On Wednesday, July 17, 2019 at 4:01:02 PM UTC-4, Tom Kunich wrote:
Do you know the difference between natural variation and mutation?
It's only a matter of scale. Even minor variations are a result of a mutation that drive the characteristic. Whether or not that variation has any effect on fitness* depends on selection pressures.
Mutation has absolutely NOTHING to co with evolution.
Mutation has EVERYTHING to do with evolution. Mutations are what enables certain members of a population to survive a selection pressure, or exploit a previously useless niche.
Especially since most mutations are sterile.
You're thinking of 'benign', not sterile. Sterility is a mutation unto it's own
*Fitness doesn't mean what you think it does:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fitness_(biology)