(June 16, 2014 at 8:10 pm)rasetsu Wrote:(June 16, 2014 at 7:43 pm)BrianSoddingBoru4 Wrote: One of our cats has six toes instead of the normal five on each front foot. Since a six-toed cat contains more information than a five-toed cat, clearly, some mutations do indeed increase information.
That's not necessarily true. The number of digits appears to be a function of when and where certain chemical triggers are turned on and off; individual digits themselves aren't necessarily hard-coded into the DNA.
This is an excellent point. It is also why I keep puhing Neil Shubin's Your Inner Fish. Early on in the book he does a great job of explaining how regulatory elements control expression. It's how fins became legs, feet, arms and hands, and how bat wings evolved.
Save a life. Adopt a greyhound.
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