‘I say “evolutions”, plural, because fox evolution works at cross-purposes to rabbit evolution, and neither can talk to snake evolution to learn how to build venomous fangs.’
Interestingly, as we’re getting better at analyzing genomes, we’re discovering that this isn’t strictly true. Rabbit and fox cross-pollinating with snake would be a bit of a stretch maybe, but there are actually a number of what we once thought to be entirely separate lines of evolution which genetic testing has revealed to be true-breeding hybrids between a set of nearby species.
Also, it’s looking like viruses can play a fairly substantial role in picking up genes from one species and ferrying them around to others.
Of course, all of that will pale in comparison to genetic engineering once we finish sorting that out.
‘I say “evolutions”, plural, because fox evolution works at cross-purposes to rabbit evolution, and neither can talk to snake evolution to learn how to build venomous fangs.’
Interestingly, as we’re getting better at analyzing genomes, we’re discovering that this isn’t strictly true. Rabbit and fox cross-pollinating with snake would be a bit of a stretch maybe, but there are actually a number of what we once thought to be entirely separate lines of evolution which genetic testing has revealed to be true-breeding hybrids between a set of nearby species.
Also, it’s looking like viruses can play a fairly substantial role in picking up genes from one species and ferrying them around to others.
Of course, all of that will pale in comparison to genetic engineering once we finish sorting that out.