John Edser wrote:
>>TH:-
>>But can we go further and say 
>>'what isn't genetic drift (in the most broad sense of the word)
> 
> 
> BOH:-
> Well, we could use a diffusion model, in which drift wouldn't be drift.
> Sorry, I couldn't resist.  To translate, selection would be the 
> difference between the expected allele frequencies at two times points.
> 
> JE:-
> Typically BOH replaces testable reality
> with just his "expectations" of it.
> In simple terms such an absurd event 
> is termed: propaganda. The master was Stalin.
> He turned reality into his "expectations" and
> millions perished.
> 
John, please read up on simple probability theory before you write 
another post ridiculing expectations.  They have a precise mathematical 
definition, which you seem to be totally unaware of.

As for testability, you might like to read up about a wonderful subject 
called "statistics".  It's used to fit models to data, which is an 
esential component of testing hypotheses.  One of the things you can do 
is to estimate expected values (e.g. of allele frequency changes).

Bob

-- 
Bob O'Hara

Dept. of Mathematics and Statistics
P.O. Box 4 (Yliopistonkatu 5)
FIN-00014 University of Helsinki
Finland
Telephone: +358-9-191 23743
Mobile: +358 50 599 0540
Fax:  +358-9-191 22 779
WWW:  http://www.RNI.Helsinki.FI/~boh/
Journal of Negative Results - EEB: http://www.jnr-eeb.org
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