How do genes know when they need to evolve?
In evolution, species change and mutate in to different species to adapt to the new environment. But how does your body know what to keep and what to change. Like how does the body know what to evolve into? Do genes have minds of their own and they know when they are needed or not? Or is it that the body knows which part of itself is not being used well and gets rid of that part and the parts of the body that is being used constantly tells the body that they need an upgrade?
Some one enlighten me!
One Response
gribbling
21 Nov 2009
It doesn’t work like that; there is no "conscious" input into evolution.
The thing to remember is that, within a population, there is diversity: not all individuals are the same. Additionally, because of mutation, this variation will constantly be arising.
So, some individuals are better-adapted for a particular set of conditions than others, and they become more common in that environment (with other, detrimental traits becoming less common, and perhaps disappearing entirely). Therefore that population has changed, with more of the beneficial traits.
With mutation, other, different traits will arise, and some of these will also be beneficial, so they will become more common with time.
Rinse and repeat…
The *environment* is what performs the selection, not the genes themselves.