lost advantageous alleles?

[iNow]

I understand your point, and won't argue much with it, as it's thrust is accurate, but doesn't an error assume you first have an ideal state? The error must be compared against the proper, and I don't think DNA has a "proper" state. Either way, cheers.

[CDarwin]

I understand your point, and won't argue much with it, as it's thrust is accurate, but doesn't an error assume you first have an ideal state? The error must be compared against the proper, and I don't think DNA has a "proper" state. Either way, cheers.

 

Well, it has a "perfect" state doesn't it? I.e., replication that is exactly faithful to the original. A mutation is a deviation from that "perfect" state. Thus an "error." It's a point of semantics, obviously.

[vampares]

I understand your point, and won't argue much with it, as it's thrust is accurate, but doesn't an error assume you first have an ideal state? The error must be compared against the proper, and I don't think DNA has a "proper" state. Either way, cheers.

 

The "error", IMO, would occur when the DNA replication is not being accomplish, well, "correctly" for lack of a better word. Otherwise it really isn't a mutation. It's perhaps a morphing?

 

 

There are alterations of DNA, such as methylation, that are intentional -- it has a mechanism and a purpose. It is really hard to say weather every methylation is conducive to biological life. If it isn't, this is obviously something we would be concerned about from an observational point of view but this is beside the point.

 

If a mutation arises from a free radical then this is not an "error" but it is still a mutation. I may have confused this in my other post.

 

Nutritional factors could result in what would be irregular cell function. Chemcal agents however could be a gray area.

 

Mutations in the protein coding, for instance, can create a mal-sense. Frame shift is an example. This from an observational point of view, where DNA coding is defunct, would seem to be an error. There is no way for a cell to "correct" this or move around it. Cell are very unintelligent in this way.

 

Sometimes there is a way for a cell to "recognize" and "fix" the altered DNA. This would be a proper systemic error (that happens to get corrected).

 

 

Ideals are obviously subjective.

 

There are "Medical" ideals. From a medical standpoint this could become more broad. I don't think any Doctor is going to admit to practicing something other than healing medicine.

 

There are stasis ideals, status quo. Ideals of an unchanging population. From this standpoint we could say "unexpected changes", with regards to genetic recombination and sexual reproduction, deviate from the gene pool. We could also include population definitions etc.

 

There ideals inferred from genetic pressures. The simple ability to survive or thrive, the susceptibility to disease, the ability to accomplish needed tasks, the discriminatory selection by predators -- even inanimate objects like doorframes have a predetermined expectation that could effectively knock out any chance of 9 foot humans. There are social pressures as well. Any of these pressures may deem mutations (and nonmutations) as nonideal or even undesirable.

 

Pressures like medical pressures are not desirable. Usually there these pressures work in conjunction to allow advantaged individuals only to reproduce.

 

I for one am not in favor of placing the worlds population under a culling duress -- even in the most minimal sense. Not sterilizing the city water, for instance, will make some people ill. For one thing, it doesn't kill them or make them unable to reproduce. It just causes undue misery. And wanton duress, ie poisoning the water supply, is the same with no benefit to mankind. Anything that wastes time or resources in frivolous attempts to stifle the population is non-conducive to living. Sometimes people will just act difficult. You will notice, if you are attune to it, this occurs very frequently with varying intentions. It is a major personality discrepancy.

 

The ability to reproduce with another organism is what some concider the definition of a species. Horse crossed w/ donkey yields a mule. Mules cannot reproduce at all. If they could, say with a horse, this might result in the loss of a chromosome in all offspring. Horse lovers are not going to be happy about this. This is not evolution. This is gainsay genetics, not Mendelian. It is destructive to the population. Nobody hates mules (anymore than they already did), but they have to breed additional horses to keep up with the cross-breeding mules. The solution to that problem is not excessive horse breeding but if they don't replace the lost chromosomes by population increase, the horse population will die (especially quickly if the horse population is divided). That is when most people would say it is an error to crossbreed horse and mule -- or donkey for that matter, as there is now a way to breed a mule. Horse breeders do not use conventional breeding techniques for reasons such as these.

 

Inbreeding is outlawed in many parts of the world. 26 state in the US have added first cousins to the relationships that are prohibited. This was done with very specific purpose. Not because it was icky. The purpose is to prevent the abuse of an arbitrary standard of human dignity -- regardless of point-of-origin-limitation and effectiveness -- in the best way they knew of at the time.