Species, an artificial concept; or liberal spin?

Hey Kitkor,

I think I read that very line somewhere recently... About everything being a bag of genes. Sounds rather like a short cut to me. Viruses are just protein envelopes with genes inside and a lock pick on the front... But other kinds of microbes are clearly much more complicated.

Speciation through isolation is probably the slowest form of evolution, unless there are more changes in the different environments the various populations end up in, causing the populations to respond in different ways. Isolation by itself probably doesn't drive evolution, but with each population coping with a different environment, it certainly can.

Heliamphora might be a little different as their isolation has been on going for dozens of millions of years. Given this large time frame, even within the same general environment speciation has taken place, might be the result of mathematical properties of genetics--simply collecting enough mutations over millions of years each population slowly drifted into different species while maintaining their fitness. Of course, the true story might be completely different than that...

I'd agree with that statement.

The way I see it.

Every organsim is primarily concerned with the survival (passing on) of its genes. This is why in some species, there is close cooperation between related individuals in raising young - a relatives offspring share some of your genes.

So it there for makes most sense to breed with an individual which also has some of those same genes - hense you get species (organisms which share many of the same genes).

However, when none of the same species are available, then an individual breeds with whatever is around and compatible (shares some genes, but less than the 'same species') which is why we get 'hybrids.

Aditionally, the concept of a 'species' is fixed and we are seeing things at one moment in time, but evolution is ongoing. So how do you define something which is in the process of forming - things which aren't really one thing or the other. And what happens when a 'species continues to change after we have described it ? or some isolated populations do. Do we just change the deffinition ?

So for me, the concept of species is the result of those selfish genes. It works well most of the time. But problems are down to the fact that we (most humans) like to put things in discrete boxes, but LIFE isn't always that simple and doesn't always play by our rules.

Dave,

Personally, I don't think a solution that suits everybody and every 'species' can ever be found. As I've said, the 'idea' of species is to a certain extent a human one - or at least it is us that draw the boundarys. As kitkor has already said, there are lumpers and splitters and those two camps will never agree.

Additionally we seem to have different standards when discussing the natural world and us humans. NOW PLEASE, DON'T ANYONE TAKE THIS AS A RACIST COMMENT. But with plants, birds or what ever, when they have evolved on seperate mountains / islands / continents to look different - size / colour even language (two bat species have recently been seperated because they 'speak a different language') then they are called different species or at least subspecies. But this rule is never applied to us humans. So we are already applying double standards - or is it just the old lumpers and splitters debate. And before anyone say's it - it is now known that many seperate species can interbreed and produce fertile offspring.

I agree that organisms probably don't think directly about passing on their genes, but then very few actually think about breathing, they are just those inbuilt things that happen automatically, but are still a driving force. Just like it doesn't matter how ill you are feeling in that hospital bed, when that nurse comes around .....

The idea of a non static deffinition of species may sound appealing, but I can't really ever see it working in reality. A dinosaur species gradually changed into a bird and numerous birds - are they now just subspecies of a dinosaur ? If the deffinition can change, then that causes problems for naming with evolution which is ongoing. So either one species ends and other begin or with the exception of mass extinctions, most species never end, they just change beyound all recognition to the original description.

So really we are stuck with what we have. It isn't perfect, but as long as we are so consumed with trying to put everything into boxes and convince ourselves that we are masters over nature, it's likely to be the best we'll get.

But that will never change the fact that 'species' couldn't care less what we call them - they will continue to do whatever they want to, with who ever they want to.

Neps and Heli's are ideal subjects for the lumpers and splitters. I don't really have too much problem with either camp, so long as we all know exactly what we are all talking. If that be species or subspecies or forms or even just locations - to be honest location is far more important to me.

Dear Alexis,

Dr. Schnell's work has a serious flaw: He specifically does more work on species he personally flavors. He loves S. flava and so S. flava gets more attention in his book. He barely pays attention to S. purpurea and so doesn't understand why S. purpurea venosa var. burkei should be removed from S. purpurea venosa; despite every test one can think to give shows the result that they are not directly related.

He doesn't really pay much attention to Drosera either. And so you see a photograph of D. spatulata in the D. capillaris section...

I have been to many of the same stands of S. flava Dr. Schnell has been to and I have not noticed the differences in vegetative growth he lists in Carnivorous Plants of North America...

S. flava var. altropurpurea is a non-existent plant; it really is more of an idea than a taxon... And as Dr Schnell explains, his varieties are generally blended in most wild plants.