[MOVED] The Extended Evolutionary Synthesis
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This has been going on for years - I respond until I get tired of it, wait a while, then go again. It's partly exercise for me, partly for lurkers (if any), and helps with exercising patience and refreshing one's knowledge.
There's a topical article in New Scientist on this whole business - with a nice introduction to the hypothesis that evolution can itself evolve by learning via gene networks; a kind of AI on a geological timescale
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It seems that after 300 plus posts I am vindicated. One of my main claims from the beginning of this thread were that the EES papers were saying that the SET (based on the literature) made natural selection the sole force in evolution. Everyone (perhaps not you) were saying I was wrong and was misinterpreting the papers. Now you acknowledge what I said by saying that the authors were actually saying this but that it is a straw-man argument. I would have rather people acknowledge this and disagree with it then pretend they didn't say it and I was misinterpreting things.
Niche construction theory is different because it is seen as a range of influences that go into making it an independent force as an evolutionary cause that can direct natural selection. Co-evolution is one of those influences but not the only one. But niche construction can also occur for individual creatures and their environment without influencing other creatures and can include a range of other processes including non-genetic ones.
How the EES views niche construction according to the papers
A body of formal evolutionary theory has shown that niche construction can affect evolutionary dynamics in a variety of ways [79–86], even when it is not an ‘extended phenotype’ [87]; that is, not an adaptation. The evolutionary significance of niche construction stems from:
(i) organisms modify environmental states in non-random ways, thereby imposing a systematic bias on the selection pressures they generate;
(ii) ecological inheritance affects the evolutionary dynamics of descendants and contributes to the cross-generational stability of environmental conditions;
(iii) acquired characters become evolutionarily significant by modifying selective environments; and
(iv) the complementarity of organisms and their environments can be enhanced through niche construction (modifying environments to suit organisms), not just through natural selection [73].
These findings have led to the claim that niche construction should be recognized as an evolutionary process through its guiding influence on selection [73],
http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/282/1813/20151019
The problem with only viewing NCT as co-evolution is still restricting evolution to the SET's adaptive view through random gene change and NS. Whereas NCT can also be seen as independent within a closed system that the creature has created to produce adaptive and heritable changes. It also include nongenetic processes and can produce adaptive and heritable variation like NS such as through developmental processes and inheritance beyond genes. For the SET any variation that is not genetic is regarded as not an evolutionary cause. Whereas for the EES it is. This is summed up in the EES papers
So under the SET view
For biologists schooled in population genetic or quantitative genetic thinking, the starting point for evolutionary analyses is the selection pressures [94]. Leaving aside cases where the source of selection is another organism, environmental change has been treated as a ‘background condition’ (e.g. [88]; table 2). On this perspective, termites evolve to become adapted to the mounds they construct in a manner no different from how organisms adapt to frequent volcanic eruptions. Because niche-constructing activities are seen as proximate sources of variation, they are typically treated as ‘extended phenotypes' [87] that evolve because they enhance inclusive fitness.
But under the EES view
We suggest that structuring evolutionary explanations around processes that directly change genotype frequencies is responsible for these interpretations. A widely accepted definition of evolution is change in the genetic composition of populations, which, to many evolutionary biologists, restricts evolutionary processes to those that directly change gene frequencies—natural selection, drift, gene flow, and mutation. Phenomena such as developmental bias or niche construction do not directly change gene frequencies, and hence are not viewed as causes of evolutionary processes.
http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/282/1813/20151019
In other words, SET still treats creatures and the environment as separate. The SET sees the activities of a creature in creating an environment that they have specifically made is to suit them as a separate process from an environment like a volcano which forces an alien environment onto creatures where they either adapt or die through NS.
Whereas for NCT the environment created by a creature is not one that is alien to them but is intertwined and is regarded as an important contributor to the evolutionary cause. It is specifically made to suit them and therefore produces adaptive and heritable variations. This includes non-genetic changes such as through conditions that produce fit offsprings such as influences of lifestyle on pre and post-birth development, disease resistance, and environments that create fit offspring, etc.
This can be summed up by this section from the paper.
Contemporary evolutionary biology does recognize reciprocal causation in some cases, such as sexual selection, coevolution, habitat selection and frequency-dependent selection. However, reciprocal causation has generally been restricted to certain domains (largely to direct interactions between organisms), while, many existing analyses of coevolution, habitat- or frequency-dependent selection, are conducted at a level (e.g. genetic, demographic) that removes any consideration of ontogeny. Such studies do capture a core structural feature of reciprocal causation in evolution—namely, selective feedback—but typically fail to recognize that developmental processes can both initiate and co-direct evolutionary outcomes.
