On Sat, 27 Mar 2004 04:14:04 +0000 (UTC), 
Jeffrey Turner  wrote:

[snip]

> Breeding in controlled environments is hardly earth-shattering.  As
> far as supporting my claim, I used a random genetic drift calculator I
> found on the net, http://www.utm.edu/~rirwin/Drift.htm and, used the
> maximum population size of 200 and a mutation frequency of 0.005
> corresponding to a mutation in a single individual.  In 50 trials, one
> mutation lasted for the full maximum duration of 200 generations and
> was at about 53% at the end having maxed out under 66%.  When
> Europeans started settling North America in numbers the bison
> population was 60 million.  To evolve a random characteristic in a
> population that size to the point where a new species would have been
> 100% different from the progenitor would have taken more time than the
> existence of the universe if you assume a reasonable length of a
> generation and suitable scaling of the numbers for the artificially
> small population of 200 used in the mathematical exercise.

If what you say is true then population geneticists and evolutionary
biologists must be really, really, stupid to believe in random
genetic drift. Is that what you think? 

When your conclusion is completely at odds with the scientific 
consensus, there are three main possibilities: 

  (1) you're on to something new and original that nobody has 
      ever thought of 
  (2) you've made a mistake or don't know enough about the subject 
  (3) you're a kook.

Which category do you see yourself in?




Larry Moran
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