8 Tips To Enhance Your Free Evolution Game
What is Free Evolution?
Free evolution is the concept that the natural processes of living organisms can lead them to evolve over time. This includes the emergence and development of new species.
This has been proven by many examples such as the stickleback fish species that can live in saltwater or fresh water and walking stick insect varieties that are apprehensive about particular host plants. These reversible traits however, are not able to be the reason for fundamental changes in body plans.
Evolution through Natural Selection
The development of the myriad living organisms on Earth is a mystery that has intrigued scientists for many centuries. Charles Darwin's natural selectivity is the best-established explanation. This process occurs when people who are more well-adapted have more success in reproduction and survival than those who are less well-adapted. Over time, a population of well-adapted individuals increases and eventually creates a new species.
Natural selection is a process that is cyclical and involves the interaction of three factors that are: reproduction, variation and inheritance. Variation is caused by mutations and sexual reproduction, both of which increase the genetic diversity within the species. Inheritance is the transfer of a person's genetic traits to his or her offspring that includes dominant and recessive alleles. Reproduction is the process of generating fertile, viable offspring. This can be done through sexual or asexual methods.
All of these elements must be in harmony for natural selection to occur. If, for instance an allele of a dominant gene allows an organism to reproduce and last longer than the recessive gene The dominant allele is more common in a population. If the allele confers a negative advantage to survival or decreases the fertility of the population, it will be eliminated. The process is self reinforcing meaning that an organism with an adaptive characteristic will live and reproduce much more than those with a maladaptive trait. just click the following document , measured by its ability reproduce and endure, is the higher number of offspring it produces. Individuals with favorable traits, like having a longer neck in giraffes or bright white patterns of color in male peacocks, are more likely to survive and produce offspring, so they will make up the majority of the population over time.
Natural selection is a factor in populations and not on individuals. This is a major distinction from the Lamarckian theory of evolution which states that animals acquire traits by use or inactivity. For instance, if the giraffe's neck gets longer through stretching to reach for prey its offspring will inherit a larger neck. The length difference between generations will continue until the giraffe's neck gets so long that it can no longer breed with other giraffes.
Evolution by Genetic Drift
Genetic drift occurs when alleles from one gene are distributed randomly within a population. Eventually, one of them will attain fixation (become so widespread that it cannot be removed by natural selection), while other alleles fall to lower frequencies. This can lead to an allele that is dominant in extreme. The other alleles are basically eliminated and heterozygosity has diminished to zero. In a small group, this could result in the complete elimination the recessive gene. This is known as a bottleneck effect and it is typical of the kind of evolutionary process that occurs when a large amount of individuals move to form a new group.
A phenotypic bottleneck could occur when the survivors of a catastrophe, such as an epidemic or mass hunt, are confined in a limited area. The survivors are likely to be homozygous for the dominant allele which means they will all have the same phenotype and therefore have the same fitness traits. This can be caused by war, earthquakes, or even plagues. The genetically distinct population, if left, could be susceptible to genetic drift.
Walsh Lewens, Walsh, and Ariew define drift as a deviation from the expected values due to differences in fitness. They give the famous example of twins who are both genetically identical and have exactly the same phenotype. However one is struck by lightning and dies, whereas the other is able to reproduce.
This kind of drift can be crucial in the evolution of a species. It's not the only method for evolution. Natural selection is the most common alternative, in which mutations and migrations maintain the phenotypic diversity of the population.
Stephens claims that there is a huge difference between treating drift like an actual cause or force, and treating other causes like selection mutation and migration as forces and causes. He argues that a causal-process model of drift allows us to distinguish it from other forces and this distinction is essential. He further argues that drift is a directional force: that is, it tends to eliminate heterozygosity, and that it also has a magnitude, which is determined by the size of population.
Evolution by Lamarckism
When students in high school take biology classes, they are frequently introduced to the work of Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744 - 1829). His theory of evolution, often referred to as "Lamarckism which means that simple organisms develop into more complex organisms by adopting traits that are a product of the organism's use and misuse. Lamarckism is usually illustrated with an image of a giraffe extending its neck to reach leaves higher up in the trees. This causes the longer necks of giraffes to be passed onto their offspring who would then become taller.
Lamarck Lamarck, a French Zoologist, introduced a revolutionary concept in his 17 May 1802 opening lecture at the Museum of Natural History of Paris. He challenged previous thinking on organic transformation. According to Lamarck, living things evolved from inanimate materials through a series of gradual steps. Lamarck was not the first to suggest that this might be the case but the general consensus is that he was the one having given the subject his first comprehensive and thorough treatment.
The prevailing story is that Lamarckism was an opponent to Charles Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection, and that the two theories fought each other in the 19th century. Darwinism ultimately won which led to what biologists call the Modern Synthesis. This theory denies that acquired characteristics can be acquired through inheritance and instead suggests that organisms evolve by the symbiosis of environmental factors, like natural selection.
Although Lamarck supported the notion of inheritance through acquired characters and his contemporaries also spoke of this idea but it was not an integral part of any of their evolutionary theories. This is partly because it was never scientifically tested.
It's been more than 200 years since the birth of Lamarck and in the field of genomics, there is an increasing body of evidence that supports the heritability acquired characteristics. This is also known as "neo Lamarckism", or more generally epigenetic inheritance. It is a form of evolution that is as valid as the more well-known neo-Darwinian model.
Evolution by the process of adaptation
One of the most commonly-held misconceptions about evolution is its being driven by a fight for survival. This view is inaccurate and overlooks other forces that drive evolution. The struggle for survival is more accurately described as a struggle to survive within a particular environment, which may include not just other organisms, but as well the physical environment.
Understanding adaptation is important to comprehend evolution. Adaptation refers to any particular characteristic that allows an organism to live and reproduce in its environment. It can be a physical structure, like feathers or fur. Or it can be a behavior trait that allows you to move towards shade during the heat, or coming out to avoid the cold at night.
The capacity of an organism to draw energy from its surroundings and interact with other organisms as well as their physical environments, is crucial to its survival. The organism must possess the right genes to create offspring and be able find enough food and resources. In addition, the organism should be able to reproduce itself in a way that is optimally within its environment.
These factors, together with gene flow and mutation result in changes in the ratio of alleles (different forms of a gene) in the population's gene pool. As time passes, this shift in allele frequencies could lead to the emergence of new traits and ultimately new species.
A lot of the traits we admire in animals and plants are adaptations, such as lungs or gills to extract oxygen from the air, fur or feathers to provide insulation long legs to run away from predators and camouflage for hiding. To understand adaptation it is crucial to differentiate between physiological and behavioral traits.
Physiological adaptations, like thick fur or gills, are physical traits, whereas behavioral adaptations, such as the tendency to search for friends or to move into the shade in hot weather, are not. Furthermore, it is important to remember that lack of planning does not mean that something is an adaptation. A failure to consider the consequences of a decision, even if it appears to be rational, may make it inflexible.