The Evolutionary Trajectories of Organisms are Not Stochastic
Les trajectoires évolutives des organismes ne sont pas stochastiques
Résumé
The theme of stochasticity in biological evolution is powered by metaphors or representations familiar to Western scientific cultures. The most common is undoubtedly the random nature of genetic mutations. The neutral theory of evolution has provided a statistical framework for inferring whether genetic changes do in fact drift within populations as a consequence of mutation events. All phylogenetic studies show the occurrence of many convergence events: different organisms in similar environments have evolved into similar phenotypes. Parallelism would therefore constitute an undeniable argument for the repeatability of evolution, even greater than convergence. The evolutionary trajectories of organisms are also strongly constrained by the environment including geography, climate and other interacting organisms. Life evolution is therefore far from being completely random; on the contrary, it is limited, constrained and influenced by many factors, which make it partly repetitive but also very innovative.
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