The Internal Brand of the Scarlet W

The Internal Brand of the Scarlet W by Stephen Jay Gould was first published as an essay in Natural History. It's reprinted in the anthology, The Lying Stones of the Marrakech. You can find it online here.

This is one of my all-time favorite Gould essays. The theme is genetic determinism and evolutionary psychology. The hook is a discussion of Charles Davenport's claim that some people have a wanderlust gene (W) that makes them undesirable as immigrants to the United States.

Of course, no one would now defend Davenport's extreme view of single genes determining nearly every complex human behavior. Most colleagues eventually rejected Davenport's theory; he lived into the 1940s, long past the early flush of Mendelian enthusiasm and well into the modern era of understanding that complex traits usually record the operation of many genes, each with a small and cumulative effect (not to mention a strong, and often predominant, influence from nongenetic environmental contexts of growth and expression). A single gene for anger, conviviality, contemplation, or wanderlust now seems as absurd as a claim that one assassin's bullet, and nothing else, caused World War I, or that Darwin discovered evolution all by himself, and we would still be creationists if he had never been born.

Nonetheless, in our modern age of renewed propensity for genetic explanations (a valid and genuine enthusiasm when properly pursued), Davenport's general style of error resurfaces on an almost daily basis, albeit in much more subtle form, but with all the vigor of his putative old gene - yes, he did propose one - for stubbornly persistent behavior.

We are not questioning whether genes influence behavior; of course they do. We are not arguing that genetic explanations should be resisted because they have negative political, social, or ethical connotations - a charge that must be rejected for two primary reasons. First, nature's facts stand neutral before our ethical usages. We have, to be sure, often made dubious, even tragic, decisions based on false genetic claims. But, in other contexts, valid arguments about the innate and hereditary basis of human attributes can be profoundly liberating.

Consider only the burden lifted from loving parents who raise beautiful and promising children for twenty years and then "lose" them to the growing ravages of schizophrenia - almost surely a genetically based disease of the mind, just as many congenital diseases of bodily organs also appear in the third decade of life, or even later. Generations of psychologists had subtly blamed parents for unintentionally inducing such a condition, then viewed as entirely environmental in origin. What could be more cruel than a false weight of blame added to such an ultimate tragedy? Second, we will never get very far, either in our moral deliberations or our scientific inquiries, if we disregard genuine facts because we dislike their implications. In the most obvious case, I cannot think of a more unpleasant fact than the inevitable physical death of each human body, but a society built on the premise that King Prospero will reign in his personal flesh forever will not flourish for long.

Take this lesson to heart. You should never oppose a valid evolutionary argument just because you don't like the ethical implications.

On the other hand, you should rigorously oppose silly evolutionary arguments no matter what the ethical implications.

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Boobies and Evolutionary Psychologists

 

Robert Kurzban is a researcher at the University of Pennsylvania. He writes for a blog called Evolutionary Psychology. It is associated with an "open-access peer-reviewed journal" of the same name. Kurzban's article is about me: Boobies, Blue-footed And Otherwise.

As you might imagine, Robert Kurzban is heavily into evolutionary psychology. Here's what he says on his website.

Research, Philosophy, and Motto. Evolution gave rise to mechanisms designed to solve the bewildering array of problems that humans faced, from problems of survival to navigating the intricate strategic dynamics of the social world. Was there an adaptive problem faced by our ancestors for a substantial period of human history? If so, then, yeah, there's an adaptation for that.

Research in the lab is currently being conducted on morality, cooperation, friendship, mate choice, supernatural beliefs, modularity, self-control, and other topics.

Robert Kurzban was upset by my critique of science journalism and evolutionary psychology [Evolutionary Psychology Crap in New Scientist]. You might recall that my criticism is based on many common features of evolutionary psychology but the most important are the unwarranted assumptions that: (1) a particular specific behavior has a strong genetic component. (2) that the behavior is adaptive, and (3) that we know how our ancestors behaved.

The particular example I discussed is domestic violence and whether there has been selection in the past for alleles promoting violent behavior of men toward their wives. I discussed this in terms of the possible genetics of violence-toward-women in order to make the point that even if there was such an allele, it's adaptive value is highly questionable.

