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Evolving to Extinction

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It is a very common misconception that an evolution works for the good of its species. Can you remember hearing someone talk about two rabbits breeding eight rabbits and thereby “contributing to the survival of their species”? A modern evolutionary biologist would never say such a thing; they’d sooner breed with a rabbit. It’s yet another case where you’ve got to simultaneously consider multiple abstract concepts and keep them distinct. Evolution doesn’t operate on particular individuals; individuals keep whatever genes they’re born with. Evolution operates on a reproducing population, a species, over time. There’s a natural tendency to think that if an Evolution Fairy is operating on the species, she must be optimizing for the species. But what really changes are the gene frequencies, and frequencies don’t increase or decrease according to how much the gene helps the species as a whole. As we shall later see, it’s quite possible for a species to evolve to extinction. Why are boys and

Evolving to Extinction Source Markdown · Talk Home About Search Contents Evolving to Extinction ❦ It is a very common misconception that an evolution works for the good of its species. Can you remember hearing someone talk about two rabbits breeding eight rabbits and thereby “contributing to the survival of their species”? A modern evolutionary biologist would never say such a thing; they’d sooner breed with a rabbit. It’s yet another case where you’ve got to simultaneously consider multiple abstract concepts and keep them distinct. Evolution doesn’t operate on particular individuals; individu

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