I have some questions. I consider myself very ignorant when it comes to biology in general but DNA especially is a mystery to me.
I've been thinking about how we view creatures and group them. Chimpanzees are apparently very close to us genetically. The 90+% shared DNA thing. So a lot of the genetic information seems to have been used to define the humanoid shape with head, arms and legs fingers and stuff. That last 10% make us human in some way. But could you say that since evolution works. The weaker species die out (neanderthal etc) the more we evolve to fit modern life the less information there is to work with? That'd make sense to me.
Or should it rather be viewed as a large tree of nodes where each node represents one unit of difference in DNA and there's regions of this tree that's creatures well adapted to modern life.
It sounds racist but I think it seem that diversity is a weakness because you're not as close to the optimal position you could be (as a human at least). So could there be a correlation between lack of diversity in a society and success? (wow I'm really sounding like a nazi now)
I'm not sure how to think about this because it can't really be a chaotic system where small changes make big differences since there's that ape fact. If you take all the information in the DNA, convert it to binary and change a bit you pretty much get a clone to my understanding (assuming it's a legal change, don't know how DNA works). Can it be that large parts of DNA are codependent? So if we alter some (small) section of the ape bits in DNA we come up with a completely different creature?
Does any of this make sense?
>>7942968
>it can't really be a chaotic system where small changes make big differences
it is exactly that
>So could there be a correlation between lack of diversity in a society and success?
imagine there is a small population with lack of diversity, say a group of aryans, perfect looking on the outside. mutations happen, nothing cant stop that, sometimes they can be reversed, sometimes they remain, they replicate during dna replication etc, that leads to a different aminoacid -> different protein, broken enzyme, depending on when the mutation occurred, it could be a single enzyme, or it could be lots, boom you have a disease. now this aryan procreates with another aryan, nothing may happen, but if it does, you have a bigger chance that the next offspring brings about the disease, chances are small, but it can happen, and since youre talking evolution, you have to think big, think thousands - millions of years, you will have a greater part of that population that might carry a potential killer gene (im exaggerating), the smaller the population, the greater the chance that the next generation will get sick -> more deaths -> smaller pop. you get the gist
>Can it be that large parts of DNA are codependent?
its such an intrincate process, look up the central dogma in molecular biology, basically dna -> rna -> proteins, then you have mutations, transposons, etc, after a while you start thinking, how the living fuck can everything work so machinelike
might have rambled on for a bit
>>7942968
With chimpanzee we have 1% difference in our genes. What has been told to me, our alleles are quite different however. Meaning that our gene to build toe is in the same place, but the actual building data is very different.
>>7942968
No no no. You don't understand. The genetic material is highly conserved over ALL species! We are genetically 75% similar to the tiny small worm, c. Elegans .
We share genes with Horseshoe crabs even.
I just posted this in another thread. Evolution and natural selection don't work to produce something that works the best or most efficient. things that are selected for just have to work. Biological systems are terribly inefficient and in an ideal world we would have wheels instead of legs.
>Can it be that large parts of DNA are codependent?
In a way, of course! When we significantly modify a gene, we are causing a loss/change of function in a particular protein. The expression of this protein may have significant effects downstream and via negative feedback loops and cascades could affects many many other genes/proteins/other variables in the organism. Everything in an organism is connected via biological mechanisms and this is true for all species on this planet.
>That last 10% make us human in some way
eh, not really. Mammalian development doesn't really play that game.
DNA isn't like computer code when you're an embryo/child. Input/output aren't set in stone. During development t's more like a rough set of directions that hopefully are followed if they're good, or messed up in a good way if they're bad.
It's really not that 10% that's making any major difference, it's a much smaller amount. And where it shows is in the biochemistry of the body and interactions between signaling proteins.
For example, if your mom drinks while she's pregnant, she's fucking up the signaling of proteins from your sonic the hedge hog gene(real gene name), and many others, that attribute things like facial symmetry. Likewise to grow a more muscular forearm, like a chimpanzee, or to keep hair all over your body, probably wouldn't take a major change, just slight ones.
