From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!agate!usenet.ins.cwru.edu!magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!mips!munnari.oz.au!comp.vuw.ac.nz!waikato.ac.nz!aukuni.ac.nz!tac From: tac@ccu1.aukuni.ac.nz (Nick Holford) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Lovelock's Daisyworld - anyone know a source? Summary: source for daisyworld program Keywords: daisyworld Message-ID: <1992Jun17.194529.16865@ccu1.aukuni.ac.nz> Date: 17 Jun 92 19:45:29 GMT Organization: University of Auckland, New Zealand. Lines: 8 Does anyone know where I can obtain a version of Lovelock's Daisyworld simulation to run under MS-DOS? -- Nick Holford, Dept Pharmacology & Clinical Pharmacology University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand INTERNET: n.holford@aukuni.ac.nz From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!ig!ames!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!swrinde!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!mcsun!uknet!daresbury!news From: 75008378@IE.DCU (Barry McMullin, DCU (Dublin, Ireland) <75008378@IE.DCU>) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Workshop "Autopoiesis & Perception": Call For Participation. Message-ID: <01GL1LUXXA349EDC5I@dcu.ie> Date: 10 Jun 92 09:20:00 GMT Sender: list-admin@daresbury.ac.uk Distribution: bionet Lines: 149 X-Envelope-To: pop-bio@daresbury.ac.uk X-Vms-Cc: 75008378 Original-To: pop-bio@UK.AC.DARESBURY X-Vms-To: @POPBIO Via: UK.AC.EARN-RELAY; Wed, 10 Jun 92 11:13 WET (V41 at UK.AC.DARESBURY.DLGM) [The workshop announced below addresses an essentially cross- disciplinary subject area, potentially involving philosophy, computer science, engineering and biology - to name but a few. It is therefore being posted across a variety of forums (fora?): so my apologies for the noise if you see it more than once! All flames directly to me, please. In case you wish to print out the plain ascii text, it has been structured with 72 columns, 66 lines per page. Please pass on the notice to anyone else who may be interested. If you require further information, or wish to register, please follow the instructions below. - Barry.] ------------------------------- CUT HERE ------------------------------- AUTOPOIESIS AND PERCEPTION A Workshop within ESPRIT BRA 3352 DUBLIN CITY UNIVERSITY: 25-26 August 1992 ************ CALL FOR PARTICIPATION ************ A common sense idea of perception is that, through the information processing capabilities of our sensory/brain system, we come to know "the" objectively real, external, world. However, this "spectator" paradigm has not proved very effective (so far) in attempts to build artificial autonomous systems. It therefore seems appropriate to critically examine this concept of perception. One alternative idea is to take a participatory rather than a spectator view of the relationship between the autonomous system and "the external world". In this perspective, to perceive is not to process sensory data, but to apprehend meaning through interaction. Autopoiesis is an organizational paradigm which can support such a participatory view of perception. The concept of autopoiesis (lit. "self-producing"), was introduced to characterise the organisation which makes living systems autonomous. An autopoietic organisation is one which is self-renewing (in a suitable environment); autopoietic systems maintain their organisation through a network of component-producing processes such that the interacting components generate the same network of processes which produced them. In the autopoietic paradigm, perception is an emergent phenomenon characteristic of the interaction between an autopoietic system and its environment: the system responds to perturbations in just such a way as to maintain its (autopoietic) identity. Structure: ---------- The key objective of the workshop is to allow for extensive, open, discussion, and it has been structured accordingly. It will consist of a small number of prepared papers by invited keynote speakers, punctuated with extended discussion periods; it will run over one and a half days (from 9.30 AM on 25th August, to 1.00 PM on 26th August). To maximize the benefit of the discussion, the workshop will be limited to 30 participants. Invited Speakers (Confirmed): ----------------------------- Prof. Francisco Varela C.R.E.A., Ecole Polytechnique, Paris. Dr. David Vernon DG XIII, EC Commission, Brussels. Dr. Dermot Furlong Department of Microelectronic and Electrical Engineering, Trinity College Dublin. Further Information: Barry McMullin, Electronic Engineering, -------------------- Dublin City University, Dublin 9, IRELAND. E-mail: Phone: +353-1-7045432 Fax: +353-1-7045508 [Page 1 of 2] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ AUTOPOIESIS AND PERCEPTION A Workshop within ESPRIT BRA 3352 DUBLIN CITY UNIVERSITY: 25-26 August 1992 ************* REGISTRATION FORM ************* The deadline for receipt of registration information is Friday, 31st July 1992. Due to the limit to 30 participants, early registration is advisable. However, postal services to Dublin are currently severely affected by an industrial dispute. Therefore, if you wish to register, it is recommended that you return this form by E-mail or FAX as soon as possible, paying the registration fee by Bank Transfer. Please advise if you require information on hotel accomodation; campus accomodation will be available at a rate of IRP 20 per night (approx.) - a separate booking form will be provided on request. The DCU campus is situated in the north Dublin suburb of Glasnevin, is less than 10 minutes from Dublin International Airport, and has easy access to the city centre. All correspondence should be directed to: Barry McMullin, Electronic Engineering, Dublin City University, Dublin 9, IRELAND. E-mail: Phone: +353-1-7045432 Fax: +353-1-7045508 Name:................................................................... Organisation:........................................................... Address:................................................................ City:........................... Country:.......................... Phone:............... FAX:................. E-mail:................... Is your organisation a member of the BRA 3352 Working Group on Vision? YES___ NO___ If YES, which consortium? ................... Registration Fee: Irish Pounds 60 (or equivalent) Payment Form: (Check One) 1) Internal Accounting (working group members only) ____ Requires signature of partner representative listed in BRA 3352 Technical Annex: Partner Representative:................... Signature................ 2) Bank Transfer: ____ Account Name: Dublin City University Conference a/c Bank: AIB Bank, 7-12 Dame St., Dublin 2, IRELAND. Account Number: 91765-215 Bank Sorting Code: 93 20 86 (IMPORTANT: Quote your NAME *and* "Ref: 421/01/121 (Autopoiesis)" in all bank transfer documents.) 3) Bank Draft (made payable to "Dublin City University"): ____ Equivalent of Irish Pounds amount in any EC currency drawn on a local bank -OR- DM, US$, or Sterling draft drawn on a UK bank. All charges to be bourn by the remitter. [Page 2 of 2] ------------------------------- CUT HERE ------------------------------- From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!agate!spool.mu.edu!uunet!mcsun!uknet!warwick!nott-cs!unicorn.nott.ac.uk!eexshs From: eexshs@unicorn.nott.ac.uk (S.H.Selmanoglu) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: World population Message-ID: <1992Jun16.143151.27946@cs.nott.ac.uk> Date: 16 Jun 92 14:31:51 GMT References: <01GL1M586FJ89EDC5I@dcu.ie> Sender: news@cs.nott.ac.uk Distribution: bionet Organization: Cripps Computing Centre, University of Nottingham Lines: 8 Hi everybody, I am looking for the sort of statistic that shows the human population of the world from the beginnig upto now. Is there any referance that you can suggest.. Sehsuvar H. Selmanoglu internet : EEXSHS@unicorn.nott.ac.uk BitNet : EEXSHS@uk.ac.nott.vme From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!agate!usenet.ins.cwru.edu!magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!usc!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov!spear From: spear@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov (spear, rich) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: demographic software Message-ID: <1992Jun1.171257.6363@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov> Date: 2 Jun 92 01:05:29 GMT Sender: news@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov (Usenet) Reply-To: spear@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory Lines: 8 News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.3-4 Nntp-Posting-Host: kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov hi there - i don't know if anyone's out there...this list has been *very* quiet. i'm looking for software that can accept inputs on fertility, mortality and migration rates and generate a pop pyramid. i saw such software, out of mcgill, i think, but i've lost the references. this list is the only one i know of that deals with pop issues, even tho my question relates to human pops. thanks...richard spear@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!CS.RPI.EDU!maniattb From: maniattb@CS.RPI.EDU Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Access to your news group Message-ID: <9206020129.AB11936@fornax.cs.rpi.edu> Date: 2 Jun 92 01:29:09 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 3 I'd like access to the genbank news groups. Bill Maniatty From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!news.cs.indiana.edu!att!pacbell.com!mips!swrinde!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!psinntp!nstn.ns.ca!morgan.ucs.mun.ca!csd.unb.ca!utgpu!martell From: martell@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca (D.L. Martell) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: evolution of sex Message-ID: <1992Jun2.012215.25241@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca> Date: 2 Jun 92 01:22:15 GMT Distribution: na Organization: UTCS Public Access Lines: 11 I saw a reference to a conference on the evolution of sex, this spring. Can anyone supply information - organization, date, place? Please respond by email to me. -- David L. Martell Faculty of Forestry, University of Toronto 33 Willcocks Street, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M5S 3B3 Phone (416) 978-6960 martell@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!agate!spool.mu.edu!umn.edu!orstnews!usenet From: moorel@bionette.cgrb.orst.edu (Larry Moore) Newsgroups: orst.bionet,sci.bio,bionet.general,sci.research,sci.misc,bionet.sci-resources,bionet.biology.tropical,bionet.molbio.evolution,bionet.population-bio Subject: Bacterial Diversity-Your Input Needed Keywords: bacterial diversity, bacteria, biological diversity Message-ID: <1992Jun5.000714.11242@talon.ucs.orst.edu> Date: 5 Jun 92 00:07:14 GMT Sender: usenet@talon.ucs.orst.edu (Usenet News admin) Followup-To: bionet.general Organization: Biological Computing Consortium, OSU, Corvallis, OR. Lines: 38 Xref: bionet sci.bio:5931 bionet.general:2993 sci.research:1941 sci.misc:3107 bionet.sci-resources:399 bionet.biology.tropical:68 bionet.molbio.evolution:483 bionet.population-bio:315 Nntp-Posting-Host: cgrb.orst.edu I will be participating in a conference addressing the issue of establishing priorities in bacterial diversity research (15-18 June). In an effort to obtain a broad range of ideas, I'm requesting that anyone who has thoughts (including biases!) about this issue please e-mail them to me. It might be helpful to examine the following background statement relative to this request. ---------------- A major limitation to identifying environmental isolates is the absence of a well characterized and balanced database. The current practice of using available databases which are based primarily on medically important bacteria often does not make it possible to identify environmental isolates. 1. What should be done to expand and organize databases to include environmental isolates? 2. When data on bacterial diversity and inventories are obtained, how should the data be handled and processed? 3. How does one go about comparing strains with one another from one habitat and from many habitats? 4. How do these strains compare with known bacteria? 5. How should these data be available to other scientists? Should this be done through publication or databases or both? 6. What features are important to users of databases? 7. How can we structure databases to reveal what are the most useful tests or comparisons that need to be done? Larry Moore, moorel@cgrb.orst.edu From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!agate!spool.mu.edu!samsung!sdd.hp.com!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!linac!att!princeton!phoenix.Princeton.EDU!harnad From: harnad@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Stevan Harnad) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio,bionet.molbio.evolution Subject: Reproductive Success: BBS Call for Commentators Keywords: sociobiology, female choice, fertility Message-ID: <1992Jun10.030540.13433@Princeton.EDU> Date: 10 Jun 92 03:05:40 GMT Sender: news@Princeton.EDU (USENET News System) Organization: Princeton University Lines: 145 Xref: bionet bionet.population-bio:320 bionet.molbio.evolution:488 Originator: news@ernie.Princeton.EDU Nntp-Posting-Host: phoenix.princeton.edu Below is the abstract of a forthcoming target article on reproductive success and culture by Daniel Perusse. It has been accepted for publication in Behavioral and Brain Sciences (BBS), an international, interdisciplinary journal that provides Open Peer Commentary on important and controversial current research in the biobehavioral and cognitive sciences. Commentators must be current BBS Associates or nominated by a current BBS Associate. To be considered as a commentator on this article, to suggest other appropriate commentators, or for information about how to become a BBS Associate, please send email to: harnad@clarity.princeton.edu or harnad@pucc.bitnet or write to: BBS, 20 Nassau Street, #240, Princeton NJ 08542 [tel: 609-921-7771] To help us put together a balanced list of commentators, please give some indication of the aspects of the topic on which you would bring your areas of expertise to bear if you were selected as a commentator. An electronic draft of the full text is available for inspection by anonymous ftp according to the instructions that follow after the abstract. ____________________________________________________________________ CULTURAL AND REPRODUCTIVE SUCCESS IN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETIES: Testing the relationship at the proximate and ultimate levels Daniel Perusse Department of Anthropology Universite de Montreal C. P. 6128, succursale A, Montreal Canada, H3C 3J7 Present address: Department of Human Genetics, Medical College of Virginia, Richmond, VA, 23298-0003 Electronic mail: dperusse@gems.vcu.edu KEYWORDS: status striving; novel environment; potential conceptions; human psyche; achievement motivation; female choice; teaching biases; sociobiology; French-Canadians ABSTRACT: In most social species, position in the male social hierarchy and reproductive success are positively correlated. This relationship is less clear in humans where studies of traditional societies have produced mixed results. In the most economically advanced human populations, the