CharonY

This is again confusing chance of chance events with the mechanism. If something is favored, it does not happen by chance. There is a mechanism that favors it.Depending on the type of population and effects we are talking here, it can be quite possible to distinguish those. You have to keep in mind that these studies are done by looking at events that took place over time and is not based on singular sampling directly after something happened, for example.

Then what follows is selection and the mechanism is not stochastic anymore. The actually killing by the strike can be seen as stochastic (i.e. if directly hit there is no selective advantage of any genotype of a given population (and again, the concept is only valid if we look at populations separately). But the resulting environmental landscape provides a change in selective pressure for the survivors. At this step selection kicks in.

It seems to me (but I may be wrong) that you are conflating two elements. The event itself may be random in terms of being unpredictable (i.e. meteor strike). But to assess whether selection is going on, the important bit is whether the effects of the events on allele frequencies is random or not. You mentioned above that have better survival after that event. i.e. This would point at a selective pressure of sorts. If the genotype has no influence on survival of the event (I am here also conflating survival with reproductive success for brevity's sake) , then it is truly stochastic and in small populations (or huge events) genetic drift would be the result. I would also like to point out that not all traits are selected for, but it is probably more accurate to state that this is true only for small set. The majority probably has not been selected against.

They define what they mean by ecological opportunity: I actually do not find it counter intuitive as times of extreme scarcity typically is not conducive to initiate potentially unrewarding behavior.

This is either wrong or a misunderstanding of principles. You are apparently comparing different species. However, if within a population there is differential reproduction (surviving is not even precisely relevant here) due to an event, that event is not stochastic.

I agree with that part, but it should be noted that while potentially a misconception, it is probably not the best to bring it up, unless it is obvious that someone else was under these assumptions (and quickly skimming the op it did not appear to be the case). Otherwise it may complicate matters. I disagree with the latter part as NS doe not favor reproduction. Rather, it is a selective filter that changes the genotype composition. Due to this misconception, I presume, you may confuse stochastic events with selection. Think of it that way, assume there are three alleles in existence (A, B and C). They are essential and fulfill the function with simliair efficiency. Assume now that mutations create more variations, but none of them are functional or have reduced functionality under the given environment. The result is that selective sweeps stabilizes the existing genotypes. All things considered equal, the three will keep a steady frequency in the population. Now assume that there is a change in environment results in C providing a fitness increase over A and B. Now over time we will see the frequency shift towards C (positive selection). Now assume that there are many more alleles (say A-Z) and none of them provide fitness benefits. However E is detrimental. Now selective sweeps will eliminate E over time (negative selection). Now contrast each these effects with stochastic effects in which individual members of a population are randomly eliminated (and note that the effects will be heavily affected by population size.). If, on the other hand you mean that different populations in different environments have different reproductive conditions, then I am not sure what you mean as it also trivially means that they face different selective pressures.

Ten oz, that is a very confused declaration of things, I am afraid.You are conflating various mechanisms into one narrative that is not in agreement with common use or understanding of selection. A distinction between selection and stochastic elements have to be made as the effects on genotype are expected to be different. Moreover, survival of species or of alleles are again different things (selection acts on the latter. In fact extinction cannot typically be explained in the context of natural selection). These are somewhat understandable misunderstandings, but will make a discussion of what selection is quite complicated. Especially the last sentence again conflates various issues as natural selection does no such thing. Whatever is alive is actually subject to selective events that will determine the gene pool of the next generation.

As a general comment, of course it is not possible to reconstruct the evolutionary history of each and every trait. But that is not what evolutionary science is about. As an analogy particle physics is will not explain where each atom came from. Actual science on the subject (if we go away from hand wavy narratives) it depends a lot on the subject being investigated. Here, you typically look at specific alleles and search whether there are differences from a null model (linkage disequilibrium being an obvious example). Thus traits under some form of positive or negative selection will exhibit different frequency distributions than neutral ones. In simple organisms as bacteria it can be investigated much more directly by applying a stressor that acts as a selective force. "Favorable" as a term is not terribly helpful as it would have to be linked to the selection itself. I.e. instead of stating that you are doing an antibiotics selection you would have to state that you are creating a condition favoring resistant bacteria resulting in a pool with higher frequency of bacteria. I have no clue why one would change well-established linguistic usage for no apparent good reason. Also one difference is "favor" implies something directional or positive. However selection can be positive as well as negative (the latter probably more common in stable situations), resulting often in non-directional (or sometimes disruptive) selection. Again, the use of selection is much deeper than the discussion actually touches upon (as Ophiolite already implied) and I feel that the whole discussion is prolonged unnecessarily by focusing on some misunderstood concepts. Maybe if you replace the word "selection" with "filter" it would make more sense to you (but it would not follow common usage). It is a bit like discussing why quantum mechanics is not called something else because it is in truth not about mechanics (just to pull something out of thin air).