By contrast, the EES views reciprocal causation to be a typical, perhaps even universal, feature of evolving and developing systems, characterizing both the developmental origin of phenotypic variation and its evolution in response to changeable features of its environment [27,71,73]. This clearly differs from Mayr's [89] strict separation of proximate and ultimate causation, and his corollary that ontogenetic processes are relevant only to proximate causation [90].
http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/282/1813/20151019
I never said the process is teleological but rather it is about the agency of the creature itself. When I say a creature knows what change is best that will be of benefit I am talking about its ability to build niches that suit them. Or with creating disease-free conditions during development that ensure a healthy offspring. The creature instinctively or intelligently knows what is needed to ensure this. It’s not a guessing game for them.
Rather than creatures and their environments being seen as separate things that need to be matched through some blind and random process as with adaptive evolution. The creature can cause and direct its own evolution and by creating conditions it knows will ensure adaptive and heritable change and thus is doing what natural selection is said to have done with the SET view.
That is what the authors mean by NS not being the sole force for producing fit and adaptive variations. In this sense evolutionary cause does have a degree of direction towards a purpose which is that the creature ensures the outcome is more beneficial and fit for surviving and reproducing.
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Again you've changed what was said - as I made quite clear, it's a false premise - natural selection is not a creative force. The processes that generate variation are the creative forces.
So no, your misinterpretations are not 'vindicated', their basis is mistaken, as we've been telling you all thread.
If co-evolution is one of those kinds of influences, it's not qualitatively different. The point being that co-evolution and the other evolutionary feedback loops have been part of evolutionary theory since its inception. You seem unable to grasp this.
The point is that you need to ask yourself what makes a change beneficial. Could it be that the individuals that make some changes are more reproductively successful than the individuals that make other changes? what is that process called?
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In what way have I invoked teleology. In saying that creatures have agency, have instincts, or intelligence in being able to determine what conditions they need to put them in a better position to survive and reproduce is not teleology. It is just a fact of life.
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If that is the case then you, I, we all invoke teleology so it cant be such a bad thing as you are trying to make out. Like I said its a fact of life.
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Speedwell
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What point do you think you are making by twisting my words like that? I never said nor even implied that it was a bad thing, just that it is absent in the natural causes which drive evolutionary processes.
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I think you have misunderstood what I said. I said you have vindicated (what I have said) that the authors were claiming ‘that natural selection was the sole creative force in evolution’. It isn’t about what you believe it is about what I claimed being vindicated as something the papers did say rather than people saying I was wrong and misinterpreting the authors and papers.
But just on natural selection as a creative force, as far as I know, it is quite common for natural selection to be described as a creative force in the sense it not only weeds out the non-beneficial variations but is selecting out the variations that are functional and fit which has produced all the variety and complexity we see today. Even Gould and Dawkins recognized this.
Stephen Jay Gould on Natural Selection
"THE RETURN OF HOPEFUL MONSTERS", NATURAL HISTORY (VOL. 86, 1977 JUNE/JULY), P. 28.
The essence of Darwinism lies in a single phrase: natural selection is the creative force of evolutionary change. No one denies that selection will play a negative role in eliminating the unfit. Darwinian theories require that it create the fit as well.
Stephen Jay Gould on Natural Selection
The theory of evolution by natural selection, as developed by Darwin, holds that natural selection results in favorable, heritable traits becoming more common in subsequent populations and, over time, is the creative force even in macroevolutionary changes, such as the development of new species, higher taxa, and major new designs.
https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Natural_selection
The point is despite all the EES forces that have been recognized by the SET the EES recognizes these forces as causes of evolution on par and additional to natural selection and the SET doesn't.
The EES forces can direct evolution and natural selection. The EES forces can both produce variation and do the job of NS in that the variation it can produce is fit and adaptive as a response to the environment the creature is faced with before NS gets involved. The SET doesn't give that level of recognition as an actual cause and director of evolution to the EES forces.
Such as with niche construction it is seen as an independent force that contains several processes (one being co-evolution). But as mentioned there are other processes that make niche construction theory in of itself and enough of a force to be regarded as a force on par with the force of natural selection.
This is part of the research that the EES is doing and they are determining the causes of evolutionary change. The point is the EES places the creature itself as a central contributor to evolutionary cause. They take a more constructive and reciprocal view of evolution.
Creatures can control the course of their own evolution by the actions they take such as through niche construction and inheritance beyond genes or by the inbuilt mechanisms that are designed to help them change and adapt such as through development.
It isn’t left to just chance or random processes or something that cannot be determined. Living things can create and select beneficial situations that help and ensure that they are more reproductively successful than other creatures that don’t. This is being supported by scientific evidence now as part of the EES research.
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I don't know but maybe it had something to do with the way you said it that it seemed to make out I had done something wrong or should not have said it. Like I have to justify what I have done.