adaptiveness of status attainment vanishes altogether as social status and fertility are uncorrelated. These findings have been interpreted by many as suggesting that evolutionary principles may not be appropriate for the explanation of human behavior, especially in modern environments. The present study tests the adaptiveness of social status with actual mating and reproductive data in a representative sample of males from an industrial society. Results show that reproductive success, even when assessed by a more reliable measure of male fertility than the one commonly used, fails to correlate with social status. In striking contrast, however, status is found to be highly correlated with proximate components of fitness, accounting for as much as 62% of the variance in male mating success. This effect is remarkably similar to the one found in many traditional societies and would result in a substantial relationship between cultural and reproductive success in industrial populations were it not for the novel conditions imposed by contraception and monogamy. Various underlying mechanisms are suggested for these findings, and the value of current behavioral and reproductive data is stressed for the study of adaptation. It is concluded that evolutionary explanations of human behavior remain entirely relevant in modern societies. -------------------------------------------------------------- To help you decide whether you would be an appropriate commentator for this article, an electronic draft is retrievable by anonymous ftp from princeton.edu according to the instructions below (the filename is bbs.perusse). Please do not prepare a commentary on this draft. Just let us know, after having inspected it, what relevant expertise you feel you would bring to bear on what aspect of the article. ------------------------------------------------------------- To retrieve a file by ftp from a Unix/Internet site, type either: ftp princeton.edu or ftp 128.112.128.1 When you are asked for your login, type: anonymous Enter password as per instructions (make sure to include the specified @), and then change directories with: cd pub/harnad To show the available files, type: ls Next, retrieve the file you want with (for example): get bbs.perusse When you have the file(s) you want, type: quit Certain non-Unix/Internet sites have a facility you can use that is equivalent to the above. Sometimes the procedure for connecting to princeton.edu will be a two step process such as: ftp followed at the prompt by: open princeton.edu or open 128.112.128.1 In case of doubt or difficulty, consult your system manager. ---------- JANET users who do not have the facilty for interactive file transfer mentioned above have two options for getting BBS files. The first, which is simpler but may be subject to traffic delays, uses the file transfer utility at JANET node UK.AC.FT-RELAY. Use standard file transfer, setting the site to be UK.AC.FT-RELAY, the userid as anonymous@edu.princeton, for the password your-own-userid@your-site [the "@" is crucial], and for the remote filename the filename according to Unix conventions (i.e. something like pub/harnad/bbs.authorname). Lower case should be used where indicated, with quotes if necessary to avoid automatic translation into upper case. Setting the remote filename to be (D)pub/harnad instead of the one indicated above will provide you with a directory listing. The alternative, faster but more complicated procedure is to log on to JANET site UK.AC.NSF.SUN (with userid and password both given as guestftp), and then transfer the file interactively to a directory on that site (named by you when you log on). The method for transfer is as described above under 'Certain non-Unix/Internet sites', or you can make use of the on-line help that is available. Transfer of the file received to your own site is best done from your own site; the remote file (on the UK.AC.NSF.SUN machine) should be named as directory-name/filename (the directory name to use being that provided by you when you logged on to UK.AC.NSF.SUN). To be sociable (since NSF.SUN is short of disc space), once you have received the file on your own machine you should go back to UK.AC.NSF.SUN and delete it from your directory there. [Thanks to Brian Josephson for the above detailed UK/JANET instructions; similar special instructions for file retrieval from other networks or countries would be appreciated and will be included in updates of these instructions.] --- Where the above procedures are not available (e.g. from Bitnet or other networks), there are two fileservers -- ftpmail@decwrl.dec.com and bitftp@pucc.bitnet -- that will do the transfer for you. Send either one the one line message: help for instructions (which will be similar to the above, but will be in the form of a series of lines in an email message that ftpmail or bitftp will then execute for you). ------------------------------------------------------------- -- Stevan Harnad Department of Psychology Princeton University harnad@clarity.princeton.edu / harnad@pucc.bitnet / srh@flash.bellcore.com harnad@learning.siemens.com / harnad@elbereth.rutgers.edu / (609)-921-7771 From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!uwm.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!usenet.coe.montana.edu!news.u.washington.edu!milton.u.washington.edu!ngrjn From: ngrjn@milton.u.washington.edu (V Nagarajan) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio,bionet.general Subject: Re: height and diet Keywords: height, dietary protein Message-ID: <1992Jun9.210822.4365@u.washington.edu> Date: 9 Jun 92 21:08:22 GMT References: <1992Jun9.131636.4439@alw.nih.gov> <1992Jun9.180429.21288@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu> Sender: news@u.washington.edu (USENET News System) Organization: University of Washington, Seattle Lines: 13 Xref: bionet bionet.population-bio:319 bionet.general:3022 In article <1992Jun9.180429.21288@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu> gchacko@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (George W Chacko) writes: >In article <1992Jun9.131636.4439@alw.nih.gov> susanc@helix.nih.gov (Susan Chacko) writes: >>A year or two ago I read an article in the New York Times about >>a study which compared the heights of Japanese-Americans and >>Japanese; the Japanese-Americans were found to have a >>significantly greater height on the average, which was >>attributed to the increase in protein in their diets. > >We don't allow sci'ers in here. ;-) > >G Are you two related? ;-) ;-) From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!ig!ames!agate!spool.mu.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!usc!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!mcsun!uknet!daresbury!news From: 75008378@IE.DCU (Barry McMullin, DCU (Dublin, Ireland) <75008378@IE.DCU>) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: TR Announcement: "Organismic Darwinism" Message-ID: <01GL1M586FJ89EDC5I@dcu.ie> Date: 10 Jun 92 09:28:00 GMT Sender: list-admin@daresbury.ac.uk Distribution: bionet Lines: 174 X-Envelope-To: pop-bio@daresbury.ac.uk X-Vms-Cc: 75008378 Original-To: pop-bio@UK.AC.DARESBURY X-Vms-To: @POPBIO Via: UK.AC.EARN-RELAY; Wed, 10 Jun 92 09:51 WET (V41 at UK.AC.DARESBURY.DLGM) [The following announcment is being cross-posted on Alife Digest, GA-List Digest, and POP+BIO. If you subscribe to more than one, my apologies for the noise. All flames to me, not the list or list maintainers! This TR is the second in a series of three. The final one, dealing with Genic versus Organismic selection (which is really the focus of the whole series), should be available within another few weeks. Instructions for obtaining a copy are at the end. Enjoy - Barry] +++++++++++++++++++++++++ TR ANNOUNCEMENT --------------- +++++++++++++++++++++++++ ..bib entry for *this* TR: ------------------------- @TECHREPORT{ McMullin:Organismic, AUTHOR = "Barry McMullin", TITLE = "Essays on Darwinism. 2: Organismic Darwinism", INSTITUTION = "School of Electronic Engineering, Dublin City University", YEAR = "1992", MONTH = Apr, NUMBER = "{\tt bmcm9202}", TYPE = "Technical Report", ADDRESS = "Dublin 9, Ireland" } +++++++++++++++++++++++++ ABSTRACT: --------- Essays on Darwinism 2: Organismic Darwinism Barry McMullin, School of Electronic Engineering, Dublin City University, Dublin 9, IRELAND. April 1992 Technical Report: bmcm9202 {\em Artificial Life\/} is, by its nature, an interdisciplinary research programme; it will involve biologists, of course, but also philosophers, mathematicians, chemists, computer scientists---and perhaps even (as in my case) engineers. Success in our endeavours will require some of us, at least, to venture into foreign territory. This essay is a log of my personal expedition into evolutionary biology. I attempt to provide a comprehensive review of Darwinism in the biological world, and to do so as an {\em outsider\/}---a non-professional in the field. My purpose is twofold. Firstly, I hope that real biologists may take this opportunity to correct at least the worst of my errors. Secondly, I offer this to other non-specialists as a sort of map---a record of my particular exploration. I hope it might at least provide some insight into the kinds of questions which need to be asked, even if the particular answers suggested here are less than satisfactory. Above all, I want to convince any who may be in doubt that {\em Darwinism\/} encompasses a complex and subtle system of interrelated theories, whose substantive transplantation to any artificial medium will be very far from easy. This essay draws on abstract concepts introduced in a previous essay [see .bib reference below]; the two essays are therefore best read in conjunction. +++++++++++++++++++++++ REFERENCES: ----------- @TECHREPORT{ McMullin:DarwinianOntology, AUTHOR = "Barry McMullin", TITLE = "Essays on Darwinism. 1: Ontological Foundations", INSTITUTION = "School of Electronic Engineering, Dublin City University", YEAR = "1992", MONTH = Mar, NUMBER = "{\tt bmcm9201}", TYPE = "Technical Report", ADDRESS = "Dublin 9, Ireland" } +++++++++++++++++++++++ TO OBTAIN A COPY: [I should warn that bmcm9202 is, relatively speaking, a biggie: it runs to just under 50 printed pages...] Copies are available in the following ways, in order of (my) preference: 1: ftp the file from directory on the Alife archive , uncompress it and then print (or preview) it. This involves doing (something like) the following: unix> ftp ftp.cognet.ucla.edu Connected to ftp.cognet.ucla.edu Name (ftp.cognet.ucla.edu:): anonymous 331 Guest login ok, sent ident as password. Password: [identification] 230 Guest login ok, access restrictions apply. ftp> cd pub/alife/papers ftp> binary ftp> get bmcm9202.ps.Z ftp> quit unix> uncompress bmcm9202.ps.Z unix> lpr -P(your_local_postscript_printer) bmcm9202.ps [Many thanks to Alife maintainer, Rob Collins, for help above and beyond the call of duty in making this possible. If you have any problems, complain to me not Rob.] 2: I can email the file bmcm9202.ps.Z to you, on request (uuencoded, split into 5 by about 55k chunks). You'll have to be able to strip off the mail headers, cat the file back together, uudecode, uncompress, and print postscript (or preview etc.). 3: Alternatively, I can email the file bmcm9202.dvi.Z to you, on request (again, uuencoded, split into 4 by about 55k chunks). You'll have to be able to strip off the mail headers, cat the file back together, uudecode, uncompress, and then do whatever you locally do to print or preview .dvi files. Apart from being slightly smaller, and thus use less network bandwidth, this option, if it suits you, is probably a bit more robust than the ..ps route, as it is much less dependent on the vagaries of your local printer... 4: Or, I can email you the LaTeX sources. This has the advantage of being plain ascii text, so I can send it without any encoding etc.. You can then run it through LaTeX to get a properly formatted version; or, if you don't have access to LaTeX, the sources are readable as they stand (just about). The disadvantage is that you need several different files, so it is a bit messy. 5: Finally, if that's all gobbledegook to you, then a limited number of good old fashioned hard copies will be available. Send me your full postal address. First come first served. However, note that Dublin is currently suffering an industrial dispute in the postal service, so I can't promise anything about when you might receive a hard copy---so this really is a last ditch alternative. In cases 1 and 2, if the .ps file fails to print fully (or at all) please let me know, including any diagnostic info. you can provide. In cases 2--5 contact me as (do *not* send requests to the whole list...). +++++++++++++++++ Bye .... Barry. From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!agate!spool.mu.edu!yale.edu!jvnc.net!darwin.sura.net!nih-csl!helix.nih.gov!susanc From: susanc@helix.nih.gov (Susan Chacko) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio,bionet.general,bionet.journals.contents Subject: height and diet Keywords: height, dietary protein Message-ID: <1992Jun9.131636.4439@alw.nih.gov> Date: 9 Jun 92 13:16:36 GMT Sender: postman@alw.nih.gov (AMDS Postmaster) Organization: National Institutes of Health, Bethesda Lines: 18 Xref: bionet bionet.population-bio:316 bionet.general:3016 bionet.journals.contents:554 A year or two ago I read an article in the New York Times about a study which compared the heights of Japanese-Americans and Japanese; the Japanese-Americans were found to have a significantly greater height on the average, which was attributed to the increase in protein in their diets. I used to have the article and the journal reference, but I seem to have misplaced them; does anyone have any pointers to the reference? Even the approximate date of the newspaper article would be helpful. Apologies for posting to so many newsgroups; I wasn't sure which was the appropriate one. Thanks for any help, Susan Chacko. -- Mail is forwarded to susan@vger.niddk.nih.gov Bldg 2, Rm 316, NIDDK, NIH, Bethesda, MD 20892 (301) 496-4295 From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!uwm.