Evolution question regarding podcasts.

[wdiaz03]

On the podcasts when a caller will not reproduce I have heard Stef say several times something along the lines of "6 millions years of evolution of your genes and it will stop with you" 

 

Is this a valid statement? As I understand it, we only pass along half of our genes to our kids, and the combinations are rearranged. Also there is nothing unique about our individual genetic material since those genes are carried by many other people. even if we carry a unique mutation that gets passed along to our kids, the fact that it occurred means that it is likely to happen on the same gene others carry. 

 

Its like we each are a unique book. but since when we reproduce we can only create a different unique book....we are not passing anything unique to us that a close relative can't pass along. say a sentence or two. The words get passed but their arrangement is likely to change and even re-occur on someone else.  

 

I see no net loss for the genes if an individual does not reproduce. thinking along the lines of Dawkins "the Selfish Gene"

 

Thoughts?

 

Thanks in advance.

[shirgall]

There is so much more than just your genes. If you have embraced philosophy and peaceful parenting and a thirst for real knowledge, you do not pass that on through your genes... you pass that on through parenting.

[Wuzzums]

"I would [die] to save two brothers or eight cousins." - JBS Haldane

 

The genes as you said are not unique but the combination of genes is. There's nothing worthwhile in Shakespeare's works on an alphabetical order, it's the combinations of letters and words that counts.

[Will Torbald]

"6 millions years of evolution of your genes and it will stop with you" 

 

Is this a valid statement?

 

Think about it this way, at least how I see it, even though it also is objectively true. From the beginning of life on Earth, from dinosaurs, to you. It was always a continuum. You are the last in line of living creatures who survived and reproduced through cataclysm to disaster, meteors, mass extinctions, and everything in between for 3 billion years. 6 million years is only the last common ancestor with chimpanzees. What about before? The entire history of life. All your ancient ancestors fought this battle, and then you come in. If you don't reproduce, that line ends. It's another line in a large genealogic bush, sure, but it's yours. Sure, you can cecede the line voluntarily to others and say "carry on yours instead of mine". It ends there.

[dsayers]

As I understand it, we only pass along half of our genes to our kids, and the combinations are rearranged. Also there is nothing unique about our individual genetic material since those genes are carried by many other people. even if we carry a unique mutation that gets passed along to our kids, the fact that it occurred means that it is likely to happen on the same gene others carry. 

Mutation is the key word here.  In

, Jack Horner answers the "which came first, the chicken or the egg" question by pointing out that every reproduction is a mutation. Because every offspring is NOT identical to its parents. This continuous recombining of genetic material has allowed humans to develop reason and master our environment from being able to explore other worlds to nanotechnology, and so on.

 

This couldn't happen if reproducing was just the same but different as you describe. Agenda time: One of the ways the State is the most destructive to mankind is the way in incentivizes bad breeding. Breeding for reasons of love and the continuation of rational values helps to offset this, even though the process isn't strictly genetic as shirgall pointed out.

[thebeardslastcall]

He's talking about your unique line. We share many similarities, but the proximity and the physical transfer of genes and information from one line to the next is direct and exact in a manner. Put another way, two people have similar ideas, but they aren't exactly the same, and the idea even within you doesn't stay as the same, but from split second to split second within you the idea has a continuity and direct replication. If you value your life you want to value a direct continuation of your life more so than some similar idea or life. You don't have to care about this and you can support other life that's similar to yours, but if you don't reproduce your life in a manner comes to an end. Really just depends on what you value, life in general, or your line in particular. Lots of animals have many genes in common, but would you be happy if all humans went extinct and it was just up to these other animals to carry on a portion of your genes? Life is more than just genes and there's a difference between the physical matter even if it has a similar vibe. You're also losing the opportunity to raise your own kids where you tend to have a greater environmental influence on these little growing individuals than you would over say a nephew or cousin. Ending one strand while letting another keep going on becomes the difference between ant, ape, and human. Who knows where your line will lead? If you don't reproduce it's over and that's one line that never gets to flow its own divergent path from the rest of life, however small or large the differences and the lines will go, they'll be unique in their own right.

[wdiaz03]

Thank you all for your replies, I just wish Stef would explain it a little better, just like you have. He seems to be talking about the genes, but it could be my interpretation.

 

Thanks again.

[shirgall]

Thank you all for your replies, I just wish Stef would explain it a little better, just like you have. He seems to be talking about the genes, but it could be my interpretation.

 

Thanks again.

 

Stef is careful to also talk about epigenetics, which is all about genes that get activated by your environment. Genetic expression is not just what you are born with but also what you experience.

[thebeardslastcall]

I thought of one more clarification to make on the genetics front. People frequently say 'half and half from parents' and then you think 'half of me', but genetically that isn't accurate. People when they say that are only referring to a small subset of the total genes that is variant in the human species. Meaning the 'variable human' portion of your offspring is 50% you 50% the other parent, but overall this could be the difference between 99% you and 98.5% you or something like that (just making up numbers in the ballpark). As many of your genes are shared with the other parent as animals of the same species and possibly even the same sub-species. Your neighbors may be 97-98% alike and other humans could be less than 97% and other species get quickly divergent. Also a small percentage difference in the gene pool is the difference between humans and other apes, so it's not doing yourself justice to discard the relevancy of a 'small', but potentially highly significant, difference between you and others. A 0.5% or even 0.05% difference could be the difference between reason and religion, peace and violence, survival or death, happiness and miserableness. Do you want to increment humanity towards your life or leave it up to others to increment it towards theirs. Evolution happens in little increments generally, but that leads to wide and very relevant differences over time.