6 ms·

A trait doesn’t have to be advantageous to persist just non-detrimental.

• rtkwe 8mo ago
  Yeah that's (to me) a more accurate framing, also evolution is bad at revisions so even if there are minor disadvantages to a setup so long as it's not affecting your ability to have and raise kids it's basically completely absent as far as evolution is concerned. For example there are some wild inefficiencies in body layout left over from fish body patterns where the nerve from the brain to the voice box wraps down around your aortic arch because the relative position of the throat, brain, and heart were very different in fish so the path it took then was more direct. It happens in humans and most hilariously in giraffes where it goes all the day down their enormous necks.
  • cyanydeez 7mo ago
    If Giraffe could speak, would they then be perceptibly delayed compared to humans?
    • seszett 7mo ago
      Well they make no sound, so that might be related. Maybe it's just really impossible because of this.
  • samus 7mo ago
    That remains as it is because it's very difficult to evolve away from. Evolution is very good at chasing and sticking around local optima. Big changes are risky.
• EA-3167 8mo ago
  They can be detrimental too, especially if they're linked to beneficial traits. The test is ultimately whether or not the harm done is sufficiently disadvantageous that it interferes with reproductive fitness. Baldness is arguably detrimental, but it's linked to a bunch of recessive genes that function in other ways, and it doesn't impact us until we're likely to have already reproduced. That's a simplification, but you get the idea.
  • TheGRS 8mo ago
    Peacocks with their giant tail feathers are my favorite example. They make flying really difficult, but they make attracting female mates much easier. The reproduction need wins.
    • awesome_dude 7mo ago
      And that, my friends, is why I bought a Pontiac...
      • brnt 7mo ago
        So, how many kids?
    • AngryData 7mo ago
      I don't know if I would consider it especially difficult for them. It is obviously not convenient but when I had peacocks they would still fly way up in some tall pine trees to roost even with a full tail without too much trouble. That said these were domestic peacocks so they didn't have to fly very far at all for everything they ever wanted, wild peacocks might have to go farther.
• frisbm 8mo ago
  and not even that, I'd narrow it further to not detrimental before and during the prime reproductive periods of a species. After that period, detrimental traits are totally fair game and more dependent on technology, culture, and family care dynamics. Heart disease later in life caused by genetic predisposition to high cholesterol isn't something people generally select for or against in a partner, but its effects happen later in life well after people have children so it passes on.
  • samus 7mo ago
    Parents must also be alive for long enough to care for their children until they can sustain themselves.
  • toasterlovin 7mo ago
    > Heart disease later in life caused by genetic predisposition to high cholesterol isn't something people generally select for or against in a partner, but its effects happen later in life well after people have children so it passes on. That depends. It can still affect genetic fitness if it affects an individual's ability to confer benefits on their descendants. Of note: most of the most wealthy and influential people in our society are beyond their reproductive years (not technically true for men, but mostly true in practice).
• CGMthrowaway 8mo ago
  It is detrimental though. It is socially impolite to yawn in public. Edit: why am I being downvoted for this?
  • frisbm 8mo ago
    is it so detrimental that it leads to a person never finding a mate and reproducing? Maybe for a totally extreme outlier, but probably not
    • CGMthrowaway 8mo ago
      Is that the right criteria? A trait must be completely, 100% disqualifying as a mate or else it sticks around? Our ancestors used to have tails. We no longer have tails. Plenty of people wear artificial tails today and get laid, it's not a 100% disqualifying trait
      • deleted 7mo ago
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      • deleted 8mo ago
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      • vizzier 8mo ago
        Natural selection doesn't require 100% disqualifying, it just needs a slight preference and a shit load of time.
        • CGMthrowaway 8mo ago
          Yes that is more along the lines I was thinking
      • torben-friis 8mo ago
        >Plenty of people wear artificial tails today and get laid …Do they? What did I miss?