Speedwell said
You may deny ever having said so but when in the same sentence you invoke a teleological characterization of EES what is one to think?
It seems you were at least implying that including agency and evolution is wrong or something that should not be done. If we all do it and it is part of describing evolution or the nature of how living things behave and act then why make an issue out of it.
But the ironic thing is it seems you are trying to twist what I have said into invoking teleology when I using common everyday language and speaking about a common understanding of life in the way intelligent beings can determine their own destiny. IE you reap what you sow etc. The EES recognizes this and the fact you think its teleology shows you don't really understand the EES. I certainly don't think the EES is evoking teleology.
The EES recognizes the role of the creature in contributing to the direction of its own evolution and that of its offspring. It is not some dumb passive entity being pushed along by some outside force. It is intelligent and knowledgable about what is happening around it and equipped to respond and can take actions to ensure it thrives and survives.
The problem is some restrict evolution to a narrow view. But today we are beginning to recognize the associated influences that come from other sciences like ecology, sociology, and the behavioral sciences. They all understand the creature as an intelligent and sentient being able to effect itself and its surrounding.
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Speedwell
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Yes, but intelligent beings determining their own destiny is teleological behavior.
Which requires a level of self-aware intelligence found only in a few creatures besides man.
No, that's your invention, the reason you've been getting so much flack in this discussion: your imaginary notion that there is a large group of evolutionary biologists who are clinging to the idea that evolution proceeds solely by random genetic variation and natural selection despite evidence to the contrary. It's offensive.
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What you actually said was, "It seems that after 300 plus posts I am vindicated." That is not the same as saying that I had vindicated the authors.
You also didn't say that the authors claimed, "that natural selection was the sole creative force in evolution". What you actually said was that they were saying, "that the SET (based on the literature) made natural selection the sole force in evolution". Sole force ≠ sole creative force.
Even in this one particular instance you've misquoted yourself misquoting them; it's not about what I believe, it's about what you actually said, here in the thread.
OK, if you want to call a dumb filter 'creative' because it's common usage, knock yourself out; but don't expect to be understood when you ask for a 'creative' colander for draining pasta, or a 'creative' tea strainer for making tea... It's certainly true that evolution wouldn't be creative without natural selection, but nor would it be without heritable variation. Both are necessary.
No; I've already explained that evolution requires both heritable variation and natural selection. They are qualitatively different parts of the evolutionary process. Heritable variation alone is not evolution, whatever the 'EES forces' involved - unless evolution has been redefined as something other than a change in gene frequencies of a population over generations... has it?
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I never said that you have vindicated the authors. I am saying that the authors claimed that mainstream evolution makes natural selection the sole creative force. That is what I claimed and I claimed this based on what the papers/authors said. You proved this by also agreeing that the authors were actually saying this. You just reckon they were making a straw man argument in claiming that. If you want to go back through my history you will find that is exactly the case.
Yes, I agree so what is the problem. Why would I claim that the authors claim that NS is the sole creative force? That would go against their whole argument for the EES. I think you are getting into semantics. You know exactly what I meant and I have made the same claim many times. Why get stuck on semantics when you know that is not what I meant. Sorry, I didn't spell it out for you. But that was not the point I was making to Frumious anyway.
No, you have misquoted me, what I have said. Where have I said it is about "what I (steve) believe'? The above quote is saying it is not about what (you) believe but about what I claimed being vindicated by the papers and authors that mainstream evolution made natural selection the sole creative force. It's pretty simple and is only complicated when you try to twist things.
But evolutionary scientists like Dawkins and Gould are not just saying it is a word attached to natural selection because it seems like its creative. They are saying natural selection is creative. That it is important to ascribe this meaning to it to reflect the way evolution works through gradualism. It is the gradual selecting of small variations that build creatures and in this sense, NS is seen as the creative force. Gould explains this as follows
Without gradualism in this form, large variations of discontinuous morphological import—rather than natural selection—might provide the creative force of evolutionary change. But if the tiny increment of each step remains inconsequential in itself, then creativity must reside in the summation of these steps into something substantial natural selection, in Darwin’s theory, acts as the agent of accumulation. (Gould 2002: 150).
Natural Selection as a Creative Force
This article also helps explain why natural selection is seen as a creative force.
In a recent expansive treatment, Razeto-Barry & Frick 2011 distinguish between the creative and non-creative views of natural selection. On the non-creative view, natural selection merely eliminates traits while doing nothing to create new ones; the latter phenomenon is the result of mutation. Proponents of the creative view see natural selection as a creative force that makes probable combinations of mutations that are necessary for the development of at least some traits. While Razeto-Barry and Frick grant that natural selection cannot explain the origin of traits that arise by a single mutation, they argue that it can explain the occurrence of sequences of phenotypic changes that would otherwise be wildly unlikely to occur without selection operating to cause the spread of the changes prior to the final one in the sequence.
