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Researchers challenge claim about how life forms co-evolve

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caterpillar and its host (the ant is farming the caterpillar)/ Maria Jose Endara

From ScienceDaily:

In nature, plants engage in a never-ending battle to avoid being eaten. Unable to run away, plant species have evolved defenses to deter herbivores; they have spines, produce nasty chemicals, or grow tough leaves that are difficult to chew. For years, scientists have assumed that herbivores and plants are locked into evolutionary competition in which a plant evolves a defense, the herbivore evolves a workaround, and so on.

New research led by the University of Utah challenges this paradigm of an evolutionary arms race.

The study analyzed multiple species of Inga, a genus of tropical trees that produces defensive chemicals, and their various insect herbivores. The researchers found that closely-related plants evolved very different defensive traits. Additionally, their analysis revealed that herbivores may drive evolution of plant defenses, but may not show coevolutionary adaptations. Instead, they may ‘chase’ plants based on the herbivore’s own traits at the time they encounter a new host. Paper. (paywall) – María-José Endara, Phyllis D. Coley, Gabrielle Ghabash, James A. Nicholls, Kyle G. Dexter, David A. Donoso, Graham N. Stone, R. Toby Pennington, Thomas A. Kursar. Coevolutionary arms race versus host defense chase in a tropical herbivore–plant system. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2017; 201707727 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1707727114 More.

In short, life forms often do different things, even if they are closely related. And where does the information for that level of complex adaptation come from?

Evolution is a history of life, not an illustration of textbook Darwinism. That’s possibly why we are hearing so much from the Fix doubters people these days.

See also: What the fossils told us in their own words

Comments
Well done Dionisio -- thanksDonJohnsonDD682
August 23, 2017
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This was posted in another thread, but maybe it fits in this one too. Are the Darwinian folks referring to the embedded variability framework (EVF) that operates within the biological systems? Don’t birds remain birds? Bacteria remain bacteria? Plants remain plants? Amphibians remain amphibians? Apes remain apes? Humans remain humans? Many ethnic groups but all equally humans. The evo-devo fundamental conundrum remains unresolved: Dev(d) = Dev(a) + Delta(a,d) That’s the bottom line. The rest is speculation. Without Delta(a,d) there’s no way to get Dev(d) from Dev(a). That’s daydreaming illusion. Figment in their imagination. Pie pie in the sky. It’s time to get serious. A couple of years ago a science professor claimed to know exactly how morphogen gradients form, but even today the research papers point to the complexity of such an important process that still is poorly understood. As outstanding questions get answered new ones are raised. However, as every new discovery sheds more light on the elaborate cellular and molecular choreographies orchestrated within the biological systems, the emerging big picture points more and more to marvelously designed systems. BTW, ‘a’ stands for ‘ancestor’ and ‘d’ for ‘descendant’. Dev(x) is the entire developmental process of a given biological system ‘x’. Delta(x,y) is the entire set of spatiotemporal changes required in Dev(x) in order to get Dev(y). All the bells and whistles have to be included. The whole enchilada. The point is to show how to get Delta(x,y) assuming that we know Dev(x) and Dev(y). I challenge that professor and his cousins to show me one example that satisfies the above formulation. We can sweep and mop the floor with all their baseless ideas. With every new discovery their situation will get even worse.Dionisio
August 23, 2017
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