Lack of random environments

What seems remarkable to me is that so many of these subtle mutations show up in environments where they are critical for survival. For example, why should some lichens be able to survive the vacuum of space? Have they needed this ability before or is it just coincidence that they have this ability at a time when we can send them into space?It seems remarkable that life so often finds the one viable course for survival. So many thin opportunities that are taken advantage of. That life is so incredibly robust and so incredibly fragile.

Yet it seems a perfect explanation to me. I do not see how it could reasonably happen otherwise and the evidence that it actually does happen this way is the only evidence that there is. Imagine a god if you wish but if there is a god then they did it this way.What I find so remarkable is that the pool of available mutations is so useful. That they successfully match up with the environment as often as they do. It is as if every possible means of exploiting the environment will eventually materialize.Is the set of all possible mutations a static thing or does it grow as life diversifies? Does life tend to accumulate an ability to survive in more environments or this an illusion?

Most of them I understand but how many successful gene mutations were required to produce a human? All those extinct species had a long string of successful mutations before they failed. So I wouldn't say that it doesn't happen all that often. As a % of total mutations the number of successful mutations is small but as a quantity the number is immense. Yeah I get that. Life has a scatter shot approach to finding the right combinations. Always firing and only occasionally making the target. It is like one of those electronic lock decoders that goes through all of the possible combinations until it hits on the right one. With the added complexity that the combination is changing while the search is running.As life becomes more complex does the pool of all possible mutations increase and thereby increase the potential to hit on the right combination for a new or changed environment? Or are the survival requirements of a more complex phenotype more exacting?Do you think if we were to start firing lichens and bacteria at the moon that we would eventually get one that sticks. If there is an environment for every mutation is there a mutation for every environment?

Take this fish that has started to eat birds from the shore for example. Say the behaviour is successful for an extended period of time or, in other words, that the environment remains stable. Is it only a matter of time before one of these fish mutates some fins that work more like feet or gills that work more like lungs? Given enough time will those mutations always come along?

Using this definition

quote:

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Lamarckism (or Lamarckian inheritance) is the idea that an organism can pass on characteristics that it acquired during its lifetime to its offspring (also known as heritability of acquired characteristics or soft inheritance).

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Is there not plenty of evidence to indicate that the behaviour of the mother will influence the genetic make up of the child? Like alcohol or drug use or exposure to lead.The 'mutation for every environment' thought was more toward the idea that if there is such a thing as infrared light then there is a genetic formula to exploit the fact. Or telepathy for example. Our brains produce electric fields that can be detected. Is it conceivable that there a genetic formula that would enable a creature to detect those fields?