A Conceptual Roadmap to Homology

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Günter P. Wagner
Keyword(s):  
Natural Selection ◽  
Morphological Variation ◽  
Research Program ◽  
Phenotypic Diversity ◽  
Evolutionary Explanation ◽  
Body Parts ◽  
Developmental Evolution ◽  
Homologous Genes ◽  
Character Identity ◽  
The Difference

This chapter proposes a conceptual roadmap to homology, with the goal of supporting the research program of developmental evolution that seeks to explain the patterns of phenotypic diversity. It offers a mechanistic developmental and evolutionary explanation of the evolution of body plans and the origin of character identities. It also examines the difference between the origin of homologs (that is, novelties) and their modification by natural selection (that is, adaptation); the limits of homology, focusing on the lack of individuality of body parts; homologous genes; characters and character states; variational modalities; character identity and repeated body parts; and character swarms. Finally, it considers alternative conceptualizations of homology, conceptual liberalism, and how to sort patterns of morphological variation.

Our Bodies, Whose Property?

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne Phillips
Keyword(s):  
Labor Markets ◽  
Personal Autonomy ◽  
The Body ◽  
Body Parts ◽  
Complex Issue ◽  
Human Organs ◽  
Property Owners ◽  
The Common ◽  
The Difference ◽  
The Right

No one wants to be treated like an object, regarded as an item of property, or put up for sale. Yet many people frame personal autonomy in terms of self-ownership, representing themselves as property owners with the right to do as they wish with their bodies. Others do not use the language of property, but are similarly insistent on the rights of free individuals to decide for themselves whether to engage in commercial transactions for sex, reproduction, or organ sales. Drawing on analyses of rape, surrogacy, and markets in human organs, this book challenges notions of freedom based on ownership of our bodies and argues against the normalization of markets in bodily services and parts. The book explores the risks associated with metaphors of property and the reasons why the commodification of the body remains problematic. The book asks what is wrong with thinking of oneself as the owner of one's body? What is wrong with making our bodies available for rent or sale? What, if anything, is the difference between markets in sex, reproduction, or human body parts, and the other markets we commonly applaud? The book contends that body markets occupy the outer edges of a continuum that is, in some way, a feature of all labor markets. But it also emphasizes that we all have bodies, and considers the implications of this otherwise banal fact for equality. Bodies remind us of shared vulnerability, alerting us to the common experience of living as embodied beings in the same world. Examining the complex issue of body exceptionalism, the book demonstrates that treating the body as property makes human equality harder to comprehend.

Beyond anthropomorphism: Odissi and the botanical

2012 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 157-165
Author(s):  
Sally Gardner
Keyword(s):  
Body Schema ◽  
Contemporary Dance ◽  
Body Parts ◽  
Bharata Natyam ◽  
Indian Dance ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Tribal Cultures ◽  
Cultural Body

Drawing on experiences that have entailed watching and learning forms of so-called ‘Indian dance’ (Bharata Natyam and Odissi), and watching Odissi dancers performing in various locations in Orissa’s ‘sacred triangle’ (Puri, Konark, Bhubaneswar), and against my own background in contemporary dance, I propose that the difference of the Odissi body is that the dancer dances with his or her feet in more than one kingdom – that is, he or she maintains a link between human bodies and the bodies of plants. Such a perception can help to displace questions of the dancer’s spatiality and representations, challenging western or westernized visions of the industrial or mechanical body, assumed hierarchies of body parts and their signifying powers, and assumptions about the role of the joints. The sense of a botanical imaginary or specific cultural body-schema at work in Odissi dance is supported by discussion of historical and ethnographic literature pertaining to the (former) female dancers of the Jagannath Temple in Puri; the temple’s links with Oriyan tribal cultures; the dancers’ traditional importance according to an axis of social auspiciousness/inauspiciousness as opposed to social purity/impurity; and the particular processes of the reconstruction of Odissi dance (separate from that of Bharata natyam) after independence.

