> MR:
> I suppose you're going to chalk up Dawkin's statement "Rothenbuhler
> surmised that there might be two separate genes, one gene for uncapping,
> and one gene for throwing out... This story illustrates a number of
> important points... It shows that it can be perfectly proper to speak of
> 'a gene for behaviour so-and-so" to your lame explanation "A
"gene for
> trait X" doesn't mean that no other factors are involved - any more than
> a "vote for candidate X" means tht there are no other factors
> influencing the election result. The word "for" simply
doesn't mean the
> same as "determines". Mr. Atmar refers to the "gene for
X" as loose
> language. Mr. Moran stated in a previous response post to you: "Gould is
> well aware of the problem, as is Rose. Neither of them claim that their
> opponents are thinking of a single gene "for" a complex trait. Both of
> them claim that the excuse used by people like you (it's just a
> short-hand way of expressing something) is deeply flawed and distorts
> one's thinking about genes and phenotypes. That's why Gould said "We
> fall into a deep error, not just a harmless     oversimplification,
> when we speak of genes 'for' particular items of anatomy or behavior."

JE:-
The correct terminology is that a gene X is _correlated_
to a phenotype Y. Any correlation has 4 possible causes:

1) X causes Y.
2) Y causes X.
3) Z causes both X and Y.
4) No causation exists between X and Y.

Analytic genetics (deductive genetics) works
OK when just one gene is _assumed_
to cause phenotype X because it
is only concerned as to where a gene may be
located or may be going. Synthetic genetics
(inductive genetics) fails almost entirely
when one gene is assumed to cause one
phenotype because it is concerned
with how that phenotype was formed and/or
evolved.

Analytic genetics is gene focused but synthetic
genetics has a phenotype focus. However, gene
centric Neo Darwinism attempts to make synthetic
genetics gene focused. It can only attempt to
do so within heuristic models. Dr Hoelzer
reverses everything when he states that
Darwinism is just a heuristic model of
Neo Darwinism. The reality is that
Neo Darwinism deleted gene fitness epistasis
but Darwinism included it. This makes
Darwinian fitness less definable as a heritable
fitness but this does not matter. A more
exact heritable Neo Darwinian fitness that
however, deletes all gene fitness epistasis
to allow each gene to become independently
selectable is more in synthetic error than
an defined Darwinian fitness that does
include it but cannot measure exactly how
much of one Darwinian fitness is heritable.

Genetics within evolutionary theory is
synthetic but remains based on just a
correlation between genotype and phenotype
where only the phenotype is selectable.
Such a correlation is only
assumed to mean: gene X causes phenotype
Y within however, gene centric, _simplified_,
Neo Darwinian _models_ of evolutionary theory.
Such an assumption just deletes all gene
_fitness_ epistasis. This is OK if and only
if, such models do not seek to contest and
win against the theory they were simplified
from and are utterly misused when they do so.
Hamilton's rule is a classic example of such
misuse. Many other examples exist, uncorrected.

The problem remains that Neo Darwinians mostly
refuse to discuss cause and effect, e.g. Prof.
Felsenstein has stated he will never discuss it.
This means Neo Darwinians are granting themselves
a blank cheque re: the four basic hypothesis
that can exist between phenotype and genotype where
1 and 2 are contradictions. When you allow
a contradiction then "anything goes".
This can bee seen within Hamilton's rule
where the baseline fitness m which determines
the rule and sets real limits to it has been
mathematically deleted. This allows the rule
to be so "free" that it cannot even measure the
difference between a donation and an investment
cost c, allowing organism fitness mutualism (OFM)
to be falsely paraded as organism fitness altruism
(OFA).  Since OFM and OFA stand as selective
_contradictions_ to each other anything goes
using Hamilton's uncorrected rule.


Regards,

John Edser
Independent Researcher

PO Box 266
Church Pt
New 2105
Australia

edser{at}tpg.com.au
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