• @ngdev@lemmy.world
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    611 months ago

    Bit of a nitpick, but adaptation is not evolution. I was about to say that you cannot observe capital E Evolution in your own lifetime but then I remembered stuff on the bacterial scale that reproduces at break neck pace and is absolutely observable. HIV is one of these examples.

    • Mike
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      211 months ago

      @ngdev I think semantics plays a part in this, too. Survival of the fittest, so to speak.

    • @DaughterOfMars@lemmy.worldM
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      11 months ago

      Indeed, micro-evolution is quite fast because the rate of mutation is relatively high and generations are short. Macro-evolution is actually not generally well-understood by lay-people, primarily because it involves thinking on a scale that is so far outside of our short lifetimes. Not many people are capable of thinking on a scale outside of their own asses let alone across thousands of generations, hence the severe level of closed-mindedness in this thread alone…

      • @ngdev@lemmy.world
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        511 months ago

        I think the idea I was referencing when I mentioned evolution not being observable in one’s lifetime is actually better stated as:

        Evolution cannot be observed in the lifetime of an individual of the species in question. I.E. A HIV “cell” won’t live to see the evolved, drug-resistant ones down the line

      • @Strawberry@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        211 months ago

        There’s no such thing as micro- and macro-evolution, those are terms made up by creationists to try to deny the existence of evolution in the face of direct observation of evolution