Revisiting Hull's Evolutionary Model of Science

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 145-152
Author(s):  
Mohammad Mahdi Hatef ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Natural Selection ◽  
Selection Process ◽  
Biological Evolution ◽  
Evolutionary Model ◽  
Scientific Change ◽  
Evolutionary Models ◽  
Natural Evolution ◽  
The Difference

Evolutionary models for scientific change are generally based on an analogy between scientific changes and biological evolution. Some dissimilarity cases, however, challenge this analogy. An issue discussed in this essay is that despite natural evolution, which is currently considered to be non-globally progressive, science is a phenomenon that we understand as globally progressive. David Hull's solution to this disanalogy is to trace the difference back to their environments, in which processes of natural selection and conceptual selection occur. I will provide two arguments against this solution, showing that Hull's formulation of natural selection prohibits him from removing the environment from the selection process. Then I point to a related tension in his theory, between realism and externalism in science, and give some suggestions to solve these tensions.

Scandinavian mutation research during the past 90 years - a historical review.

2021 ◽  
pp. 10-23
Author(s):  
Udda Lundqvist
Keyword(s):  
Phenotypic Diversity ◽  
Historical Review ◽  
Chemical Mutagenesis ◽  
Induced Mutations ◽  
Spike Density ◽  
Early Maturity ◽  
Breeding Programmes ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Effects Of Radiation ◽  
Wax Coating

Abstract In 1928, the Swedish geneticists Herman Nilsson-Ehle and Åke Gustafsson started to act on their own ideas with the first experiments with induced mutations using diploid barley. They started with X-rays and UV irradiation. Very soon the first chlorophyll mutations were obtained and followed by the first 'vital' mutations Erectoides (ert) (Franckowiak and Lundqvist, 2001). Several other valuable mutations were identified as early maturity, high yielding, lodging resistant and characters with altered plant architecture. The experiments expanded to include other different types of irradiation, followed by chemical mutagenesis starting with mustard gas and concluding with sodium azide. The research brought a wealth of observations of general biological importance, such as the physiological effects of radiation as well as the difference in the mutation spectrum with respect to mutagens. This research was non-commercial, even if some mutants have become of important agronomic value. It peaked in activity during the 1950s to 1980s and, throughout, barley was the main experimental crop. About 12,000 different morphological and physiological mutants with a very broad phenotypic diversity were brought together and are incorporated in the Nordic Genetic Resource Centre (NordGen), Sweden. Several important mutant groups have been analysed in more detail genetically, with regard to mutagen specificity and gene cloning. These are: (i) early maturity mutants (Praematurum); (ii) six-rowed and intermedium-spike mutants; (iii) mutants affecting surface wax coating (Eceriferum); and (iv) mutants affecting rachis spike density (Erectoides). Some of these groups are presented in more detail in this review. Once work with induction of mutations began, it was evident that mutations should regularly be included in breeding programmes of crop plants. In Sweden, direct X-ray induced macro-mutants have been successfully released as cultivars, some of them having been used in combination breeding. Their importance for breeding is discussed in more detail.

Adaptation and Natural Selection

2021 ◽  
pp. 125-154
Author(s):  
Áki J. Láruson ◽  
Floyd A. Reed
Keyword(s):  
Natural Selection ◽  
Allele Frequency ◽  
Levels Of Selection ◽  
Frequency Data ◽  
Selection Coefficient ◽  
Frequency Distributions ◽  
Single Allele ◽  
Selection Strength ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Over Time

Here non-random shifts in allele frequencies over time are introduced, as well as how to incorporate varying levels of selection into a model of a single population through time. This chapter highlights the difference between weak and strong selection, the dynamics of single allele versus genotype-level selection, and how selection strength and population size affect allele frequency distributions over time. Finally the inference of the selection coefficient from allele frequency data is discussed, alongside the concepts of overdominance and underdominance.

scholarly journals Analysis of Dynamic Coupling Characteristics of the Slope Reinforced by Sheet Pile Wall

2017 ◽  
Vol 2017 ◽  
pp. 1-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. L. Qu ◽  
H. Luo ◽  
L. Liu ◽  
Y. Liu
Keyword(s):  
Slip Surface ◽  
Retaining Wall ◽  
Time History ◽  
Interaction Force ◽  
Body Parts ◽  
Sheet Pile ◽  
Stabilizing Piles ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Coupling Characteristics ◽  
Sheet Pile Wall

Large deformation of slope caused by earthquake can lead to the loss of stability of slope and its retaining structures. At present, there have been some research achievements about the slope reinforcement of stabilizing piles. However, due to the complexity of the structural system, the coupling relationship between soil and pile is still not well understood. Hence it is of great necessity to study its dynamic characteristics further. In view of this, a numerical model was established by FLAC3D in this paper, and the deformation and stress nephogram of sheet pile wall in peak ground motion acceleration (PGA) at 0.1 g, 0.2 g, and 0.4 g were obtained. Through the analysis, some conclusions were obtained. Firstly, based on the nephogram of motion characteristics and the positions of the slip surface and the retaining wall, the reinforced slope can be divided into 6 sections approximatively, namely, the sliding body parts of A, B, C, D, and E and the bedrock part F. Secondly, the deformation and stress distributions of slope reinforced by sheet pile wall were carefully studied. Based on the results of deformation calculation from time history analysis, the interaction force between structure and soil can be estimated by the difference of peak horizontal displacements, and the structure-soil coupling law under earthquake can be studied by this approach.

