Re: Rapid genetic variation

Walter ReMine (wjremine@mmm.com)
Fri, 18 Aug 1995 19:53:58 -0500

Bill Hamilton wrote
>I'm also a bit puzzled about where Walter is going with his argument that
>rapid genetic variation can occur if you include neutral and harmful
>variations. He seemed to be depending especially on harmful variations.
>But wouldn't these variations get eliminated pretty rapidly by selection?
>That's why evolutionists don't worry very much about them.

Evolutionists tend to ignore harmful mutations, by assuming that selection
will automatically eliminate these. Typically they assume
"mutation-selection balance" or a "balance between selection and mutation"
-- which silently assumes away the problem of error catastrophe: a
continual genetic deterioration generation to generation.

But the problems cannot be ignored. My book makes this argument, using the
following items:

1) mutation rates as measured, reported, and used by evolutionary geneticists

2) the standard model of evolutionary genetics (the one model prominently
displayed in all evolution books)

3) the known size of the human genome and observed limitations on human
reproductive capacity

Using those items we can readily show that humans are near (perhaps even
within) error catastrophe, even if we minimize the problem by assuming a
full 97% of the human genome is inert and functionless, and therefore immune
to the effects of mutation. The problem is fairly simple to understand, and
easily to calculate. Yet evolutionary genetics textbooks ignored the
problem for decades. Error catastrophe is one of the trade secrets of
evolutionary genetics, right along with Haldane's Dilemma, and the highly
inert genome.

Walter ReMine