>>7943006
>rambling
No I find all of that very useful assuming it's true.
>it's a chaotic system
Ok.
>It's an intricate process
>dna->..->mutations
This is probably what I'm missing. But I'd like to know more specifically what I'm to look for in that 'intricate process' label to get the answers I want (still sounding like a nazi wtf). Because the dna->mutations bit doesn't really explain why we're not breeding abominations every now and then. If there's some codependency somewhere the mutations have to always happen outside of that right? Also I don't know how mutations happen either so I guess that could also be a good thing to know.
>>7943035
>evolution and natural selection just picks what works
Yeah. I guess you'd need eugenics to make the preference happen.
>codependency
Well it seems bounded to me. That's what I'm not getting really. I can't even write what I want here because every time I try I just come up with more ideas of why I may be wrong or whatever. God damn this is complicated.
>>7943036
>input output aren't set in stone
Yeah. Environment matters alot I'm told. But the product seems fairly close to home still. If it was a chaotic system and we abstracted DNA to integers then 254 is a completely different being to 255. So the idea I had was that most mutations only happen in part of the DNA. But that seems counter to what everyone here is saying.
>sonic the hedgehog gene
Born with a copyright claim. Funny, what is it related to?
Sorry if I'm being annoyingly stupid.
>>7943052
>assuming it's true.
get yourself a book on genetics, the one that comes to mind right now is concept of genetics (klug), its up on libgen, read the chapter on evolutionary genetics, developmental genetics, and translation/transcription
>>7943055
Yeah I'm not claiming you're wrong. I'm just naturally sceptical. I generally strip that from my posts but it slipped past. Your information is my current actionable truth if I'm forced.
>>7942968
>it seem that diversity is a weakness because you're not as close to the optimal position you could be
a key concept in evolutionary biology is that fitness ("optimal position") is very much subjective and relevant. a trait that is a disadvantage in one environment may be advantageous in another slightly different setting. to use a common example in humans, is it more advantageous to have light or dark skin? well, it depends. melanin absorbs UV radiation, and you need some UV to produce vitamin D but too much causes sunburn. in a tropical environment, where sunlight is more intense, dark skin is advantageous, as light skin burns more easily and ultimately leads to greater mortality from cancer. but in more temperate environments, dark skin leads to vitamin D deficiency and rickets, and so light skin is better in that setting. (and indeed, dark-skinned peoples dominate the tropics whereas the peoples of the temperate zones are paler.)
and then there are some traits that have good and bad to them inherently. the A blood type, for example, grants greater resistance to plague, but increases the risk of heart attacks.
the point is, environments are not static; they change rapidly and unpredictably. some amount of diversity is greatly beneficial in the long run, because even if most individuals are well-adapted to the current environment, a change will upset that balance. if some of the different ones happen to be well-suited to the new environment, they give the population a better chance to persist.
>it can't really be a chaotic system where small changes make big differences since there's that ape fact
certain genes are what's called "highly conserved"; that is, they don't undergo a whole lot of change. this isn't because they don't mutate, but because their functions are so important and so delicate that mutations to them typically result in death (and thus the mutation is not passed down).
>>7943052
>Born with a copyright claim. Funny, what is it related to?
It's related to the amount of ether they had to use in those kind of labs back in the day.
It's also known as a hox gene, which are extremely conserved across all species. It's a good reading topic, and an amazing discovery for the technology they had at the time.
There were literally ghetto DNA sequencing methods where the information was recorded on paper instead of screens. And someone said "HEY, I've seen that combination of 180 base pairs before!" Or something like that. I only studied development briefly.
>>7943055
>>7943052
yup just read up on it. We could go on for days discussing methylation, repair errors, shifts, deletions, etc.
the bounding you're talking about i think has something to do with lethal mutations. Sometimes, if you change the right protein coding sequence bad enough, the organism dies! So, in a way,
errors that still produce "viable" organisms are confined.
>>7943028
any time you see "____ difference in genes" it actually means "_____ difference in alleles"
the general public doesn't know what an allele is so they stick with genes