Developmental evolution and the origins of phenotypic variation

2014 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 343-352 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Lickliter
Keyword(s):  
Individual Development ◽  
Levels Of Analysis ◽  
Phenotypic Traits ◽  
Evolutionary Explanation ◽  
Social Environments ◽  
Individual Organism ◽  
Developmental Context ◽  
Developmental Evolution ◽  
The Stability ◽  
Conceptual Overview

AbstractBecause of the variability of relevant developmental resources across different environments, and because only a portion of the genome is expressed in any individual organism as a result of its specific developmental context and experience, what is actually realized during the course of individual development represents only one of many possibilities. One conclusion to be drawn from this insight is that the origin of phenotypic traits and their variation can be traced to the process of development. In this conceptual overview, I briefly explore how recent efforts to integrate genetic, epigenetic, and environmental levels of analysis through a developmental lens is advancing our understanding of the generation of the stability and variability of phenotypic outcomes observed within and across generations. A growing body of evidence indicates that phenotypes are the outcomes of the whole developmental system, comprised of the organism, with its particular genetic and cellular make-up in its specific physical, biological, and social environments. I conclude that the emergent products of development are epigenetic, not just genetic, and evolutionary explanation cannot be complete without a developmental mode of analysis.

Genetic trends for weaning weight during development of a multibreed population of beef cattle in two contrasting environments

2000 ◽  
Vol 80 (1) ◽  
pp. 191-193
Author(s):  
J. J. Tosh ◽  
R. A. Kemp
Keyword(s):  
Natural Selection ◽  
Beef Cattle ◽  
Key Words ◽  
Genetic Component ◽  
Weaning Weight ◽  
Common Base ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Selection Differentials ◽  
Genetic Trends

Genetic trends for weaning weight were determined in two herds of multibreed beef cattle that originated from a common base and were subject to mutual breeding policies in separate environments. The herds diverged for the direct though not the maternal genetic component of weaning weight within the 13-yr period examined; in the final year, the difference (P < 0.001) between the herds was almost 3 kg. This could have been partly due to unequal selection differentials and generation intervals. Results suggested the extent of natural selection also differed between the two environments. Key words: Beef cattle, crossbreeding, genetic trends, selection, weaning weight

scholarly journals Early life adversity alters normal sex-dependent developmental dynamics of DNA methylation

2016 ◽  
Vol 28 (4pt2) ◽  
pp. 1259-1272 ◽  
Author(s):  
Renaud Massart ◽  
Zsofia Nemoda ◽  
Matthew J. Suderman ◽  
Sheila Sutti ◽  
Angela M. Ruggiero ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Dna Methylation ◽  
Early Life ◽  
Maternal Separation ◽  
Methylation Profile ◽  
Early Life Adversity ◽  
Developmental Evolution ◽  
Dna Methylation Profile ◽  
Males And Females ◽  
The Difference ◽  
The Impact

AbstractStudies in rodents, nonhuman primates, and humans suggest that epigenetic processes mediate between early life experiences and adult phenotype. However, the normal evolution of epigenetic programs during child development, the effect of sex, and the impact of early life adversity on these trajectories are not well understood. This study mapped the genome-wide DNA methylation changes in CD3+ T lymphocytes from rhesus monkeys from postnatal day 14 through 2 years of age in both males and females and determined the impact of maternal deprivation on the DNA methylation profile. We show here that DNA methylation profiles evolve from birth to adolescence and are sex dependent. DNA methylation changes accompany imposed weaning, attenuating the difference between males and females. Maternal separation at birth alters the normal evolution of DNA methylation profiles and targets genes that are also affected by a later stage maternal separation, that is, weaning. Our results suggest that early life events dynamically interfere with the normal developmental evolution of the DNA methylation profile and that these changes are highly effected by sex.

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