As a person who studies evolution, I think the most common misconception about evolution among those who accept it is that selection hones traits such that organisms tightly fit specific niches. Contemporary evolutionary biology, however, gives a lot of emphasis to random or stochastic processes that Darwin didn’t. Given the power of these forces, evolution does not necessarily maximize the fitness of organisms.

The simple inequality above neatly conveys the role that one of these random processes, genetic drift, plays in evolution. The variable s can be thought of as the “selection coefficient” or the relative fitness of a phenotype where s=0 would represent neutrality with respect to selection and s=1 would represent complete lethality. The variable N_e which is known as the “effective population size” can be thought of as the number of breeding individuals in a population. When the above inequality is fulfilled, the power of genetic drift overwhelms that of natural selection. The idea is that, in small populations, the random sampling of genes can render selection weak.

I think that if a person advocates for evolution (scientist or not), they should be aware of the idea that natural selection is not the sole mechanism of evolution and that random processes have an important role in evolution.

(Source: mxduki)

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7. callyoumaybe said: Fuck you for reminding me of this equation and of biology. Give me back chemistry.
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