Parasitic evolutionary structures
Onar Aam (onar@HSR.NO)
Fri, 24 Feb 1995 18:38:58 +0100
There has been some confusions as of my use of parasitism. The most important
reason I prefer such a strong term is due to what I call "parasitic evolutionary
structures". Modern evolutionary biology suggests that most new designs that
have evolved are *bi-effects* of other adaptions. In other words, preadaption is
the most significant component in radical evolutionary redesign. Neither the eye
nor the insect wing would have evolved with "direct" selection. In that sense
they are completely _dependent_ on the evolution of other functions in order to
evolve. We may say that they _parasite_ on preadapted functions. This is indeed
true parasiting because the new, parasiting function often destroys the original
function.
Onar.