When a Loss Becomes a Gain
Purveyors of goo-to-graffiti-artist evolution tend to deal from the bottom of the deck when it comes to definitions. You'll hear about beneficial mutations, but what does beneficial really mean? If I spray paint something on a wall, the paint may protect the covered areas from rain, which is beneficial. But the chemicals may cause the affected bricks to deteriorate, obviously not a benefit. Nor is it a benefit to me when Marshall Long takes me to jail. Before people get irritated because I'm using an analogy about non-living things, just study on it for a spell; I'm talking about word usage and perspective. When some living things have mutations, some are neutral but the overwhelming majority are bad. Calling them "good" mutations is subjective. A critter can have a mutation that looks good in a lab setting, but will kill it off in the wild. Likewise, some changes can be good in one instance, but extremely bad elsewhere. (They've tried to make somet