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    Home/Original/inverse
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    Inverse View

    It is not the case that The Panaxia dominula populations were undergoing natural selection, not genetic drift

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    Reasons For

    1 perspective
    Reason for
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    • 1.The fluctuations of gene frequencies across generations were too large to be accounted for by genetic drift
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    • 2.The size of the gene frequency fluctuations did not differ between small and large populations, contrary to what drift would predict
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    Reasons Against

    2 perspectives
    Reason against 1 of 2
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    • 1.Fisher's fundamental theorem establishes that variance in fitness within a population directly predicts the rate of evolutionary change via selection.
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    • 2.Sheppard and Fisher's own analysis of Panaxia showed medionigra allele fitness differentials large enough to produce observed frequency shifts deterministically.
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    • 3.When selection coefficients are sufficiently strong relative to population size, drift becomes causally negligible even in small populations.
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    Reason against 2 of 2
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    • 1.Elliott Sober's distinction between selection-for and drift requires that drift explanations invoke population size as the primary explanatory variable.
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    • 2.If frequency changes track environmental variables like predation pressure across generations rather than population size, selection is the better-supported causal explanation.
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    • 3.Kettlewell and Ford's long-term Panaxia data showed directional trends correlated with ecological variables, not the random walk pattern characteristic of drift.
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