The Evolution of Complex Organs

Gregory, T. Ryan

doi:10.1007/s12052-008-0076-1

Cited by 53 publications

(54 citation statements)

References 148 publications

(224 reference statements)

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“…Kirschner and Gerhart (2005) argue that the "irreducible complexity" argument prominently espoused by intelligent design creationists (Forrest 2008;Shanks and Green 2011) is largely undone by advances in evo-devo, which suggests ways complex organs, such as vertebrate limbs (or the eye that bedeviled Buschbeck and Friedrich 2008;Gregory 2008b), may undergo major transformations not from gradual ("progressive") accumulation of minor mutations in structural genes but instead from minor tweaking of regulatory (e.g., homeobox) genes. Epigenetics is another burgeoning branch of biology that adds richness to the study of phenotype, especially as it suggests ways in which environmental circumstances might lead to genomic imprinting and hence inheritance of traits influenced by long-ago conditions experienced by ancestors (Jirtle and Skinner 2007).…”

Section: Just So Stories: Does All Evolution Involve Adaptive Change?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Avoiding the Pitfall of Progress and Associated Perils of Evolutionary Education

Werth

2012

Evo Edu Outreach

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People reflexively see all change as implying inevitably increasing progress and complexity. This expected directionality is especially observed in students' views of living things, with some species envisioned as "higher" or more evolved. Students tend naturally to see all evolutionary change as adaptive, progressive, optimal, and teleological, with improvement achieved as needed or desired by organisms (if not as planned in advance). Following an extended outline of many interrelated ways, this basic yet unfortunately widespread and deep-seated misconception of evolutionary thinking ensnares students and hinders proper understanding of the actual pattern and process of evolution, a more useful pedagogical approach is presented. A strategy that involves eliciting preconceptions, engaging in numerous counterexamples, and continually reinforcing an alternative view is generally effective. This is best achieved by tackling the misconception of progress head-on, with an active learning model that forces students to come up with substitute explanations. Several examples of exercises and activities to combat the universal and automatically intuitive inclination toward teleological notions of progress are given, including analyses of paleontology, ecology, biochemistry, development, and systematics.

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Section: Just So Stories: Does All Evolution Involve Adaptive Change?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Avoiding the Pitfall of Progress and Associated Perils of Evolutionary Education

Werth

2012

Evo Edu Outreach

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“…In his study on the evolution of complex organs, and to facilitate the reader's understanding, T. Ryan Gregory (2008) draws a parallel between the mechanism of biological functional shift and the way a common everyday object -a coin -has been given a new use in recent years. If the primary function of a coin was and still is as currency, the appearance of a new conditioning situation (lott ery tickets covered by removable coating) has turned it into a lott ery tickets scraper as well.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Approaching a semiotics of exaptation: At the intersection between biological evolution and technological development

Weible

2013

SSS

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Abstract. Th is paper recognizes a specifi c correspondence between biological evolution and technological development and on this basis tries to set up a semiotic approach to the evolutionary phenomenon of exaptation. To do this, the existence of a historical-structural and pragmatic analogy between organs and tools is shown, which in turn implies on a communicative ground the dissolution of some of their traditional distinctive att ributes. Finally, a philosophical-analytical approach to natural and cultural functions is applied to defi ne three types of exaptations.

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“…For further reviews of eye evolution aimed at a more general audience, the reader is referred to Gregory (2008) and to the other papers in the same issue of that volume.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%