Posted on 02/06/2005 5:48:12 AM PST by snarks_when_bored
The thumbnail-sized Laupala spawns new species at the rate of 4.17 every one million years, or more than 10 times faster than the average speciation rate for invertebrates.
This bears repeating: a speciation rate of 4.17 new species every 1 million years is very, very fast, indeed, 10 times faster than the average speciation rate for invertebrates. It's no wonder that we're not witnessing new species proliferating all around us (as some would claim ought to be happening). By human standards of time reckoning, evolution is an achingly slow process.
Worth noting, too, is the fact that Tamra Mendelson and her co-investigator, Kerry Shaw, spent three-and-one-half years studying the Laupala cricket.
Ping
Perhaps the writer meant 'non-vertebrate'? Anyway, thanks...
Right, humans have accelerated evolution in many ways (antibiotic-resistant bacteria also come to mind, not to mention domesticated animals and the like). I suppose the writer was considering 'natural evolution' or 'evolution considered apart from human activity' or something like that.
Invertebrates means they don't have a backbone. In general, any animal that's not a fish, amphibian, reptile, bird or mammal.
I remember those times, years ago.
in·ver·te·brate (
n-vûr
t
-br
t
)
adj.n.
- Lacking a backbone or spinal column; not vertebrate.
- Of or relating to invertebrates.
- An animal, such as an insect or a mollusk, that lacks a backbone or spinal column.
Source: The American Heritage® Stedman's Medical Dictionary
Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Uh-huh. Yep. Right.
Yes. They prefer not to die. :)
ditto. In my BG (before gray) years.
This is speciation? What's the difference? This is how life was created? This is how wings evolved? This is how the spine evolved?
This is fantastic. Crickets are evolving into crickets.
Who paid for that 3.5 years....? LOL!
Adaptation is NOT evolution.
This is speciation? What's the difference? This is how life was created? This is how wings evolved? This is how the spine evolved?
Patience, grasshopper cricket, patience. 3.8 billion years is a long, long, long, long, long, ... time.
| Wow!... Imagine... If only man were as intelligent as these female crickets, maybe we could evolve ourselves some wings and strong legs too! |
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