Thanks for doing these posts, David. It makes a nice supplement to my reading of GTNS.

Strikes me as odd that Fisher bothered to criticize Wright's assumption of panmixia -- that objection would seem to cut pretty deeply through much of population genetics, insofar as the results derived therefrom depend on that assumption.

If you've read Gavrilets' book, any chance you might do a post or two on that sometime?

Not on Gavrilets as such, but I am working on another post on 'peaks' in the adaptive landscape.

If Fisher never brought forth an extended formal critique of Wright's veiws it ought to be assumed he didn't think he would have the the best of it.

I want to know how Wright's theories are represented today and how they stand up to cutting edge criticism from an avowed opponent.

If I get the gist, and the interpretation of Fisher is correct, he thought that the partial isolation of infra-species geographical variation does not do much for the evolutionary processs. What would be the implications of this veiw for Homo sapiens? More to the point, does what we know about our evolution support the implications of this?

"If Fisher never brought forth an extended formal critique of Wright's views it ought to be assumed he didn't think he would have the best of it"

You are perhaps forgetting that Wright's own statements of both the adaptive landscape concept and the shifting balance theory are fragmentary and sometimes confused, as I think my own notes (and Provine's biography) have illustrated. I don't see why Fisher should be expected to give an 'extended formal critique' of a theory that was itself not very formal. Wright did not publish any very 'extended' treatment (i.e. more than a few paragraphs at a time) until after Fisher was dead.

Some of your other points will be covered in my final (planned) post on Wright's shifting balance theory. Menawhile, try this

http://www.gnxp.com/MT2/archives...ves/ 000629.html

If Fisher never brought forth an extended formal critique of Wright's veiws it ought to be assumed he didn't think he would have the the best of it.

this is a really tenuous assumption to make. scientists are not engaging in formal debate where they try to "flow" over their opponent's talking points. whether right or wrong it seems from the biographical info i've seen fisher just thought he was smarter and more mathematically fluent than wright and felt inclined to dismiss and ignore beyond a certain point. he thought the adaptive landscape was a joke because he believed he was a much better geometrical thinker than wright in any case.

see r. a. fisher: life of a scientist

The mathematical blah blah blah aside, "wing colour in an isolated colony of the moth Panaxania dominula" is what Fisher staked his generalisations on.

"Evolutionist and Missionary" The Reverend John Gilick would be a joke to him as well I suppose, but the "extraordinary profusion of species and 'varieties' of land snails belonging to the pulomate family Achatinellidae in Oahu" seem more impressive to me than Fisher's single gene study.

Apllied to human beings, thoroughgoing Fisherism leads to the transparent nonsense of John Tooby with his "adaptationalist principles".

Gulick, not Gilick, Panaxia not Panaxania, and pulmonate, not pulomate (just in case anyone wants to Google on these terms).

Both Wright and Fisher encouraged a lot of empirical research, especially by Dobzhansky (for Wright) and Ford, Cain, and Sheppard (for Fisher). The general result of this research (including Dobzhansky's) was to strengthen the evidence for selection, rather than drift, in explaining geographical variation.

I don't know if there has been any comparable research on Gulick's snails, many of which are now extinct.

"Gulick's snails, many of which are now extinct"

Yes and we know why, because of the one that is left; the Uber-snail which colonised their range to acheive TOTAL DOMINATION! An attempt at humour, though awareness of certain such implications may motivate some who are no freinds of drift in my opinion.

Thanks for the corrections.
As I understand it there has long "been rather general agreement that non-adaptive evolution, without any infuence from selection has played only a minor role in evolution" so no suggestion to the contrary from this quarter. Are Fisher's veiws really any different to "those who would deny that (drift)...has played any part at all"?

Lake Victoria ciclids evolved by eyesight. Different levels of the lake favour different coloured fish Forthcoming in Nature, What do you make of that David B?

Huh? What is your point?

I haven't seen the full article (now in the current issue of Nature), but here is the abstract:

" Speciation in colour: a textbook example of evolution in action The cichlid fish of African lakes are textbook examples of rapid speciation but the mechanisms involved remain elusive. Observations of the cichlids in Lake Victoria now demonstrate the ecological and molecular basis of divergent evolution of the visual system (seen as divergence of vision genes, male coloration and female preferences) leading to speciation by sensory drive through interacting natural and sexual selection. The sensory drive hypothesis predicts that divergent adaptation in sensory and signalling systems to different environments can cause premating isolation between populations. As well as providing clear evidence that speciation can occur through sensory drive without geographical isolation, this work provides a mechanistic explanation for the collapse of cichlid fish species diversity during the anthropogenic eutrophication of Lake Victoria. On the cover, the colourful cichlids Pundamilia nyererei and Pundamilia pundamilia, as well as a wild intermediate (top) with the light spectra from different water depths in the background. [Article p. 620; News & Views p. 601; www.nature.com/podcast]"

Sorry about my tone and use of your name.
I wondered if there was any connection with the Gulick effect. The Swiss (I think) biologist was talking about it on BBC radio. He said pollution would make most of these species unable to survive, an orange one is the exception. Sewall Wrights theories, punctuated eqilibrium, ect.?
As you may have noticed I do not possess enough knowledge or understanding to make points about this subject.