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Foul Tasting Bugs

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Author Topic:   Foul Tasting Bugs
Dr Jack
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Message 3 of 47 (550382)
03-15-2010 10:54 AM 		Reply to: Message 1 by InGodITrust
03-15-2010 3:44 AM

Kin selection.
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It's not true that the fowlest tasting bug has no more chance to pass on its genes than any other bug.
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Also, remember foul taste comes about by exaptation not de novo formulation.
​
Edited by Admin, : Fix spelling: exaption => exaptation.
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Dr Jack
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From: Immigrant in the land of Deutsch
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Message 9 of 47 (550394)
03-15-2010 11:33 AM 		Reply to: Message 8 by Percy
03-15-2010 11:23 AM

Batesian mimicry.
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Even more intriguing to me is Mullerian mimicry, where other bad tasting beetles will evolve to look similar to existing ones.
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Dr Jack
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Posts: 3514
From: Immigrant in the land of Deutsch
Joined: 07-14-2003
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Message 13 of 47 (550399)
03-15-2010 12:02 PM 		Reply to: Message 10 by Huntard
03-15-2010 11:41 AM

Re: Sounds rather obvious to me
I mean, if you look like a bad tasting bug, you are much less likely to get eaten, even if you don't taste bad. Now, if you do taste bad, yet look completely different, there's no way to tell you taste bad, except after being eaten. So, it's better to look like each other, whether bad tasting or not.
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Yes, it is, that being why it evolves. I just like it, and there's some really neat traces of regional variation in warning patterns, where the variation between different species in one region is smaller than the variation in the same species across different areas. So you get these (apparently) reasonless cross-species parallel drifts.
​
Edited by Mr Jack, : No reason given.
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Dr Jack
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Message 21 of 47 (550665)
03-17-2010 5:50 AM 		Reply to: Message 18 by InGodITrust
03-17-2010 5:09 AM

Re: evolution is in populations not in individuals
I understand how kin selection works once the foul taste is established throughout a population, but it is harder to see how the foul-taste blood line gets started and spreads through a population by natural selection.
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RAZD claims neutral drift; I make a different claim. Exaptation: foul tasting chemicals emerged not because they were foul tasting but because they performed some other function in the organism and just happened to also be foul tasting.
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Dr Jack
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Posts: 3514
From: Immigrant in the land of Deutsch
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Message 25 of 47 (550707)
03-17-2010 1:01 PM 		Reply to: Message 23 by RAZD
03-17-2010 12:52 PM

Re: evolution is in populations not in individuals
Hi RAZD,
​
I find the concept of bugs having an awareness of kin to be somewhat problematical, and to me kin selection only works when one is aware of kinship at some level.
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Kin Selection does not require any awareness of kin/non-kin only that the feature selected increases the survival probability of other carriers of the gene.
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Dr Jack
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Posts: 3514
From: Immigrant in the land of Deutsch
Joined: 07-14-2003
Member Rating: 8.3

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Message 26 of 47 (550708)
03-17-2010 1:03 PM 		Reply to: Message 24 by RAZD
03-17-2010 12:59 PM

Wot no adaptation?
Genetic drift of neutral mutations is a more general pattern than kin selection, and fits this situation better, imho.
​
Wait, what? Are you suggesting that the explaination for foul tasting insects is genetic drift? That this feature is not adaptive?
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Dr Jack
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Message 30 of 47 (550719)
03-17-2010 3:32 PM 		Reply to: Message 28 by RAZD
03-17-2010 2:44 PM

Re: evolution is in populations not in individuals
Hi RAZD,
​
Then you have watered kin selection down to common ancestry,
an already adequate explanation for the transmission of genes from parents to offspring where there is no action taken by, or any different behavior of, any of the carriers to enhance the survival or breeding of their kin other than surviving and breeding.
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With this definition of kin selection there is no point in saying kin selection is a mechanism.
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No.
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Standard selection applies because an organism with an adaptive features produces more offspring that those without; kin selection applies not to the organism itself, or its direct descendents, but to other carriers of the gene.
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Do you see the distinction?
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It is only when the proportion of foul-tasting bugs within the population increases to the point where the predator associates the foul taste with enough members of the population that they are reluctant to attack the bugs that selection begins to take effect.
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Genetic drift gets you to that point. Kin selection doesn't, nor does kin selection explain that point all members of the population benefit at that point, fellow foul-tasting kin or not.
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But we didn't suggest that kin selection gets you to that point, either. How are you explaining how it gets from there to a trait common to the population if not kin selection?
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