Chapter category: Viruses

Introduction

This chapter appears in the following book:

Quasispecies and RNA Virus Evolution: Principles and Consequences

Edited by: Esteban Domingo
ISBN: 1-58706-077-9
» Get more information about this book at landesbioscience.com «

Chapter authors:
Esteban Domingo, Christof K. Biebricher, Manfred Eigen and John J. Holland.

It has always been the main aim of human intelligence to attempt to understand the bewildering diversity of the environment by recognising patterns and regularities of events. It is thus no accident that one of the first objects of scientific observation was the starred night sky: it displays to the eye a fantastic pattern of light points of different luminosity and color. A persevering observer can note that despite its apparent randomness, the pattern of light points does not change from observation to observation: the relative orientation of the different points apparently remains the same. An immediate sense of the pattern is not recognizable, and the earliest astronomers tried to bring some order into the pattern by constructing constellations modelled after simple objects.

Despite the apparent invariance of the geometrical orientation of the stars, there is a highly regular periodic change recognizable: exact observations revealed that the pattern rotates during the night and that the observed pattern is exactly reproduced after a period of one year, suggesting the division of the whole cycle into 360 degrees. Even for the planets that do not follow the simple mechanical rules that apply to distant "fixed" stars, a suitable model that was in full agreement with the observations was presented by Ptolemaeus. However, later measurements with higher accuracy revealed phenomena that could not be reconciled with the model of Ptolemaeus. The scientific concepts of astronomy had to be revolutionized several times, and the change of paradigm did not occur without controversy and serious disputes. Today we know that the apparent invariance of the pattern is fortuitous: there is neither direct interaction between the stars of a constellation nor are the patterns invariant: because of the enormous distance to the stars the change in the pattern is so slow that it escapes observation unless it can be demonstrated by measurements of very high precision. The static picture of astronomy was slowly tranformed into a dynamic concept where stars and even galaxies are formed and die, culminating in the startling realization that even the universe had an origin and may one day have an end. In a similar manner, modern plane tectonics has transformed our view of the crust of our own planet, earth, from a rather static structure to a rather dynamic, everchanging environment.

The notion of an everchanging nature has influenced human thinking as reflected in philosophy and science in practically every discipline. In biology, the concept of the origin of the species by evolution, first formulated by Charles Darwin, was so appealing and successful in interpreting biological phenomena that many years later Dobzhansky made his famous statement "Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution" (Dobzhansky, 1973). We live in a continuously evolving, complex and to a large extent unpredictable universe. Our constantlyevolving environment necessarily demands that life forms must also evolve (or perish).

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Additional chapters from this book:

Quantitative Molecular Evolution