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!rpi!maniattb From: maniattb@cobb.cs.rpi.edu (Bill Maniatty) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Who Does Large Scale Computations?? Message-ID: Date: 2 Jun 92 19:05:24 GMT Organization: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy NY Lines: 85 Nntp-Posting-Host: cobb.cs.rpi.edu Hi, I'm a computer scientist and not a biologist, so please bear with me. We are speeding up computations by arranging the data in computationally convenient patterns. We are looking for equations of a specific form, an example might look like: Let P1[i,j,t] be a 3 dimensional matrix, representing the population (or other characteristic) of a certain species at time "t" at the spatial coordinate (i,j). Matrix P1 looks like: ___________________________________________ / Time (t = 0) /| / ... / | Depth = t /__________________________________________/ | / Time (t - 1) /| | /__________________________________________/ | | n across / Time (t) /| | | ----> /__________________________________________/ | | | |(1,1,t)|(1,2,t)| ... |(1,n,t)| | | | m | |_______|_______|__________________|_______| | | | down | | . . . | | | | V | . . . | | | | | . . . | | | / |__________________________________________| | |/ |(m,1,t)|(m,2,t)| ... |(m,n,t)| |/ |_______|_______|__________________|_______|/ Matrix P1 In the model, there could be many species (represented by matrices similar to P1) and the population of one species may have some effect on others. We want a realistic formulation of the problem, in terms of the matrices P1, P2, ..., (which represent population of different species in the system) such that the population of a species at coordinate (i,j) at time t, is a function of the population of many of the species (including itself) at time t-1, t-2, ... at various nearby coordinates. To make the model computationally extensive and more accurate, the dependencies should include (among others): references to non-adjacent neighbors, ie: population of species at location (i + c1, j + c2) where either |c1| > 1 or |c2| > 1 (or both). references to past states (at or before) time = (t-1), asymmetric reference patterns, for example, the population at location (i,j) is affected by the population at (i-2, j), (i-1, j) but not by (i+2, j) and (i+1, j). This may represent, migration of (or spreading of a disease in) the population in a certain direction, or some other non-symmetrical transient behavior in the system. For example an equation of this form might look like: P[i, j, t] = f( P[i-2, j, t], P[i, j - 2, t], ..., P[i - 1, j - 1, t - 2] ) The format of computations used in population biology seems convenient for us, in particular if we examine the diagram on page 83 of Caswell's Matrix Population Models, we see a simple case of the asymmetry, but this is on too small a scale for our experiments which will be run on a 2048 processor MASPAR system, a massively parallel computer. It also does not rely on information in any stage prior to i - 1. We would like to increase the number of parameters, and increase the asymmetry of the problem, for computational reasons. We are reluctant to just extend the model, as we are not biologists, and might create an unrealistic model. Do biologists model systems in this manner, if not, why not? Thanks, Bill Maniatty -- | | maniattb@cs.rpi.edu - in real life Bill Maniatty | From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!SNYMORVA.bitnet!DREWWE From: DREWWE@SNYMORVA.bitnet ("Bill Drew -- Serials Librarian") Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: FWD: Guide to Agricultural Resources on the Internet Now Available Message-ID: <9205131555.AA20267@genbank.bio.net> Date: 13 May 92 15:51:00 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 67 I am posting this message below to this list because of the subject matter. I am not member so please send any comments or questions directly to me NOT to the list. My guide to INTERNET Resources in Agriculture is now available at three different sites. The description below is from the SURANET guide maintained by Michael Taranto of NIC Services at SURAnet. NOT JUST COWS - A Guide to INTERNET/Bitnet Resources in Agriculture and Related Sciences; Written and Compiled by Wilfred Drew, 5/8/92; SUNY at Morrisville College of Agriculture and Technology. The purpose of this Guide is to list Agricultural and Related Sciences information resources available through the INTERNET. Agricultural information resources listed include; an index of over 40 libraries with extensive collections in agriculture; INTERNET BBS such as Advanced Technology Information Network and CENET; a collection of mail based services such as Almanac Servers and over 60 Listserve Discussion Groups; other miscellaneous information resources such as WAIS and FEDIX. ================================= Access: ftp.sura.net Directory: pub/nic File: agricultural.list (Note that this is a text file not binary.) ================================= Gord Nickerson's LIBSOFT ARCHIVE Access: ftp hydra.uwo.ca Directory: libsoft File: AGRICULTURE_INTERNET_GUIDE.TXT (Note this is a text file not a binary) AGRICULTURE_INTERNET_GUIDE.WP51 (Note this is a BINARY and is in WOrdPerfect format) ================================= Billy Barron's Site at UNT. Access: ftp ftp.unt.edu File: AGRICULTURE-INTERNET.TXT (Note this is a text file not a binary) AGRICULTURE-INTERNET.WORDPERFECT51 (Note this is a BINARY and is in WordPerfect 5.1 format) ================================= Before you print out the WordPerfect file, be sure to generate the table of contents file as the paging will be different from my original file due to different default printers. I also used the master document and sub document features of WordPerfect so WP will ask you if the document needs generating before you can print it. Please feel free to use this guide in any way you want as long as YOU DO NOT CHARGE ANY ONE FOR A COPY. Please also credit me for my work. It took a lot of digging to assemble this guide. I could have put the standard copy right statement in it but I hate those things and will only do that if necessary. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- | Wilfred Drew (Call me "Bill") ______ | | Serials/Reference/Computers Librarian / | | | State University of New York / | | | Agriculture and Technical College | | | | P.O. Box 902 _________/ | | | Morrisville, NY 13408-0902 | | | | DECnet: SMORV::DREWWE / * Morrisville | | BITNET: DREWWE@SNYMORVA |______________ | | | INTERNET: DREWWE@SNYMORVA.CS.SNYMOR.EDU |_ | | | DREWWE@SNYMORVB.CS.SNYMOR.EDU \__| _____ | | Phone: (315)684-6055 or 684-6060 |_____| | | Fax: (315)684-6115 | ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!SNYMORVA.bitnet!DREWWE From: DREWWE@SNYMORVA.bitnet ("Bill Drew -- Serials Librarian") Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Revised announcement of agiculture guide to internet resources Message-ID: <9205131951.AA07871@genbank.bio.net> Date: 13 May 92 19:47:00 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 106 My guide to INTERNET Resources in Agriculture is now available at three different sites. The description below is from the SURANET guide maintained by Michael Taranto of NIC Services at SURAnet. NOT JUST COWS - A Guide to INTERNET/Bitnet Resources in Agriculture and Related Sciences; Written and Compiled by Wilfred Drew, 5/8/92; SUNY at Morrisville College of Agriculture and Technology. The purpose of this Guide is to list Agricultural and Related Sciences information resources available through the INTERNET. Agricultural information resources listed include; an index of over 40 libraries with extensive collections in agriculture; INTERNET BBS such as Advanced Technology Information Network and CENET; a collection of mail based services such as Almanac Servers and over 60 Listserve Discussion Groups; other miscellaneous information resources such as WAIS and FEDIX. ================================= Access: ftp.sura.net Directory: pub/nic File: agricultural.list (Note that this is a text file not binary.) ================================= Gord Nickerson's LIBSOFT ARCHIVE Access: ftp hydra.uwo.ca Directory: libsoft File: AGRICULTURE_INTERNET_GUIDE.TXT (Note this is a text file not a binary) AGRICULTURE_INTERNET_GUIDE.WP51 (Note this is a BINARY and is in WOrdPerfect format) ================================= Billy Barron's Site at UNT. Access: ftp ftp.unt.edu File: AGRICULTURE-INTERNET.TXT (Note this is a text file not a binary) AGRICULTURE-INTERNET.WORDPERFECT51 (Note this is a BINARY and is in WordPerfect 5.1 format) ================================= Before you print out the WordPerfect file, be sure to generate the table of contents file as the paging will be different from my original file due to different default printers. I also used the master document and sub document features of WordPerfect so WP will ask you if the document needs generating before you can print it. Please feel free to use this guide in any way you want as long as YOU DO NOT CHARGE ANY ONE FOR A COPY. Please also credit me for my work. It took a lot of digging to assemble this guide. I could have put the standard copy right statement in it but I hate those things and will only do that if necessary. =================How to FTP======================================== FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol. It allows a person to transfer files between two systems, generally connect over local area networks or wide area networks, such as the Internet. Sample FTP session The commands you enter are at ftp> prompt. ftp hydra.uwo.ca <== This command is entered at your system prompt. The address of the remote system here is hydra.uwo.ca. Response from remote system: 220 HYDRA.UWO.CA MultiNet FTP Server Process 3.0(12) at Thu 7-May-92 11:48AM-GMT Connected to HYDRA.UWO.CA. Name (hydra.uwo.ca:drewwe): anonymous <== Enter anonymous at this prompt. 331 anonymous user ok. Send real ident as password. Password: <== Enter your e-mail address. It will not be visible. 230-Guest User DREWWE@SNYMORVA.BITNET logged into PUB:[000000] at Thu 7-May-92 11:48, job 5793. 230 Directory and access restrictions apply ftp> cd libsoft <== Change directory command. 250 Connected to PUB:[000000.LIBSOFT]. <== Directory changes ftp> ls <== Lists files in directory 200 Port 6.98 at Host 136.204.1.1 accepted. 150 List started. <== I have deleted the list of files from this example. 226 Transfer completed. Received transfer complete reply 1553 bytes received in 00:00:27.97 seconds ftp> ascii <== Sets file transfer to text. If binary type binary instead. 200 Type A ok. ftp> get AGRICULTURE_INTERNET_GUIDE.TXT <== command for transferring file to our system ftp> quit <== Ending session 221 QUIT command received. Goodbye. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- | Wilfred Drew (Call me "Bill") ______ | | Serials/Reference/Computers Librarian / | | | State University of New York / | | | Agriculture and Technical College | | | | P.O. Box 902 _________/ | | | Morrisville, NY 13408-0902 | | | | DECnet: SMORV::DREWWE / * Morrisville | | BITNET: DREWWE@SNYMORVA |______________ | | | INTERNET: DREWWE@SNYMORVA.CS.SNYMOR.EDU |_ | | | DREWWE@SNYMORVB.CS.SNYMOR.EDU \__| _____ | | Phone: (315)684-6055 or 684-6060 |_____| | | Fax: (315)684-6115 | ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!uwm.edu!spool.mu.edu!uunet!news.claremont.edu!ucivax!noiro.acs.uci.edu!orion.oac.uci.edu!manderse From: manderse@orion.oac.uci.edu (Mark Andersen) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Ordination software? Summary: MS-DOS, Windows? Message-ID: <2A116644.21795@noiro.acs.uci.edu> Date: 13 May 92 18:56:04 GMT Distribution: na Organization: University of California, Irvine Lines: 13 Nntp-Posting-Host: orion.oac.uci.edu Does anyone have or know of ftp sites with ordination software available? I need a program, preferably Turbo Pascal, or executable (.EXE), to run under MS-DOS (or Windows), to do various types of ordination (reciprocal averaging and detrended correspondence analysis in particular; clustering would be a nice plus). I have heard that H Gauch (author of "the book" on ordination) has programs available. Can they be obtained through ftp? Is Gauch on the net? Thanks to all, Mark Andersen manderse@orion.oac.uci.edu Dept. of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology UC Irvine, Irvine, CA, 92717 From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!uwm.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!bronze!sunflower.bio.indiana.edu!gilbertd From: gilbertd@sunflower.bio.indiana.edu (Don Gilbert) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Re: Ordination software? Message-ID: <1992May13.210358.24563@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu> Date: 13 May 92 21:03:58 GMT References: <2A116644.21795@noiro.acs.uci.edu> Sender: news@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu (USENET News System) Distribution: na Organization: Biology, Indiana University - Bloomington Lines: 22 Nntp-Posting-Host: sunflower.bio.indiana.edu You may want to look at MVSP. Anonymous ftp to ftp.bio.indiana.edu, cd science/ibmpc/ Part of its blurb: MVSP - A MultiVariate Statistical Package, ver. 2.0 MVSP performs a number of numerical analyses useful in many fields. It calculates three basic types of eigenanalysis ordinations: principal components (PCA), principal coordinates (PCO), and correspondence analyses (CA). It can also perform cluster analysis, with eighteen different distance and similarity measures and seven clustering strategies. Three different diversity indices may be calculated for ecological data. Scatterplots and dendrograms of the results of these analyses can be plotted in graphics mode. The program also has a built-in data editor and a variety of options for data manipulation and transformation. It is menu driven, with context-sensitive help, and provides a large number of user-defined settings that can be saved for future use. -- Don Gilbert gilbert@bio.indiana.edu biocomputing office, biology dept., indiana univ., bloomington, in 47405 From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!KELVIN.JPL.NASA.GOV!SPEAR From: SPEAR@KELVIN.JPL.NASA.GOV Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: human sex Message-ID: <920506174857.21002245@KELVIN.JPL.NASA.GOV> Date: 6 May 92 17:49:13 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 6 to continue the discussion - the june issue of "discovery" mag is devoted to sex. putting aside the generally shallow approach of the popular press, there are some interesting articles addressing the 'whys' of sex...regards --- richard spear@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!agate!stanford.edu!morrow.stanford.edu!news From: minch@lotka.stanford.edu (Eric Minch) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Re: Roughgarden's evolution of sex paper in Am Nat Message-ID: <1992Apr30.221752.27105@morrow.stanford.edu> Date: 30 Apr 92 22:17:52 GMT References: <2599@news.duke.edu> Sender: news@morrow.stanford.edu (News Service) Organization: Stanford University, California, USA Lines: 17 In article <2599@news.duke.edu> una@phy.duke.edu (Una Smith) writes: > One idea I've seen tossed about (by Dawkins?) is that sex allows > the units of selection (whatever they may be) to shed parasites! > The genes contained in sperm, for example, are in a sense the > passengers of a sinking boat, abandoning ship at the first > opportunity and leaving the crew on board. The crew here are > mitochondrial DNA and any other loyal, hardworking but none too > swift inhabitants of the eucaryotic cell that don't manage to > make it across the membrane along with the nuclear DNA. Just > how does the nuclear DNA of males accomplish this amazing trick?! > It's a guy thing; you wouldn't understand. ;^) Eric Minch Any resemblance to the opinions of persons Epistemic Artisan or organizations other than myself--living, Stanford Genetics dead, or imaginary--is purely fortuitous. From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!TWSUVM.BITNET!GREENBER From: GREENBER@TWSUVM.BITNET Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: (none) Message-ID: <9205011303.AA29621@genbank.bio.net> Date: 1 May 92 13:01:35 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 4 The faculty at Wichita State University are looking into unionization. We solocit pro and con comments from our colleagues with union experience. Thanks Gary Greenberg From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!ig!ames!agate!stanford.edu!morrow.stanford.edu!news From: minch@lotka.stanford.edu (Eric Minch) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: offensive? (was: Roughgarden's evolution of sex paper in Am Nat) Message-ID: <1992May5.232305.15822@morrow.stanford.edu> Date: 5 May 92 23:23:05 GMT References: <2753@news.duke.edu> Sender: news@morrow.stanford.edu (News Service) Organization: Stanford University, California, USA Lines: 39 In article <2753@news.duke.edu> una@phy.duke.edu (Una Smith) writes: > Although the smiley face suggests an attempt at humor, I find > Eric Minch's comment to be an offensively sexist put-down, and > I expect a public apology. > -- 1) This is a good newsgroup which I've enjoyed reading and (occasionally) contributing to, so I'll try to be brief. 