking that the extinction of the less-fit automatically means
the survivors have seen some sort of improvement.)
Let's say the pre-windmill ratio of fast-maneuverable-with-great-
eyesight to normal ducks was 2:98, and had been static for eons,
since the environmental situation was such that even the "normal"
ducks got plenty of food and mates.
But the normal ducks will get killed off, and so in 20 years the
ration of super ducks to normal ducks will be 98:2, and what-was-
super is now the norm, and what was normal is now inferior.
Thus, all of the super-ducks will be mating, and any recessive
super-duper genes will come to the forefront.