I have thought of an experiment that might proof evolution: Philosophy Forums

I have thought of an experiment that might proof evolution

Nemjit
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Posted 09/17/08 - 12:45 PM: Subject: I have thought of an experiment that might proof evolution	#1
My experiment concerns the use of mayflies (those flies that only live for a couple of hours). I looked it up and the shortest-lived mayfly only lives for half an hour. Let's assume we use flies that live for an hour. What if we put those flies in an environment they're not used but they can survive in it nevertheless. If we would let them breed for a year that means almost 10.000 generations. Will they adapt to their new environment in this time or does it take more generations. So my question is, what is your opinion on my theory? Would it be executable?

Kwalish Kid
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Posted 09/17/08 - 05:02 PM:	#2
You are right on track. This is something that people already do with populations of bacteria. (Such populations are easier to keep around and compare earlier generations to later generations.) I'm not sure what extent this is going on with insect populations in the lab. For example, see here: http://www.newscientist.com/channel/life/dn14094-... You should be able to find more detail if you follow the link on that page to Richard Lenski's page.
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swstephe
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Posted 09/17/08 - 06:15 PM:	#3
I don't think mayflies as good a choice as you think they are. The adult mayfly lives from half an hour to a day. But their life cycle is much longer. They exist as larvae for up to a year. So the results of passing genetic materials will only happen annually. Also, the adults aren't that interesting. You can't test evolutionary theory of diet, since their mouth-parts are non-functional as adults. But another insect is very popular for testing evolution: drosophila melanogaster, a kind of fruit fly, because it is easy to breed and has a short life cycles, (30 days, but can mature in 7 days). It has already produced quite a body of evidence in support of evolution. Of course, the anti-science crowd dismisses all the findings claiming that the conditions are artificial, (that they wouldn't have happened in nature), or that any variation would not benefit the species and is therefore a mutation. There are interactive drosophila databases at http://flybase.org/ and http://www.sdbonline.org/fly/aimain/1aahome.htm for you to play with.
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Nemjit
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Posted 09/17/08 - 10:36 PM:	#4
Ah, I didn't know all that. Thank you for all the extra information.

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