The mandate of the FDA or CDC is independent of companies and before vaccines are approved the companies need to submit rigorous documentation of safety and efficacy. There are various databases to mine, such as http://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/Activities/VSD.html The data tracked by these agencies tend to be the most thorough, as they obtain and track data from large populations, whereas specific studies tend to be more limited. For example, they may specifically track the safety for high-risk groups, such as children with kidney issues, pregnant women and other groups that would get lost in the overall data tracked by agencies. I would advise you to make a quick google scholar or pubmed search or vaccine safety, as they are far too many to list. If you are interested in non-experimental vaccines that are generally regarded as safe you will probably have to go back in time a bit. You may be interested in the development of the pertussis vaccine that started off as whole-cell vaccines, but then got refined to only gone an antigenic protein (Lambert, J Infect Dis. 2014). In a way we only have a discussion about vaccine safety because they are so effective. Before they effectively reduced or almost eliminated the disease, it was a no-brainer to vaccinate as serious health issues and death due to the respective diseases were so devastating. Now that the disease levels are so low, people start for looking for the very rare events of vaccine-related issues. Sadly, this could result in re-emergence of the disease which starts the whole cycle again. Until of course, pathogens emerge that somehow changed so much that existing vaccines stop working...

The efficacy of vaccines varies, depending on the disease. I am not sure what you means with third party but organizations like WHO, FDA and CDC provide information about effectiveness and safety of vaccines. Negative side effects are vanishingly small (typically found in the order of a few incidences per million vaccination) which makes it very hard to figure out whether these were the result of vaccination or caused by something else entirely. One known risk is the use of certain live vaccinations in immunodeficient people (such as polio vaccine which was phased out in the late 90s). Other than that long-term effects are almost impossible to figure out, as you are exposing your body continuously to potentially harmful things in the air (especially in homes), food, water etc. A singular exposure due to vaccination is likely to vanish in the noise of overall exposure.

The answer is obviously "turtles."

The example was provided in the context of random effects, such as drift and luck). Which means that all individuals were equally likely to be eliminated. But of course in Strange's example it is not a stochastic event anymore, as now there are individuals that are less likely to die from rock fall. To summarize, a stochastic event in this context is essentially anything affecting the gene pool regardless of its composition. If there are differential reproductive success due to events (such as disease or antibiotics resistance) they are not considered random anymore, as they shape the gene pool in a specific manner. Also note that phenotypes generally do not arise as a response to something. Mutations leading to sickle cell arise with or without malaria. However, their frequency in the population are affected by it.

Well, what known Venusians life forms are there from which we could speculate survivability under Earth-like conditions?

In a fictional setting the chances are exactly as the author wants them to be.

No, these are aspects are stochastic events that contrast with natural selection. The latter is specifically tied to differential reproductive success under given conditions. I.e. selective forces act on a given gene pool and shapes the resulting frequency.

I agree completely with that assessment. Also a new theory would, in my opinion, only be useful if it is able to synthesize all those directions in a cohesive way that allows quantitative predictions. However, the analysis of these mechanisms is split between disciplines with a lot of unknown in each area. In fact, one could argue that the complexity of the processes and their implications need to be broken down into sub-research topics as there is not enough information available to research in a unified manner.

That is a morphological characterization.

Actually there are different types of classifications, depending on the context and approach (e.g. function, morphology, reaction to certain dyes etc.).

Although to be fair, biological and related topics are a bit all over the place here. E.g. there is not good reason why immunology and microbiology is grouped together and placed under medicine. On the other hand, the sub topics are easy enough to see in the main view, so it does not really matter. Likewise, considering the amount of posts (or lack thereof) it does not make a lot of sense to have a lot of topics, as they are likely to remain mostly empty. Finally aside from very rough categories the subdivision of disciplines tend not to be terribly helpful for newer research directions.

For that you have to ask yourself: - what does lysozyme do? - what relevant characteristics distinguish Gram+ and Gram- bacteria?

Actually it is also misspelled in the title above the video (though I should not complain about misspelling). However, there is an option to ignore signatures. I am not sure whether it works on mobile devices, though.

Everyone is in a funk every now and then. However, you should be aware that there will be some shifts once once you get towards a proper academic position (i.e. TT). Yet, if you are not terribly interested in what you are doing it will be quite painful as, a) the path to TT is very uncertain and stressfull and b) can take quite a long while with a lot of financial insecurity. Even after landing an academic job you will often take your work home with you, which is alright if you love what you are doing, but adds to stress if you do not. It would be a good time to evaluate what you want from life (e.g. work life vs private life balance, family, location etc.) and see which careers would provide you with what you want.While it is not universally true, some industrial jobs allow you to leave your job at work. Even if you are not terribly interested in it (but are decently competent) you could balance that part off with a fulfilling private life. An academic job tends to stay with you the whole time although in theory you could settle down once you achieve tenure. However, you are typically in your 40s (and in some countries even older) and by then you probably do not know how to do things differently anymore.... To summarize, the correct mindset is to think about what you want from live. What do you want to have and do in the next 5 years, ten years, twenty years? And go from there.

It should be noted that typical water filters do not provide microbial filtration. If the filter is not flushed, bacteria can grow in it, however.

To be fair, judging from med school students, many doctors hate biology.

A rest pulse of 90 or higher is sometimes indicative of some underlying health issue (although abnormal values could also highlight the need for a better measurement). The feeling of already having experienced something could be a déjà vu. I.e. a short-term inability of the brain to distinguished between new events and memory of a given event, so to speak.