2) The posting I responded to was apparently from an intelligent and well-informed person with a lively curiosity. I feel considerable respect for those characteristics, and no inclination towards gratuitous offense. 3) I was taught a gentleman never offends anyone *unintentionally*, and have found this a valuable heuristic in communities, i.e., in social milieux in which most of the belief system is held in common. On an international network this can't be taken for granted, hence the smiley face has been developed to defuse potentially offensive messages. 3) Was it offensive? At least one person took offense, so I suppose it must have been. Was it sexist? I don't think so: I've heard the catch-phrase "It's a thing; you wouldn't understand" used both seriously and humorously, by and about men, women, and racial groups. The humor in this case lay in the incongruity of synecdochic identification of spermatazoa with male humans. Was it a put-down? Certainly not. How could a flip, facile attempt at humor be an effective put-down of a serious and informative posting? En fin, I'll offer to apologize for my portion of the collective wasting of bandwidth which my remark precipitated. If Una Smith or anyone else wishes to convince me that any more than this is called for, I suggest this be done by email. -- Eric Minch Any resemblance to the opinions of persons Epistemic Artisan or organizations other than myself--living, Stanford Genetics dead, or imaginary--is purely fortuitous. From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!rutgers!mcnc!duke!news.duke.edu!phy.duke.edu!una From: una@phy.duke.edu (Una Smith) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Re: Roughgarden's evolution of sex paper in Am Nat Message-ID: <2753@news.duke.edu> Date: 4 May 92 16:39:02 GMT References: <2599@news.duke.edu> <1992Apr30.221752.27105@morrow.stanford.edu> Sender: news@news.duke.edu Organization: Duke University Physics Dept.; Durham, N.C. Lines: 21 Nntp-Posting-Host: bashful.phy.duke.edu I wrote: >> One idea I've seen tossed about (by Dawkins?) is that sex allows >> the units of selection (whatever they may be) to shed parasites! [stuff deleted] >> how does the nuclear DNA of males accomplish this amazing trick?! To which Eric Minch replied: >It's a guy thing; you wouldn't understand. ;^) Although the smiley face suggests an attempt at humor, I find Eric Minch's comment to be an offensively sexist put-down, and I expect a public apology. -- Una Smith una@phy.duke.edu School of the Environment Duke University Durham, NC 27706 From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!ig!ames!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!usc!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!mcsun!uknet!gdt!ccshf From: ccshf@gdr.bath.ac.uk (Henry Ford) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Re: Sex and evolution Keywords: sex Message-ID: <1992Apr28.082603.22242@gdr.bath.ac.uk> Date: 28 Apr 92 08:26:03 GMT References: <01GJCHS7AKJK003KI2@MSUS1.MSUS.EDU> Distribution: bionet Organization: Bath University Computing Services, UK Lines: 17 This is getting interesting. I've forgotten most of the theory about this but here goes: 1: arguments for the origins of sex are quite different to those concerning maintenance; 2:clonal growth (and I take this as a form of asexual reproduction as it results in the formation of discrete individuals with the same genotypes but separate fates) results in genotypes that exist for several thousand years. (work on grasses and pteridium, etc.) 3: apomixis (asexual reproduction via seeds - some form of failed meiosis - see Mogie's latest book for the whole description) results in genotypes that are pretty constant for tens of thousands of years (since the last ica age anyway). There is no evidence that apomictic lines become extinct faster than sexual (I think). When does it pay to reproduce sexually? Henry Ford From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!uwm.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!usc!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!lll-winken!bu.edu!bu-bio!colby From: colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Re: (none) Message-ID: <84897@bu.edu> Date: 27 Apr 92 23:48:31 GMT References: <01GJCHS7AKJK003KI2@MSUS1.MSUS.EDU> Sender: news@bu.edu Distribution: bionet Organization: animal -- coelomate -- deuterostome Lines: 44 In article <01GJCHS7AKJK003KI2@MSUS1.MSUS.EDU> KKLEIN@MSUS1.MSUS.EDU writes: >Una Smith brings up the point that the utility of sex is really at question >concerning the retention of sex in evolution. I find Dawkins ideas about >shedding parasites far-fetched (to say the least) especially as sex, or ^^^^^^^ >should I say recombination, has a perfectly good use, namely DNA ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ >repair. Should you say recombination? This was the question that the Roughgarden paper put forth. He claims in his paper that the benefit of sex (or at least _a_ bene- fit of sex) has nothing to do with recombination. He presents a one-locus, two allele model that shows that a sexual population is more fit than an analogous asexual population when the environ- ment fluctuates (*) This is because sex forces the genotype distribution of the population to remain more stable over time (it must conform to the HW equilibrium each generation) than an asexual population. (*) and, yes, his model is explicitly group selectionist One poster, on bionet.molbio.evolution, claimed that Rough- gardens biological assumptions were unfounded (R.'s model uses simultaneous hermaphrodism as ancestral to dioecy); but, as far as the math goes, it could be any sexual population. As Una Smith points out, the paper mainly deals with describing a benefit of sex -- not proposing a pathway from asexuality to sexuality. It's really about the maintainance of sex rather than how it evolved. Recombination (as well as diploidy) may have evolved for reasons unrelated to sex (Michod's repair hypothesis is interest- ing). Roughgardens paper, to me, strongly suggests that these two (or three) phenomena do not need to be linked (as they almost always are) in discussing the maintainance of sex. >Keith Klein >KKLEIN@MSUS1. MSUS.EDU Chris Colby --- email: colby@bu-bio.bu.edu --- "'My boy,' he said, 'you are descended from a long line of determined, resourceful, microscopic tadpoles--champions every one.'" --Kurt Vonnegut from "Galapagos" From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!ITESO.BITNET!SISC92 From: SISC92@ITESO.BITNET Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: 3th Week of Computing Systems Engineering... Message-ID: <9204300428.AA10668@genbank.bio.net> Date: 21 Apr 92 20:05:47 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 41 Hello!! everybody: We are a group of students of Computer Systems Engineering at ITESO University, in Guadalajara Mexico. Each year a symposium of subjects, items and tutorials related to our studies is organized by students of this career, supported by our University, Corporations and Institutes (like IEEE of Mexico) to make it possible, and this year is our turn. With this goal, we are using this media to get in touch with people related to or interested in computers, to ask them for some help and/or support in contacting conferencists or people that give tutorials. The topics that we are focused in are : * Multimedia * Networks * Virus * CASE Tools * OOP * Unix * Etc.. This event will take place in Guadalajara, Mexico from September 21 to 25 of the present Year. If you want to help us or you know someone that would and could, please contact us. Thank you in advance for your atention and colaboration. Sincerely, Jose M. Rodarte M. Committe of conferences. SISC92@Iteso.Bitnet SISC92@Itesocci.gdl.iteso.mx ITESO University. Guadalajara, Mexico. From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!MSUS1.MSUS.EDU!KKLEIN From: KKLEIN@MSUS1.MSUS.EDU Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: (none) Message-ID: <01GJCHS7AKJK003KI2@MSUS1.MSUS.EDU> Date: 27 Apr 92 21:25:00 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 31 Subject: evolution of sex To: population-biology@genebank.bio.net Message-id: <01GJCDBZ1UDC003L8U@MSUS1.MSUS.EDU> X-Envelope-to: population-biology@genebank.bio.net X-VMS-To: IN%"population-biology@genebank.bio.net" Una Smith brings up the point that the utility of sex is really at question concerning the retention of sex in evolution. I find Dawkins ideas about shedding parasites far-fetched (to say the least) especially as sex, or I should say recombination, has a perfectly good use, namely DNA repair. While admittedly the least efficient of the DNA repair mechanisms, recombination repair is the only method which will fill in deletions (at least as far as I know). Since there are any number of mutagenic agents which can cause deletion (radiation, alkylating agents, ozone), it stands to reason that organisms that have this kind of repair might enjoy an advantage in some environments. Sex might be the result of cells fusing to swap information (and repair each other reciprocally) and needing a way to sort themselves out after the process is finished. Thus, meiosis is a way to ex-conjugate two cells which have fused to provide mutual repair of lost information in a way that preserves the most DNA. Other methods of ex-conjugation (e.g.random loss of chromosomes) are more wasteful. If there are ancillary benefits to this process, e.g.Mendelian recombination and production of new genotypes/phenotypes, which increase overall fitness, then retention of this behavior seems assured. I haven't worked out the theory on this, but it seems that even infrequent (in generations) recombination repair ought to be highly favored by selection. It might not be necessary to recombine every generation to achieve fixation of the recombination genes. Some argument ought to ensue about the probability of lethal deletions in a lineage, and the necessity of repair, but I'm not sure what that should be. Keith Klein KKLEIN@MSUS1. MSUS.EDU From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!ucselx!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!decwrl!mcnc!duke!news.duke.edu!phy.duke.edu!una From: una@phy.duke.edu (Una Smith) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Re: Technical Report Available: "Darwinian Ontology" Message-ID: <2600@news.duke.edu> Date: 24 Apr 92 22:57:18 GMT References: <9204220924.AA10594@genbank.bio.net> Sender: news@news.duke.edu Distribution: bionet Organization: Duke University Physics Dept.; Durham, N.C. Lines: 50 Nntp-Posting-Host: grumpy.phy.duke.edu 75008378@DCU.IE ("Barry McMullin, DCU ", Dublin, Ireland) writes: [stuff deleted] >The problem tackled in this essay is to formulate ``Darwinian'' >theory in a way which is divorced from any specifically >biological interpretation. For my purposes, the crucial >constraint on this abstract formulation of Darwinian theory is >that it must qualify as a realisation of {\em unjustified >variation and selective retention\/} in the sense of >D.T.~Campbell [see .bib references below]---for it is (arguably) >only thus that Darwinian evolution can lead to the spontaneous >growth of ``knowledge''. [stuff deleted] You might want to investigate the bionet.info-theory group. They've certainly got a lot to say on this topic. I am looking forward to reading the actual paper, but I have a couple of comments about the abstract. First, an explicit definition of what you take to be Darwinian theory would be useful here. And I don't understand at all what you are trying to say in the sentence with the emphasis marks. The "realisation" is what throws me here. Are you saying that current Darwinian theory somehow is not a statement about random variation and subsequent extrinsic selection on that variation? >I introduce a novel ontological >category: the Similarity-lineage, or {\em S-lineage}. [stuff deleted] Well, now I am very interested in seeing the report itself, because although you have introduced a new name, what you describe does not sound novel to me. Have you read Niles Eldridge's recent work? Paleobiologists have talked about hierarchical systems for a very long time, and it is not clear to me that your novelty is indeed new to science. However, you are quite right to be interested in the issue, because it is one of fundamental importance to biological theory. Una -- Una Smith una@phy.duke.edu School of the Environment Duke University Durham, NC 27706 From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!agate!spool.mu.edu!uwm.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!decwrl!mcnc!duke!news.duke.edu!phy.duke.edu!una From: una@phy.duke.edu (Una Smith) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Re: Roughgarden's evolution of sex paper in Am Nat Message-ID: <2599@news.duke.edu> Date: 24 Apr 92 22:38:32 GMT References: <83802@bu.edu> Sender: news@news.duke.edu Organization: Duke University Physics Dept.; Durham, N.C. Lines: 40 Nntp-Posting-Host: grumpy.phy.duke.edu In article <83802@bu.edu> colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby) writes: > I was wondering if anyone would like to comment on Rough- >garden's recent paper in Am. Nat. regarding the evolution of sex? (*) > The standard reason given for the evolution of sex is that >it allows groups to evolve faster. [stuff deleted] >(*) Roughgarden, 1991, The evolution of sex, American Naturalist 138: >934- 953 Well, there hasn't been a whisper out of this group. I'm surprised! I guess that means there isn't anyone out there who might be willing to take charge of producing a FAQ for the group? On the question of the utility of sex (that's really the issue Chris is getting at, I think, rather than evolution), I've seen quite a few references in the past week. Lynn Margulis has published quite a bit on this, along with various co-authors, and I believe that Richard Dawkins talks about sex quite a bit in his book "The Selfish Gene", which is surely required reading. One idea I've seen tossed about (by Dawkins?) is that sex allows the units of selection (whatever they may be) to shed parasites! The genes contained in sperm, for example, are in a sense the passengers of a sinking boat, abandoning ship at the first opportunity and leaving the crew on board. The crew here are mitochondrial DNA and any other loyal, hardworking but none too swift inhabitants of the eucaryotic cell that don't manage to make it across the membrane along with the nuclear DNA. Just how does the nuclear DNA of males accomplish this amazing trick?! Una -- Una Smith una@phy.duke.edu School of the Environment Duke University Durham, NC 27706 From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!ANTHRO.UTAH.EDU!rogers From: rogers@ANTHRO.UTAH.EDU Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Re: human pops Message-ID: <9204231546.AA17046@anthro.utah.edu> Date: 23 Apr 