> The course I'm in doesn't get very mathematical.

Thank God for small mercies Though of course some people are good at that stuff...

> On the molecular level, natural selection (the positive selection for certain phenotypes, or traits) isn't that important... Evolution may work only through the elimination of deleterious mutations...

Interesting... I remember learning a little about evolution by natural selection when I did General and Experimental Psychology. The lecturer kept emphasising that it was better to think of natural selection as 'elimination of the unsuccessful' rather than as 'survival of the fittest'. He said the genes that were largely responsible for his nose (which wasn't the prettiest and ran in his family) hadn't been selected for because his nose was so very great; it is just that it wasn't hideous enough to have been selected against. So... We are all successful because we are all here

But then other things... Certain traits (like having a long neck if you are a giraffe and food is scarce so you have to reach for it)... Certain traits can confer an advantage on the organism so it is more likely to survive longer and produce more offspring (with similar genes / phenotype). But... That is the organism level and that doesn't happen so much on the molecular level they reckon? Interesting...

Uh. Do you know if they reckon the same goes for the cellular level?

> I'm always amazed at the wide variety of knowledge you possess.

Most of what I learn is abstract enough so as to apply to... Most things. And I guess we are expected to read widely as well... I like learning about different things. But it can be hard to find something at a suitable level (first year texts can be great but sometimes my interest isn't sustained enough for me to really grasp the concepts as I go along). I got a physics text too. Because I've heard that physics is math really and I wanted to understand how it was math. I see that now. Just took me 10 minutes. And yup, I see that physics is math. And thats all I needed / wanted to know about that lol.

> Thanks for reminding me why I like science. :-)

:-)

Welcome