On Sat, 15 May 1999, Ray Audette wrote:

> Many domestic animals exihibit traits that are not found in their wild
> counterparts and are not explainable by neoteny (a form of mutation
> itself)alone.

It is not known that neoteny is a form of mutation.  But you are
correct that domestication involves more than neoteny, if it
involves neoteny at all, which is by no means clear.

> A good recent example is a new breed of very short-legged cat that was
> bred from one individual cat that first exhibited this mutation that had
> never been seen before.

How was it established that this trait was caused by a mutation?
The fact that it had never been seen before means nothing, since
it is as easily explained as a rare recessive gene.  To know that
it is a mutation it is necessary to know that the *gene*, not the
trait, is new and not present in either parent.  Granted, it
*could* have been a mutation.  It's at least theoretically
possible that a point mutation would result in a cat with short
legs, but I wonder if anyone has actually ascertained that this
is so.


> Several breeds of plants have also been bred
> from individual mutants in recent history and prior to recent genetic
> splicing techniques mutations were the principle source of new plant
> variants.  That natural selection wouldn't be able to duplicate the
> efforts of Man grossly underestimates God's abilities

Again I ask where is the evidence that these variants were
mutants, i.e., carriers of *new genes* not found in the "parent"
plants?  The technique of breeding certain characteristics in
plants or animals involves selective mating according to desired
traits, not waiting for mutations.  Gene splicing is, of course,
a different technique.


> The lack of "missing links" in the fosil record is explained by the
> statical improbality of such a small population being preserved.  Species
> that existed for millions of years in large numbers may be represented by
> only a few individuals.  Variants existing in far fewer numbers for far
> less time have scant chance of being preserved at all.

I'm not sure what this has to do with the subject matter at hand.
It sounds a bit like a loose paraphrase of Gould's punctuated
equilibria theory but that theory also *assumes* that variations
are caused by mutations.

Todd Moody
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