92 15:46:29 GMT Sender: kristoff@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 59 >hi there - ill preface this by saying im not a biologist - im doing a >masters in anthropology. ive got an interest in human pops and the >effects that their size, growth rates,etc. have on cultural evolution. >i wonder if there is literature that eddresses human pops and human >pop dynamics from that perspective You might look at L. Binford's article "Post-pleistocene adaptations", which appeared (I think) in his book, "An Archeological Perspective". In addition, here are a few references in BibTeX format. @Book{Boserup:65, author = "Boserup, Ester", title = "The Conditions of Agricultural Growth", publisher = "Aldine", year = "1965", address = "Chicago" } @Book{Boserup:81, author = "Boserup, Ester", title = "Population and Technological Change: {A} Study of Long-Term Trends", publisher = "University of Chicago Press", year = "1981", address = "Chicago" } @Article{Lee:87, author = "Lee, Ronald D.", title = "Population Dynamics of Humans and other Animals", journal = "Demography", year = "1987", volume = "24", pages = "443--465" } @Article{Keeley:88, author = "Keeley, Lawrence H.", title = "Hunter-Gatherer Economic Complexity and ``Population Pressure'': A Cross-Cultural Analysis", journal = "Journal of Human Evolution", year = "1988", volume = "7", pages = "373--411" } @InCollection{Rogers:Resources, author = "Rogers, Alan R.", title = "Resources and Population Dynamics", booktitle = "Human Evolutionary Ecology", publisher = "Aldine de Gruyter", year = "1992", editor = "Smith, Eric and Bruce Winterhalder", chapter = "12", OPTpages = "", address = "Hawthorne, NY", note = "in press" } From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!agate!qal.qal.berkeley.edu!mwande From: mwande@qal.qal.berkeley.edu (Mike Anderson) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Survival/hazard analysis Message-ID: Date: 23 Apr 92 02:58:03 GMT Organization: University of California, Berkeley Lines: 45 NNTP-Posting-Host: qal.qal.berkeley.edu I posted this in sci.math.stat a while ago, without a satisfactory answer. Can someone answer this? >>Is anyone out there familiar with the output from the SPSSx procedure >>SURVIVAL? I'm trying to figure out exactly how the columns of the >>"life table" are computed. I can't figure out where >>the numbers are coming from. > > If all else fails, try the manual (SPSS-X Statistical Algorithms). I > have a old (1985) edition which gives hazard rate lambda(i) as: > > 2 q(i) > ------------- > h(i) (1+p(i)) > >where q(i) is the proportion terminating in interval i, h(i) is the width >of the interval i and p(i)=1-q(i). This might not correspond with the >current version of the program however. Thanks - I haven't got that manual. Can you also tell me how the hazard rate according to SPSSx output corresponds to the hazard rate I am familiar with? I thought the hazard rate equaled the number of events divided by total exposure. In my case, the width of each interval is 1, so this is simply equal to q(i), the proportion terminating, no? (Look at sample output: the proptn. terminating column = # of term. events/# exposed to risk). So how is the SPSSx eqtn. a hazard rate? Also, how does this correspond to the traditional life table columns (i.e. nmx, nqx, etc.)? I always thought that the hazard rate was the lim (nmx) as x -> 0, so the discrete form is simple the nmx (rate) column. The spssx manual, however, says that the hazard rate is the probability that cases entering the interval experience the terminal event. Doesn't this correspond to the nqx column, then, not the nmx column? Thanks in advance, Mike Anderson -- ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Mike Anderson Dept. of Demography UC Berkeley mwande@QAL.Berkeley.EDU "It's the little touches that make a future solid enough to be destroyed." - William S. Burroughs From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!KELVIN.JPL.NASA.GOV!SPEAR From: SPEAR@KELVIN.JPL.NASA.GOV Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: human pops Message-ID: <920422021056.23a02885@KELVIN.JPL.NASA.GOV> Date: 22 Apr 92 23:34:55 GMT Sender: kristoff@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 11 hi there - ill preface this by saying im not a biologist - im doing a masters in anthropology. ive got an interest in human pops and the effects that their size, growth rates,etc. have on cultural evolution. i wonder if there is literature that eddresses human pops and human pop dynamics from that perspective - forgive me if this is the wrong forum to raise such a question. thanks in advance for any help you might be able to give... richard spear@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!DCU.IE!75008378 From: 75008378@DCU.IE ("Barry McMullin, DCU ", Dublin, Ireland) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Technical Report Available: "Darwinian Ontology" Message-ID: <9204220924.AA10594@genbank.bio.net> Date: 22 Apr 92 10:19:00 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 175 [The following announcement is being cross-posted on Alife Digest, GA-List Digest, and POP+BIO. If you subscribe to more than one, my apologies for the noise. All flames to me, not the list or list maintainers! This TR is first in a series I hope to complete over the next month or two. Instructions for obtaining a copy of the TR are at the end. Enjoy.] +++++++++++++++++ TR ANNOUNCEMENT --------------- Essays on Darwinism 1: Ontological Foundations Barry McMullin, School of Electronic Engineering, Dublin City University, Dublin 9, IRELAND. March 1992 Technical Report: bmcm9201 The problem tackled in this essay is to formulate ``Darwinian'' theory in a way which is divorced from any specifically biological interpretation. For my purposes, the crucial constraint on this abstract formulation of Darwinian theory is that it must qualify as a realisation of {\em unjustified variation and selective retention\/} in the sense of D.T.~Campbell [see .bib references below]---for it is (arguably) only thus that Darwinian evolution can lead to the spontaneous growth of ``knowledge''. I hope that such an abstract formulation might help to clarify the application of the theory even in its native biological setting; but, more importantly, it seems to me that this exercise is a necessary pre-requisite for the valid application of Darwinian principles in any domain {\em other\/} than conventional, terrestrial, biology---such as the emerging field of study commonly referred to as {\em Artificial Life}. In attempting to solve the problem of formulating a satisfactory, abstract, version of Darwinism, I introduce a novel ontological category: the Similarity-lineage, or {\em S-lineage}. With the aid of this hybrid category, which combines some aspects of both a class and an individual, I argue that Darwinian evolution relies on a process of S-lineage selection---which is to say that S-lineages are, in a certain precise sense, the elusive Darwinian {\em units of selection}. +++++++++++++++++ REFERENCES: ----------- @ARTICLE{ Campbell:BlindVariationInCreativeThought, AUTHOR = "Donald T. Campbell", TITLE = "Blind Variation and Selective Retention in Creative Thought as in Other Knowledge Processes", JOURNAL = "Psychological Review", YEAR = 1960, VOLUME = 67, NUMBER = 6, PAGES = "380--400" } @INCOLLECTION{ Campbell:BlindVariationAsGeneralStrategy, AUTHOR = "Donald T. Campbell", TITLE = "Blind Variation and Selective Survival as a General Strategy in Knowledge-Processes", CROSSREF = "Yovits:SelfOrganizingSystems", PAGES = "205--231" } @INCOLLECTION{ Campbell:EvolutionaryEpistemology, AUTHOR = "Donald T. Campbell", TITLE = "Evolutionary Epistemology", CROSSREF = "Schilpp:Popper", PAGES = "413--463 (Book~I)" } @INCOLLECTION{ Campbell:UnjustifiedVariation, AUTHOR = "Donald T. Campbell", TITLE = "Unjustified Variation and Selective Retention in Scientific Discovery", CROSSREF = "Ayala:PhilosophyOfBiology", CHAPTER = 9, PAGES = "139--161" } @BOOK{ Ayala:PhilosophyOfBiology, EDITOR = "Francisco Jose Ayala and Theodosius Dobzhansky", TITLE = "Studies in the Philosophy of Biology", BOOKTITLE = "Studies in the Philosophy of Biology", PUBLISHER = "The Macmillan Press Ltd.", ADDRESS = "London", YEAR = 1974 } @BOOK{ Schilpp:Popper, EDITOR = "Paul Arthur Schilpp", TITLE = "The Philosophy of Karl Popper", BOOKTITLE = "The Philosophy of Karl Popper", PUBLISHER = "Open Court", ADDRESS = "Illinois", YEAR = 1974, VOLUME = "XIV", SERIES = "The Library of Living Philosophers" } @BOOK{ Yovits:SelfOrganizingSystems, EDITOR = "Marshall C. Yovits and Scott Cameron", TITLE = "Self-Organizing Systems", BOOKTITLE = "Self-Organizing Systems", PUBLISHER = "Pergamon Press", ADDRESS = "Oxford", YEAR = 1960, NOTE = "Proceedings of an interdisciplinary conference, 5~and 6~May, 1959" } +++++++++++++++++ Copies are available in the following three ways, in order of (my) preference: 1: ftp bmcm9201.ps.Z from pub/alife/papers on the Alife archive (ftp.cognet.ucla.edu). To retrieve, do (something like) the following: unix-1> ftp ftp.cognet.ucla.edu Connected to ftp.cognet.ucla.edu Name (ftp.cognet.ucla.edu:): anonymous 331 Guest login ok, sent ident as password. Password: [identification] 230 Guest login ok, access restrictions apply. ftp> cd pub/alife/papers ftp> binary ftp> get bmcm9201.ps.Z ftp> quit unix-2> uncompress bmcm9201.ps.Z unix-3> lpr -P(your_local_postscript_printer) bmcm9201.ps [Many thanks to Alife maintainer, Rob Collins, for making this possible. If you have any problems, complain to me not Rob.] 2: If you don't have ftp access, I can email the file to you, on request (uuencoded, split into about 3 by 55k chunks). You'll have to be able to strip off the mail headers, glue it back together, uudecode, uncompress, and print postscript (or preview etc.). 3: If that's all gobbledegook to you, then a limited number of good old fashioned hard copies will be available. Send me your full postal address. First come first served. In cases 2 and 3 contact me as (do *not* send requests to the whole list...). +++++++++++++++++ That's all for now folks .... Barry. From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!agate!usenet.ins.cwru.edu!po.CWRU.Edu!drg2 From: drg2@po.CWRU.Edu (Diddahally R. Govindaraju) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Re: Plasticity Message-ID: <1992Apr21.102718.21499@usenet.ins.cwru.edu> Date: 21 Apr 92 10:27:18 GMT Sender: news@usenet.ins.cwru.edu Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio, (USA) Lines: 18 Nntp-Posting-Host: cwns4.ins.cwru.edu Plasticity in woody plants -- some comments Plasticity in plants has been examined by some plant breeders notably K. Mather of Birmingham and Grafius of Michigan State University. The former has analyzed the componet characters in terms of global and particular characters; while the latter in therms of geometry of characters. Govindaraju (1984; New Phytologist 97: 691-696? and Can. J. Bot. 1988; 66: 183-188) has analyzed phenotypic plasticity in woody plants using path analysis. In particular, the second paper deals with plasticity and stability of characters in relation to environmental variation. He has extended these analyses further into inter-demic (family) selection in plants (Govindaraju; Evol. Theory 8: 191-197; Acta Oecologia 1989; 10: 159-165) Govindaraju From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!BUCLLN11.BITNET!GENA2 From: GENA2@BUCLLN11.BITNET (Xavier DRAYE) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: European Drosophilists Message-ID: <9204211242.AA01598@genbank.bio.net> Date: 17 Apr 92 08:05:24 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 20 CONCERNED: European drosophilists. In a research on the evolutionary genetics of ageing, the Laboratoire de genetique of the University of Louvain (F.A. LINTS) wishes to compare the life history of wild-captured populations of Drosophila melanogaster from different geographical origin (Europe-restricted). For that purpose, we are looking for drosophilists who would accept to collaborate by collecting, say, 100 flies and by sending them to us immediately after capture. Were you willing to collaborate, please contact us as soon as possible. Send your coordinates, and the approximate date at which you think you may be able to collect flies. Of course, we'll call you back as soon as possible. Thanks, Xavier Draye, Universite Catholique de Louvain (Belgium) E-mail: Draye@gena.ucl.ac.be From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!ANTHRO.UTAH.EDU!rogers From: rogers@ANTHRO.UTAH.EDU Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Stearns monograph Message-ID: <9204101554.AA16744@anthro.utah.edu> Date: 10 Apr 92 15:54:50 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 11 I understand that Steve Stearns has just published a monograph on Life History Evolution. Can anyone tell me who the publisher is? Thanks, Alan R. Rogers INTERNET : rogers@anthro.utah.edu USMAIL : Dept. of Anthropology, Univ. of Utah, S.L.C., UT 84112 WORK PHONE: (801) 581-5529 HOME PHONE: (801) 486-6013 FAX : (801) 581-6252 From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!agate!spool.mu.edu!uunet!know!hri.com!ukma!psuvax1!psuvm!akr100 From: AKR100@psuvm.psu.edu Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Re: Roughgarden's evolution of sex paper in Am Nat Message-ID: <92106.204238AKR100@psuvm.psu.edu> Date: 16 Apr 92 00:42:38 GMT References: <83802@bu.edu> Organization: Penn State University Lines: 2 Way to go, you so-called lowly grad student (is there such a thing?) Finally an interesting article in bionet. Keep up the good work. From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!rutgers!sun-barr!lll-winken!bu.edu!bu-bio!colby From: colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio,bionet.molbio.evolution Subject: Roughgarden's evolution of sex paper in Am Nat Summary: looking for comments Message-ID: <83802@bu.edu> Date: 11 Apr 92 23:04:07 GMT Sender: news@bu.edu Reply-To: colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby) Followup-To: bionet.population-bio Organization: animal -- coelomate -- deuterostome Lines: 44 Xref: bionet bionet.population-bio:288 bionet.molbio.evolution:452 References: Distribution: I was wondering if anyone would like to comment on Rough- garden's recent paper in Am. Nat. regarding the evolution of sex? (*) The standard reason given for the evolution of sex is that it allows groups to evolve faster. Beneficial mutations occuring in separate organisms could be shuffled onto the same chromosome via recombination (whereas sequential mutations would have to occur in an asexual population). Thus, the benefit of sex (to a group) was tied to the ability to recombine; this is especially useful when the environment is unstable. Sex is assumed not to be adaptive to individuals. Roughgraden attempts to decouple sex from recombination and develops a one-locus model of why sex may be adaptive to groups of organisms. He shows that in a sexual population, the distribution of genotypes stays more stable with time (because random mating brings about genotype frequencies in Hardy-Weinberg eq.) than in an asexual population when the fitnesses of the different genotypes fluctuate. So, when the fitnesses of the genotypes change, there are always more representatives of the most favored genotype in a sexual population than in an asexual one. The benefit of sex increases (in his model) with the magnitude of