Natural Selection (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
So it is not so much the variation that is provided as this can be very small and nit amount to much on its own. It is the gradual selection and building of particular variations into something bigger over time that is attributed to NS as a creative force.
I understand this already. NS needs variation to act on. But it's not about that, is it? It's about the type of variation and how that can bias and diminish natural selections role.
Once again you misunderstand the EES as explained above. No one is disputing the SET view of evolution through random variation and NS. What the EES is saying is that the EES forces can produce variation as well just like random mutation does in the SET view. The difference is that some EES variations are not random and already suit the environment. So the EES forces have also acted like NS in determining and selecting an adaptive variation.
It has more or less done the job of NS in that it has produced an adaptive fit. Technically NS may come along and rubber stamp that already adaptive change. But it is only confirming what has already been determined as adaptive by the EES forces. That is why the EES forces are said to bias NS and drive it in certain directs because if the EES forces determine what is fit and adaptive then NS has to go along with those variations. In that way, the EES forces are driving evolutionary change.
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Speedwell
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Heritable variation is not always randomly distributed in SET, either. For instance, sometimes it's a Poisson distribution. Sometimes it's just plain binary. So what?
And you go on and on and on about it but you never seem to answer the most important question: so what? You're basically making a semantic argument, quibbling about how scientists choice of phraseology indicates how much relative importance they ascribe to EES phenomena. Why is it worth so much effort to you?
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I've been trying to prompt him to make his own arguments so he gets to see a more integrated evolutionary picture, but all he ever does is simply assert what he can find in articles. The last post was so confused, talking to me about my post as if I was someone else entirely and repeating the errors I'd already pointed out, that there's really nothing coherent to respond to - once you've read the previously quoted articles you're done ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
As you say, so what?
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Fair enough, so what is wrong with that. Why is this such a wrong idea for understanding evolution and the sciences? We use it often in the social sciences and social sciences are being included more and more in evolution. We know that living things are not dumb and passive to what is going on around them to varying degrees. In fact, we are finding how much creatures understand their surroundings and how they can have input into their own evolution.
If evolution is about fit and adaptive change that allows creatures to survive and reproduce then a creature putting themselves in a more fit and adaptive position is producing evolutionary change or at the very least putting them in a better position to evolve.
Your underestimating the level of intelligence in living things. Even if we find intelligence in higher-order creatures that then means there is intelligence that contributes to evolution at least in these creatures. But I think it is far more spread than that. But intelligence is only part of the equation. Living things also have instincts that help them know about what best helps them survive. Evidence shows they also have inbuilt systems such as developmental processes (developmental plasticity and epigenetic changes for example) that can respond to environmental changes and pressures that can produce needed changes to survive.
I can't remember making it so drastic as 'clinging to the idea'. But I have made the claim that mainstream evolution the SET restricts evolution to random genetic variation and natural selection. But that hasn't been my invention but rather something once again I claimed the papers said.
So what did the papers mean when they said this
The EES papers state that the mainstream core assumptions of the SET by biologists are
Table 1.A comparison of the core assumptions of the classical MS and the EES.
(i) The pre-eminence of natural selection. The major directing or creative influence in evolution is natural selection, which alone explains why the properties of organisms match the properties of their environments (adaptation)
(ii) Genetic inheritance. Genes constitute the only general inheritance system. Acquired characters are not inherited
https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rspb.2015.1019
The EES papers also state clearly
Charles Darwin conceived of evolution by natural selection without knowing that genes exist. Now mainstream evolutionary theory has come to focus almost exclusively on genetic inheritance and processes that change gene frequencies.
Does evolutionary theory need a rethink?
Contemporary evolutionary biology textbooks support this interpretation (see the electronic supplementary material, table S1). Only selection, drift, gene flow and mutation are consistently described as evolutionary processes
http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/282/1813/20151019
The story that SET tells is simple: new variation arises through random genetic mutation; inheritance occurs through DNA; and natural selection is the sole cause of adaptation, the process by which organisms become well-suited to their environments.
Does evolutionary theory need a rethink?
Evolutionary biologists, therefore, need manageable representations of how organisms fulfill the Lewontin conditions. The familiar representation – the one we find in textbooks – is the genetic theory of evolution by natural selection.
How do living beings fulfil the conditions for evolution by natural selection? – Extended Evolutionary Synthesis
This clearly shows that the EES papers support what I am saying. The authors have checked out the contemporary literature and found that the mainstream view of evolution is almost exclusively through random gene change and natural selection.
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