environmental fluctuation. (His model is one-locus, two allele. The asexual population is diploid and hermaphroditic. The sexual population is (of course) diploid and randomly mated. I hope I have not butchered it in my description above.) I have posted this to bionet.population-biology and bionet.molbio.evolution because I think it may be relevant to both groups. But, to prevent wasting bandwidth, I've set the follow-up to the pop-bio board. Are there any criticisms of his model? It seems valid to me (but I'm just a lowly grad-student -- what the hell do I know 8-) (*) Roughgarden, 1991, The evolution of sex, American Naturalist 138: 934- 953 Chris Colby --- email: colby@bu-bio.bu.edu --- "'My boy,' he said, 'you are descended from a long line of determined, resourceful, microscopic tadpoles--champions every one.'" --Kurt Vonnegut from "Galapagos" From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!NIU.bitnet!T80SMS1 From: T80SMS1@NIU.bitnet Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Genetic variability, plasticity, and Lolium Message-ID: <9204091343.AA10185@genbank.bio.net> Date: 9 Apr 92 13:43:00 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 41 >Joachim Benz writes: > >2) Is the mechanism of "phenotypic plasticity" in vegetatively > reproducing plants a requirement of success? (I am specially > interested in ihe forage grass Lolium perenne L.) No, phenotypic plasticity is never a requirement. Theoretical models agree that 2 conditions are necessary for selection to favor plasticity, environmental variability and predictability of that variability. By predictability I mean that the environment at the time the phenotype becomes fixed must be highly correlated with the environment at the time of selection. The above is for temporal variability. For spatial variability it depends on the relative difference in the 2 optimal phenotypes vs the cost for being plastic. See the recent papers by van Tienderen (Evolution 45:1317-1331), Gabriel and Lynch (J. evol. biol. 5:41-59), and de Jong (J. evol. Biol. 3:447-468), and upcoming papers by Gomulkiewicz and Kirkpatrick (Evolution in press) and Gavrilets and Scheiner (J. evol. biol. in press). So before I can answer your question concerning Lolium it is necessary to know something about the pattern of environmental variability, migration patterns, and effects of environment on phenotype. However, it is true that plants in general tend to be plastic, more so than animals. A reasonable guess why is because they are not mobile. At this point we have not accumulated enough information to predict which which types of plants or plant traits are more likely to be plastic than others. So there is at least 2 or 3 PhD theses of work waiting to be done. *+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+* * Samuel M. Scheiner + Being a scientist is like * * Department of Biological Sciences + beating one's head * * Northern Illinois University + against a wall and then, * * DeKalb, Illinois 60115 + when the wall begins to * * Phone: (815) 753-7847 + crumble, picking another * * Fax: (815) 753-0461 + intact wall against which * * Bitnet: t80sms1@niu + to beat. Steven Vogel * *+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+* From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!YUBGEF51.BITNET!EMESAROS From: EMESAROS@YUBGEF51.BITNET ("GABOR MESARO[") Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: subscribe Message-ID: <9204081051.AA17551@genbank.bio.net> Date: 7 Apr 92 23:26:00 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 3 register Gabor Mesaros subscribe pop-bio From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!VTVM1.CC.VT.EDU!NSTEWART From: NSTEWART@VTVM1.CC.VT.EDU Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Plasticity Message-ID: <9204101206.AA11442@genbank.bio.net> Date: 10 Apr 92 11:56:15 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 18 To follow up with Sam's answer to Joachim Benz's query: Is plasticity necessary for success? I'm doing one of those theses Sam was talking about with a vegetatively reproducing plant, cranberry. I don't know about Lolium, but in cranberry there seems to be very low intrapopulational genetic variation, therefore one individual plant may spread over quite a large area. It seems that selection may favor plasticity in such a case in which the spreading growth habit may exploit putative spatially heterogeneous environments. Unfortunately, my common garden experiments are just beginning, so I can't provide data to support this. Most plant phenotypic plasticity studies have been done with fast-growing annuals, so clonal plant plasticity is a black box (especially woody plants). Hope this helps. Neal Stewart From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!daresbury!embnet.se!corax.udac.uu.se!sunic!ugle.unit.no!nuug!nn.no!nntp.uio.no!haraldst From: haraldst@darwin.uio.no.uio.no (Harald Steen) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Transmitters Message-ID: <920306.171822.haraldst@biozoo02> Date: 6 Apr 92 16:18:22 GMT Sender: news@ulrik.uio.no (Mr News) Organization: University of Oslo Lines: 5 Nntp-Posting-Host: biozoo02.uio.no Does anybody know of a firm in Canada (possibly Ottawa) named "Holohil" that make radiotransmitters for animals? Thanks! Harald Steen haraldst@darwin.uio.no From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!RT2.MENZIES.SU.EDU.AU!daryl From: daryl@RT2.MENZIES.SU.EDU.AU (Daryl Webb) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Ashmoles Hypothesis Message-ID: <9204071646.AA13086@genbank.bio.net> Date: 8 Apr 92 04:34:37 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 18 I'm in the process of writing a short evaluation of Ashmole's Clutch size Hypothesis as part of my studies. I also need to examine the validity of Lack's earlier work as a component of this. I would be interested in receiving any comments pertaining to this field. Thanks -- | | Daryl Webb (daryl@menzies.su.edu.au) \ / Menzies School of Health Research \__/ P.O. Box 41096 || << Casuarina N.T. 0811 ----------------------- * << Australia || << Voice : 61_89_228196 /||\ Fax : 61_89_275187 * || o / || \ From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!agate!spool.mu.edu!yale.edu!jvnc.net!moesun.edu.tw!twnmoe10!hsinchi From: HSINCHI@TWNMOE10.BITNET Newsgroups: bionet.software,bionet.population-bio Subject: LIFETABL - life table analysis Message-ID: <92092.095941HSINCHI@TWNMOE10.BITNET> Date: 1 Apr 92 14:59:41 GMT Organization: Ministry of Education, Computer Center NETNEWS system V2.3 Lines: 2 Xref: bionet bionet.software:2182 bionet.population-bio:281 If you need help on life table analysis (age-stage, two-sex life table), you are welcome to contact me. From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!s.u-tokyo!ccut!sun-barr!cs.utexas.edu!usc!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sample.eng.ohio-state.edu!purdue!mentor.cc.purdue.edu!jombo From: jombo@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (James F. Gries) Newsgroups: bionet.general,sci.bio,bionet.population-bio Subject: Species Diversity in Temperate zones Keywords: Diversity, temperate zones, size of plot Message-ID: <40584@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> Date: 17 Mar 92 14:54:37 GMT Followup-To: poster Organization: Purdue University Lines: 13 Xref: bionet bionet.general:2549 sci.bio:5101 bionet.population-bio:277 I am a college student attending Purdue University. I am writing a paper/research proposal (the assignment is to write a proposal but will not be entered anywhere). The topic I chose was "Species diversity verses forest size in temperate zones". I am looking for any articles written on this or a related topic within the last few years. The only things I have found were on diversity in the tropics. I am particularly interested in looking at the infractioned forest caused by the extensive farming here in the Midwest and comparing that to the diversity of the a relativly undisturbed area. Any help would be appreciated. As I do not often have time to read the news, please reply by email to: jombo@mentor.cc.purdue.edu Thanks in advance. From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!VNET3.VUB.AC.BE!fheyligh From: fheyligh@VNET3.VUB.AC.BE (Francis Heylighen) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: An Appeal to Support Researchers in Flanders Message-ID: <9203171106.AA18209@genbank.bio.net> Date: 17 Mar 92 10:44:32 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 132 Dear Colleague, We are spreading this message in order to ask colleagues abroad to help the actions of Flemish researchers against drastically reduced funding. The funding for basic research in Belgium, and especially in its northern region of Flanders, has been getting worse and worse during the last years, and has become especially dramatic lately. Since the group of researchers in Flanders is small and not very well organized as yet, and since it has no political power, we have decided to appeal to friends and colleague researchers abroad to help us in our protest against these measures, by sending us letters of support. In Belgium the main institution that provides employment and grants for researchers is the "National Fund for Scientific Research" (NFWO/FNRS). There is a wide consensus within the Belgian academic world about the outstanding quality of this institution, as well with respect to its administrative functioning, as to the high scientific level of its researchers. Hence, the recent measures to cut funding for the NFWO cannot be justified by any criticism of the institution. As you may know, Belgium is gradually evolving towards a federal structure with two main independent regions of about 5 million inhabitants each: the French-speaking Wallonia, and the Flemish-speaking Flanders. This process has recently led to a split-up of the National Fund into a French and a Flemish part. Presently the French part is being strenghtened, financially and structurally. This was to be expected since Belgium as a whole was spending much less money on basic research than comparable countries. According to the OECD, less than 0.5 % of GNP is spent by government for research in Belgium, compared to around 1 % in the neighbouring France, Holland, Germany and UK (and even more in Japan and the USA). Therefore the effort of Wallonia to increase funding can be seen as an attempt to adapt itself to the European level. It came as a complete surprise and shock then, when the Flemish government decided to cut funding for the Flemish part of the NFWO, and that to such an extent that its internal function must collapse. In the short term, the measure implies the complete disappearance of long-term research contracts, the diminishing of short term contracts, and a radical reduction of about 80 % in the funding for general working costs and equipment of major research centers. In the long term the only effect can be the factual disappearance of basic research in Flanders. Practically this means that young researchers, however bright they are, will be unable to continue their career in academic research. The situation in the universities is not much better, and there are no ways of escape there either. In the recent past (10 to 20 years ago) relatively many people have received a permanent research contract because of university expansion. This means that they will stay there until their retirement. In these times of budget cuts, however, there is practically no money left to create new positions, and hence the younger generation simply does not have any outlook for continuing research, unless they emigrate. And this in spite of the fact that the average level of research in Belgium is quite high, as testified by famous research centers such as the one created by the Belgian Nobel-prize winner Ilya Prigogine. Though the Belgian and Flemish governments do have important budget deficits, that is not a sufficient argument to cut spending on research. First, as outlined above, the funding in Belgium is already much below what could be expected from a highly developed country. Second, what politicians do not understand is that the development of knowledge is the single most important factor determining economical and societal development, and as we are moving towards a post-industrial information society that factor is gaining in importance with every day that passes. Cutting funding on R&D can only keep down future economic growth and, hence, income for the state. Third, in spite of the budget deficit, Belgium (and especially Flanders) is still one of the richest regions in the world, with an economy that has been doing quite well recently and a per capita income higher than those of France or the UK, and only slightly below that of Germany. The reasons for saving money in research rather than in other domains are to be found in short-sightedness, lack of understanding of what research really means, and the lack of political power of researchers as a group. When train engineers, factory workers, or nurses are unhappy, they go on strike, and everybody is immediately alarmed. If researchers would go one strike, nobody would notice, unless many years later. But then it would be too late to repair the damage. So we are looking for other ways to attract the attention of the public and the politicians to our grievances. For example, on February 6, for the first time in Belgian (and perhaps World?) history there has been a public demonstration of some 5000 researchers in Brussels, protesting against the reduced funding. We have further been organizing several panel discussions with famous scientists (such as Prigogine) and politicians. Until now the actions have had success insofar that the new Flemish government has taken a more positive attitude and has promised to study the problem. But no concrete measures have been taken as yet concerning the reduced funding. So we need to keep putting pressure on them. That is the reason we are making an appeal to international solidarity. We ask all our colleague researchers to write a letter in which they express their solidarity with our movement, stressing the importance of an adequate funding for basic research, and protesting against the cutting down of the NFWO. If you have had personal contacts with researchers employed by the NFWO, we would ask you to emphasize the quality of their work, which was made possible by the NFWO. From people with experience in R&D management, we would like to hear about statistics, models or research findings showing the impact of research on economy and society in general, to be used as arguments to convince politicians that investment in basic research is not lost money. We would also be interested in suggestions on how we might continue our actions. We would ask you to distribute the present message to all people you know who might be interested, so that an as a large as possible public of researchers is reached. The letters of support (and possible further reactions) are to be sent to "Focus Research. Belgian Association for the Advancement of Science", a recently founded group representing all researchers, which will distribute them to the press and to politicians. The address is: Focus Research Triomflaan 63 B-1160 Brussels Belgium Phone: + 32 - 2 - 647 77 13 Fax: + 32 - 2 - 647 31 57 We thank you in advance for your support. Sincerely, Francis Heylighen _______________________________________________________________________ Dr. Francis Heylighen Systems Researcher PO, Free University of Brussels, Pleinlaan 2, B -1050 Brussels, Belgium Phone:+32-2-6412525; Fax:+32-2-6412489; Email: fheyligh@vnet3.vub.ac.be _______________________________________________________________________ From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!ucselx!network.ucsd.edu!usc!wupost!darwin.sura.net!haven.umd.edu!news.umbc.edu!gmuvax2!cboes From: cboes@gmuvax2.gmu.edu (Christopher Boes) Newsgroups: sci.bio,sci.environment,bionet.info-theory,bionet.journals.contents,bionet.population-bio Subject: Crown-of-Thorns Starfish Keywords: Preditors, coral reefs, life cycle Message-ID: <1992Mar30.212200.12589@gmuvax2.gmu.edu> Date: 30 Mar 92 21:22:00 GMT Followup-To: poster Organization: George Mason University, Fairfax Va. Lines: 11 Xref: bionet sci.bio:5180 sci.environment:16092 bionet.info-theory:393 bionet.journals.contents:503 bionet.population-bio:280 I am looking for recent information about the life cycles and preditors of the Crown-of-Thorns Starfish. Journal referances are prefered but all information is welcome. Thanks Chris Boes Enviornmental Biologist George Mason University cboes@gmuvax.gmu.edu cboes@gmuvax2.gmu.edu ************************************************************************* From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!bcm!cs.utexas.edu!qt.cs.utexas.edu!yale.edu!jvnc.net!moesun.edu.tw!twnmoe10!hsinchi From: HSINCHI@TWNMOE10.BITNET Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Need help of life table data analysis Message-ID: <92084.230742HSINCHI@TWNMOE10.BITNET> Date: 25 Mar 92 04:07:41 GMT Organization: Ministry of Education, Computer Center NETNEWS system V2.3 Lines: 4 If you are working on life table studies and need help for data analysis, you are welcome to contact me. I offer free data analysis using age-stage, two-sex life table theory. This method is especially adequate for population with stage differentiation (e.g. insects and mites). From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!CORNELLF.TC.CORNELL.EDU!IHMY From: IHMY@CORNELLF.TC.CORNELL.EDU (simon levin) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: job at Cornell University Message-ID: <9203201847.AA24421@genbank.bio.net> Date: 20 Mar 92 18:46:54 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 27 Position available: Visiting faculty, rank open Starting date: January 15, 1993, or earlier Location: Section of Ecology and Systematics Cornell University Ithaca, New York 14853 Description: This is a temporary position, to share in the teaching of an upper- division mathematical ecology course, in Spring 1993, and to interact and consult with students and faculty in ecology and evolutionary biology. Salary negotiable, but funds available are limited to equivalent of one semester at the level of Assistant or Associate Professor. Research areas may include any subjects in ecology and evolutionary biology, but substantial mathematical and computational skills essential, and strong links between theory and data. Contact N. Hairston, D. Winkler, or S. A. Levin, Section of Ecology and Systematics, Cornell Unversity, Ithaca, NY, 14853-2701, sending letter of interest, CV, and list of referees. Applications will be reviewed beginning April 15, 1992, and until position is filled. Cornell University is an equal opportunity/affirmative action employer. Women, minorities, and the handicapped are encouraged to apply. From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!news.cs.indiana.edu!spool.mu.edu!caen!kuhub.cc.ukans.edu!jimdb From: jimdb@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu Newsgroups: bionet.jobs,bionet.population-bio,bionet.agroforestry Subject: SURVEY ON BIOLOGY JOB ACQUISITION: PLEASE RESPOND!! Message-ID: <1992Mar10.215948.38455@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu> Date: 11 Mar 92 03:59:47 GMT Organization: University of Kansas Academic Computing Services Lines: 74 Xref: bionet bionet.jobs:804 bionet.population-bio:272 bionet.agroforestry:175 As part of a series of discussions in the Department of Entomology at the University of Kansas, we have come up with a questionnaire that addresses the relative merits of a variety of experiences in getting a faculty position at universities. We would like to compare the responses from those people who are on staff at larger universities where research may be more valued versus those who are on the faculty at smaller, teaching-oriented schools. If you would be interested in filling out brief (or longer, if you wish) responses to the following list of questions and then emailing your response to me, I will compile the replies and post them to this newsgroup. We are obviously primarily interested in information regarding positions in biology, but any scientific field would be great. Thanks for your help!! Name of institution at which you work: Approximate number of students in the institution: How would you classify your institution? (eg: research-based, teaching-oriented, etc...): Assign percentages which reflect the typical expected effort for faculty at your institution (totalling to 100%): ----% RESEARCH -----% TEACHING ------% ADMINISTRATIVE Please give each of the following items a rating as to its relative importance in acquiring a "typical" (whatever that may mean) faculty position in your institution -- 5 = extremely important, 1 = unimportant. We are interested in realistic answers, so please answer according to what is considered in practice, NOT what should be considered in theory. TEACHING HISTORY Teaching experience, length of time = Teaching experience, diversity of courses = Teaching record, quality = Teaching methods, type or philosophy of teaching = ACADEMIC HISTORY Undergraduate G.P.A. = Undergraduate alma mater (does the school matter?)= Graduate school G.P.A. = Graduate alma mater (does the school matter?) = Biology G.P.A. = RESEARCH HISTORY Number of publications = Quality of publications = Quality of journals in which you were published = Thesis/dissertation quality = Grants received, quantity = Grants received, sources = Diversity of research history, subjects = What are some of the qualities of applications which seem to rise to the top and in the process separate the applicant from the rest of the pack? (answer as much or as little as you would like) Any other comments or advice for prospective candidates? Thanks very much for your help in this survey, we greatly appreciate your time. Please respond to: JIMDB@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu (internet) JIMDB@ukanvax (bitnet)-- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Jim Danoff-Burg (Snow Museum, Univ. of Kansas, Lawrence, KS 66045) Bitnet: JIMDB@UKANVAX Internet:jimdb@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu "Myrmecophiles-R-Us" From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!RCL.WAU.NL!VLINDERS From: VLINDERS@RCL.WAU.NL (Greetings from Meindert de Jong) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: On Land Reclamation by a Perennial Salt Marsh Plant Message-ID: <9203031039.AA12970@genbank.bio.net> Date: 3 Mar 92 10:38:23 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 70 Dear Members of ECOSYS-L and POPBIO-L: Herewith an "Electronic Short Communication" about Land Recla- mation by a perennial salt marsh plant (Limonium vulgare). A long time ago, when I was a MSc-student, I made a field study of the population biology of Limonium vulgare. I investigated occurrence of seeds in the soil, germination, life tables, and rust epidemiology. Throughout the year the plants are oversilted. This causes bulbs on the growing stem. The age of the plant can be deter- mined by counting of the number of these bulbs. I measured also the length of these bulbs (Y), because this is a quantification of the silt deposition. It was measured of clones ('genets') on a little heightening of about 20 m2 area and 0.5 m height at the lower side of the marsh (with Salicor- nia spp. and Spartina spp.). I developed the following regres- sion model (p=.05): Y = 13X1 + 22X2 + 1.0X3 + 0.3X4 (Eqn. 1) where Y=length of the year bulbs, X1=plants in centre of heightening (y or n), X2=plants on boundary of heightening (y/n), X3=age of plants in centre (years), X4=age of plants on boundary. Obviously, a small heightening results in higher mud deposi- tion (also due to colonization of Spartina on the boundary) until a certain hight is reached, where mud deposition is correlated with age of Limonium (see Figure). In conclusion: An example is given on how a simple regression model can prove a simple theory. 5 m <---------> ^0.5 m ___________________|______ 0 year lumb v _______ c=centre _________/ c \b_______ 2 years b=boundary mud deposition v | :@::%: v ------ ____#:__/ \#_%%____ 6 years new mud deposition #%##:# v :::::: -------::::: _:#:____/ \___:@:#___ 12 years Figure: Genesis of a little island due to mud deposition. In- terpretation of lengths of year bumps of Limonium vulgare (Eqn. 1). [This E-paper was sent to ECOSYS-L@DEARN and to POP-BIO@IRLEARN] P.S. I posted this before but it went wrong for unknown reasons. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Sincerely Yours, dr Meindert D. de Jong e-mail: Vlinders@rcl.wau.NL phone: (+31) 8370 21937 photo: de Jong et al.'90. Risk Analysis for Biological Control. A Dutch case study ... Plant Disease 74: 189-194. e-available: de Jong et al.'91. Modelling the spore escape .... from a larch forest ... Neth.J.Pl.Path.97: 55-61. ---------------------------------------------------------------- From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!CALSHP.CALS.WISC.EDU!aesmith From: aesmith@CALSHP.CALS.WISC.EDU Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: (none) Message-ID: <9203141907.AA10494@calshp.cals.wisc.edu> Date: 14 Mar 92 19:07:14 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 1 subscribe population-biology Art Smith From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!rutgers!stanford.edu!ames!network.ucsd.edu!swrinde!mips!panasonic.com!chorus.mei!icspub!wakagw!wusun!toyo-w From: toyo-w@wusun.center.wakayama-u.ac.jp (Toyoaki Washida) Newsgroups: talk.environment,bionet.population-bio Subject: Re: ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS (Followup) Message-ID: <1058@wakagw.center.wakayama-u.ac.jp> Date: 13 Mar 92 02:22:41 GMT Sender: news@wakagw.center.wakayama-u.ac.jp Followup-To: poster Lines: 94 Xref: bionet talk.environment:5884 bionet.population-bio:274 Nntp-Posting-Host: wusun A few days ago, I posted a article with the same Subject. Then I recieved some e-mails. One of them made a request to explain my paper in terms of entropy. Definitely, it is a interesting subject to understand the relationship between the Maximum Respiration Principle and the Second Law of Thermodynamics. I am going to make some comments on it. First, some additional explanations may be needed on my Maximum Respiration Principle (MRP). MRP does not hold within each individual living things. Each living things, as Hannon(1973) states, may maximizes its stored energy. It means that in each living things the forces to minimize entropy generation are working. On the other hand, MRP works on the interrelations of living things, different populations, different species. MRP states that the quantified relation between living things in ecosystems, referred to as ecosystem configurations, is controled by forces to maximize waste heat generated by all of living things in the ecosystems. The succession of ecosystem finally reaches a climax where the configuration is established with a stable configuration. MRP show how the configuration is determined, and show reasons why the stable ecosystem consists of a wide variety of species, and show how important roles decomposer plays. Therefore, MRP means that ecosystems can not escape from the Law of Entropy. But it is not a negative phenomenon for ecosystems. The productivity of waste heat in ecosystems is equivalent to the efficiency of energy use. Thus, the ecosystem with the high productivity of waste heat has abilities to recover from disasters or disturvances and to conquer the ecosystem with the comparatively low productivity of waste heat. It means that MRP is reinforced by the law of natural selection and that the stability of the cofiguration which is determined by MRP has evolutionally meanings. **** Some of references ********************* Constanza,R. and Neill,C.,1984, Energy Intensities, Interdependence, and Value in Ecological Systems: A linear Programming Approach. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 106:41-57. --- Hannon,B.,1973, The Structure of Ecosystems. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 41:535-546. --- Hannon,B.,1976, Marginal Product Pricing in the Ecosystem. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 56:253-267. --- Hannon,B.,1979, Total Energy Costs in Ecosystems. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 80:271-293. ********************************************* I have already written the paper. But since it now aims at distributing among Japanese, it is written in Japanese. I will rewite it in English. Then I will send it to someone who would like to read it. I fixed up English of the summary of my paper which was posted last time. Although it may be unnecessary, I copy it below again. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Title: Ecosystem Configurations and the Maximum Respiration Principle One of the serious reasons why our society is losing its sustainability is in the inconsistency between the way mankind tries to organize components of the biosphere and the way the internal forces of ecosystems organize them. Therefore, it is an urgent issue to understand how ecosystems reach their stable configurations of biological components and what their internal forces are. B.Hannon, in 1976, posed 'The Energy Storage Maximizing Hypothesis' (ESMH) as forces functioning in the macro ecosystems. ESMH, however, contradicts the facts that the ratio of production/respiration in each ecosystem approaches 1 as succession occurs and that decomposers, whose activities aim at the minimization of the energy storage, play important roles in ecosystems. These facts mean, conversely, that macro ecosystems tend to maximize the utilization of total inflow of energy or to maximize the level of the total respiration. This is referred to as 'The Maximum Respiration Principle' (MRP). MRT means that ecosystems tend to attain the maximum efficiency of energy utilization and to avoid the production of waste materials including usable energy. As for theoretical studies of how MRT works, we use the von Neumann type of network model, which is the most flexible of the linear input-output models. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!news.cs.indiana.edu!sdd.hp.com!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!ames!sun-barr!ccut!wnoc-tyo-news!sh.wide!astemgw!icspub!wakagw!wusun!toyo-w From: toyo-w@wusun.center.wakayama-u.ac.jp (Toyoaki Washida) Newsgroups: talk.environment,bionet.population-bio Subject: Ecological Economics (In English) Message-ID: <1053@wakagw.center.wakayama-u.ac.jp> Date: 11 Mar 92 02:18:24 GMT Sender: news@wakagw.center.wakayama-u.ac.jp Followup-To: talk.environment Lines: 52 Xref: bionet talk.environment:5873 bionet.population-bio:273 Nntp-Posting-Host: wusun Hello! Is anyone who will attend the second meeting of the International Society for Ecological Economics, Stockholm, Sweden, Aug. 3-6, 1992 ? I will have a presentation in that conferrence. The title of the paper is " Ecosystem Configurations and the Maximum Respiration Principle". The summary of it is listed in the latter part of this article. I'd like to communicate to someone who will attend the meeting or who is interested in that kind of subjects. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Title: Ecosystem Configurations and the Maximum Respiration Principle One of the serious reason why our society is losing the sustainability is in the inconsistency between the way mankind tries to organize components of biosphere and the way the internal forces of ecosystems organizes them. Therefore, it is an urgent issue to understand how ecosystems reach the stable configurations of biological components and what are their internal forces. B.Hannon, in 1976, posed 'The Energy Storage Maximizing Hypothesis' (ESMH) as forces functioning in the macro ecosystems. ESMH, however, contradicts the facts that the ratio production/respiration in each ecosystem approaches to 1 as succession occurs and that decomposers, which activities aim at the minimization of the energy storage, play important roles in ecosystems. These facts mean, conversely, that macro ecosystems tend to maximize the utilization of total inflow of energy or to maximize the level of the total respiration. This is refered to as 'The Maximum Respiration Principle' (MRP). MRT means that ecosystems intends to attain the maximum efficiency of energy utilization and to avoid the production of waste materials including usable energy. As the theoretical studies of how MRT works, we use the von Neumann type of network model, which is the most flexible model in linear input-output models. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Toyoaki Washida Wakayama University Faculty of Economics 930 Sakaedani Wakayama, 640 Japan (Tel. 0734-54-0361,ext.3220) (Fax. 0734-54-0390) (E-maile: toyo-w@wusun.center.wakayama-u.ac.jp) From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!AHI.PBRC.HAWAII.EDU!sasha From: sasha@AHI.PBRC.HAWAII.EDU (Alexander Zhuikov) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: ECOLOGICAL ASPECTS OF FISH LEARNING Message-ID: <9202260551.AA20316@ahi.pbrc.Hawaii.Edu> Date: 26 Feb 92 05:51:30 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 360 The experiments carried out are only a first try to understand the role of learning ability and intelligence in native life of fishes, and I'll be very glad for any remarks, criticisms and advises about the used methods and the chose directions of investigations. I also shall be very happy to carry out collaborative works in this field with interested colleagues. I welcome any professional contacts in this field. For discussion you can use this news-group, for professional contacts, please, send me E-mail: sasha@ahi.pbrc.hawaii.edu ECOLOGICAL ASPECTS OF FISH LEARNING Alexander Y. ZHUIKOV 1.INTRODUCTION 2. LEARNING PROCESSES AND INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES 3. BEHAVIOUR IN A GROUP 4. INSPECTION ACTIVITY 5.BEHAVIOUR IN ZONE OF FISHING GEAR 5.1 PASSIVE FISHING GEAR 5.2 TRAWL 6. CONTROL OF FISH BEHAVIOUR 6.1 ARTIFICIAL REEFS 6.2 RANCHING 1.INTRODUCTION These investigations I have carried out in systems of Ministry of Fishery and Academy of Sciences of the USSR since the beginning of eighties (80). From ecological position we use the term "learning ability" as ability of animal to analyze biologically significant components of environment and to adopt their behavior to those changes. But from my point of view the role of learning abilities in animal ecology is wider than simple adaptation of behaviour to comparatively regular working stimuli. We consider that different speed of learning, which is determined in experiments, reflects differences in functioning of Central nervous system of different individuals (in other words, different level of intelligence). This differences, probably, may show not only in a learning speed (for example, defence habits), but also in a wide row of other forms of behavior, connected with analysis of environmental information. Examples of those forms of behavior are inspection of new territory, new things and animals in living place, adaptation to new kinds of food. Investigation of these aspects of behavior was developed on representatives of class of Fishes, because this class has a wide spectrum of ecological diversity, that allowed us to curry out wide comparative investigations with relatively small modifications of experimental methods. The aim of the work was to understand the role of learning ability as ecological phenomenon in natural life of fish. Several experiments have been carried out for obtaining the complete picture, necessary for general conclusions. 2. LEARNING PROCESSES AND INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES When we began in 1978 our work with Atlantic salmon it was found that hatchery fishes were significantly worse then wild ones by many physiological parameters. The result of it was poor survival of released hatchery fishes in natural conditions. In order to determine the role of learning processes in adaptation of released fishes to natural environment, comparative investigation of learning abilities of wild and hatchery young Atlantic salmon have been carried out. It was proposed before the beginning of the investigation that learning process of Atlantic salmons would be reflected by typical learning curve, and different animals would be differ in speed of habit development. But really we obtained more sophisticated picture. It was not possible to describe learning of different animals by one type of learning process. There were three groups of tested animals, which differed in dynamic of process. Individuals showed one of 3 patterns of learning (named "Types") in all tested species: 1) (-)- Poor learning individuals. This fishes unlearned or inhibited the formed unstable conditioned activity; In this case I am speaking about concrete developed habit of active avoidance reaction. Escape reaction and classical Pavlovian conditioning may be developed. 2) (0)- normally learning - those consolidated the habit after a period of unstable conditioned activity; and : 3) (+)- fast learning - individuals formed habit very rapidly with sudden transition from no response to a stable habit. Some fast learning fishes formed the habit after several combinations of a conditioned and unconditioned stimuli. Experience of work with Atlantic salmon have shown that animals of those third groups are easy recognizable by learning curves and correlation of groups in one extract may be reliable quantitative index for ecological comparision of different groups of animals. In other words, this index is an integrative characteristic, which describes learning ability of tested extract as a whole. As recent investigations with other fish species have shown, phenomenon of fast learning is met in most of species. It is very probable that absence fast learning individuals in some tested species is conditioned by the size of tested extract. Comparison of different groups of Atlantic salmon showed that learning abilities increased with the age. Using enrichment of environment of hatchery young fishes, learning abilities was sharply increased within several months before releasing into natural environment. Comparing hatchery young fishes released into a river with wild fishes from the same river it was found that among wild fishes there were much less poor learning individuals and more fast learning ones. Taking into consideration that compared wild and hatchery fishes had practically equal genofond (genepool), as spawn for hatchery is taken from wild animals, the proposal was made that these learning differences caused by collaborative influence of two groups of factors: rate of environmental enrichment and direct selection poor learners by predator. In order to test the second proposal the next steps were undertaken. 1.The comparison of learning characteristics of a group of hatchery fishes, released into a river, and learning characteristics of a group of fishes, migrated to river's outlet during several hours after release was conducted. It was found that preferably well learned individuals reached the outlet. Hunting of predators, fishes and birds, was possible during this migration. This hunting, probably, was the cause of loosing of poor learning fishes. 2. As a next step experimental testing of predatorous mortality of well and poor learning fishes was carried out. a) In the first experiment influence of model of predator to well and poor learned fishes was tested. Predator's hunting was imitated with using the model of predator, in which special harpoon device was placed. Harpoon was shot at length about several centimeters through the front end of the model at the moment of touching the prey. The experiment have shown, that probability of lack jump of predator in a group of well learning salmons quickly decreased, and in a poor learning one this process developed more slowly. Thus, well learning fishes have higher probability of survival in this case. b) In the second experiment imitation of release of hatchery young fishes into a reservoir with predators was carried out. Males of guppy (Poecilia reticulata) were used as a model of released hatchery fishes (in other worlds, individuals without developed defensive reactions to predator), and 200-liter aquarium with gravel, plants and 5 individuals of South-american characinid predatorous fish Ctenolucius hujeta was used as a reservoir with predators. As a result the experiment showed that, fishes with low learning abilities preferably died after release into reservoir with predators, and well learned individuals survive. 3. BEHAVIOUR IN A GROUP After finishing investigations of Atlantic salmon learning abilities, in which influence of learning ability to those significant ecological factor, as survival in natural environment was shown, a set of investigations was organized to clear up other probable connections between learning ability and ecological aspects of behavior. One of those problems was investigation of behaviour in a group of fishes with different learning abilities. For the first experiment in this direction Black sea swallow fishes Chromis chromis (Pomacentridae) were used. A group of fishes, preliminary individually tested to a learning abilities in shuttlebox and individually tagged, was kept in big aquarium (it was about 1.5 cubic meters). Budget of behavioral activity for each individual was registered, which included seven (7) activity forms: slow swimming, rest, fast swimming, feeding, display behaviour, aggressive interactions with the observed fish attacking other fishes (positive aggression), and aggressive interactions with other individuals attacking the observed fish (negative aggression). Hierarchical status of an individual in a group was estimated by correlation between indexes of positive and negative aggression. The absence of direct dependence between hierarchical status versus learning ability was found, because this status was determined by weight - lenght characteristics of an individual. Estimating as a whole distribution of individuals by indexes of positive and negative aggression it is possible to expect, that the share of positive aggression gradually decreased and the share of negative one increased in budget of activity with decreasing of hierarchical rank. But actually observed distribution was evidently nonlinear. With decreasing of social rank (decreasing the part of positive aggression) in comparatively high-rank individuals the share of negative aggression practically does not decrease. It is probably connected with active avoidance of those individuals of attacks of more hide-rank individuals. Sharp increasing of the share of negative aggression was met only in budgets of low-rank part of group. Since because of differences of body weight potential possibilities of small fishes for taking a high-rank place was not realized, special investigation of hierarchical structure of groups of guppy males, compound with comparatively equal fishes was carried out. Each group included three individuals (with poor, normal and fast learning abilities). The experiment showed, that poor learned individuals occupied a lower rank of hierarchy in a group , and fast learned ones - a higher rank as a rule. 4. INSPECTION ACTIVITY One of a main behavioral forms, which lets animal to adopt at changing environmental conditions, is inspection reactions. In order to investigate differences in inspection behaviour of individuals with different learning ability testing of their behaviour in next situations was carried out: 1) inspection of open space - "open field" test; 2) inspection of fish of unknown species with equal size; 3) inspection of bigger fish of unknown species. A fish of a bigger size was used as a potentially dangerous unknown object, and a fish of equal size - as potentially neutral one. By now From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!rutgers!stanford.edu!ames!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!usc!wupost!csus.edu!ucdavis!amhastings@ucdavis.edu From: amhastings@ucdavis.edu (Alan Hastings) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: Re: Question about bifurcation Message-ID: <11275@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu> Date: 24 Feb 92 19:11:57 GMT References: <1992Feb22.101911.7722@dartvax.dartmouth.edu> Sender: usenet@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu Organization: ucdavis Lines: 33 In article <1992Feb22.101911.7722@dartvax.dartmouth.edu>, Graham.T.Herrick@dartmouth.edu (Graham T. Herrick) writes: > > I'm studying a system of two integro-differential equations > (exponential time lag kernels) which model ecosystem nutrient recycling > for an analysis course i'm taking here (focusing mostly on > applications). > The system undergoes a Hopf bifurcation at a particular critical value > of a parameter. > I want to add diffusion terms to the equations. (For starters I'm > assuming that the population and resource undergo linear diffusion). > Does anyone know: > 1. whether adding diffusion (with possibly non-scalar diffusion > matrix) will change the critical parameter value at which bifurcation > occurs. material omitted > Graham (gth@mac.dartmouth.edu) > > This is a complex problem which is currently under investigation by many workers. For starters, though, a good reference is "Mathemtical Aspects of Reacting and Diffusing Systems", by Paul Fife (even though it is not current). Another good reference, more current, and more of a textbook, is "Mathematical Biology" by James Murray. Look up the sections on the Fisher equation, where the way to get travelling waves from reaction diffusion equations is described. Also, see the sections on pattern formation, and take a look at the sections on the rabies epidemic. Good luck! Alan Hastings (amhastings@ucdavis.edu) From owner-population-bio@net.bio.net Sun Sep 27 23:00:00 1992 Path: bionet!AHI.PBRC.HAWAII.EDU!sasha From: sasha@AHI.PBRC.HAWAII.EDU (Alexander Zhuikov) Newsgroups: bionet.population-bio Subject: ECOLOGICAL ASPECTS OF FISH LEARNING Message-ID: <9202240657.AA12788@ahi.pbrc.Hawaii.Edu> Date: 24 Feb 92 06:57:21 GMT Sender: daemon@genbank.bio.net Distribution: bionet Lines: 360 The experiments carr