Robert Kurzban got a real bee in his bonnet over this comparison. He claims that the violence-toward-women that was adaptive was restricted to special circumstances. According to him, it's not just general violence toward women that was being selected it was violence only under special circumstances. In other words, the specific allele that Kurzban is proposing is one that cause males to only attack their mates some of the time—like when they suspect infidelity. That's correct, that's what the paper discusses even though the distinction isn't clear in the article in New Scientist.

Like it makes a difference. All that Kurzban is doing is making the genetics and the evolution more difficult by restricting the behavior to special circumstances. What he is saying is that there is an allele (or a combination of alleles) that makes men respect women most of the time but, under special circumstances, they attack their mates violently. Since these special circumstances are, presumably, rare, it becomes even more difficult to imagine what kinds of genes/alleles might be involved and how such alleles could become fixed in the population. (Especially if most males never encountered those special circumstances.)¹

This is supposed to make evolutionary psychology much more acceptable?

Here's what Kurzban says,

Now suppose our hypothetical author said that because this trait, predicted to occur only in certain circumstances was not, in fact, seen all the time, then,well, there is something “seriously wrong” with the field from which the paper is drawn.

Let me try and be clear about what I said using Kurzban's terminology. What he is saying is that violent behavior toward women under certain circumstances was adaptive in our ancient ancestors. Therefore the alleles (or combination of alleles) for this behavior became fixed in the population. Therefore all modern men have this genetic tendency to act violently toward women under particular circumstances.

Most modern men do not act violently toward women under those particular circumstances even though they presumably carry the adaptive allele (or combination of alleles). It's reasonable to ask how such a behavior could be possibly adaptive enough to have been fixed in the population. It hard enough to believe this just-so story but it becomes even harder if the penetrance of the genotype is low.

Robert Kurzban seems to think that my simplified version was a serious mistake that calls into question the critique of evolutionary psychology. I think that his scenario does not rescue the field—in fact it makes it look even more ridiculous.

Kurzan also tries another defense of evolutionary psychology.

Now, finally, because the topic at hand is something with moral overtones, let’s say the author punctuated the critique with a pious remark about how siblicide is bad, bad, bad, and that the boobies who engage in it are “assholes,” and added that, hey, we can all overcome our bad, bad traits.

What kind of person would thoroughly botch an argument about a paper, condemn an entire discipline on the basis of the incorrect analysis, and then brandish their moralistic piety by condemning the behavior in question? I don’t know…some kind of Moran?

I know damn well that there's a difference between genetics/evolution and ethical behavior and anyone who reads my blog knows this. We've discussed the naturalistic fallacy and the is-ought problem many times on this blog and I've said repeatedly that I'm a big fan of Gould's position on those issues. [See The Internal Brand of the Scarlet W.]

What pisses me off is the way evolutionary psychologists turn those arguments upside down. They postulate—often without any scientific evidence—that bad behavior has a strong genetic component and that such behavior was beneficial in our ancestors. According to them, we are stuck with these alleles today even though we don't like the consequences. We all understand that possibility.

Just because it's a possibility doesn't mean it's correct. According to many evolutionary psychologists, anyone who criticizes the science must be doing so because they don't like the behavior and not because the science is bad.

It's a convenient way to avoid dealing with the real problems in evolutionary psychology.

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1. Wouldn't it be nice if evolutionary psychologists could actually do some research to establish the existence of these amazing alleles and show where they map in the human genome? Heck, I'd settle for just a decent speculation on what kinds of alleles could possibly be involved.

Take this particular case as an example. There must have been a combination of alleles in our ancestors that caused men to be nice to their wives all the time. Then, 50,000 years ago, a mutation (or several mutations) arose that caused men to start beating their wives under special circumstances but to be nice to them most of the time. We have 20,000 genes. Which ones control that kind of behavior?

And if all those subtle behaviors were so strongly adaptive then how come evolution didn't fix some more serious problems like impacted wisdom teeth, hernias, susceptibility to breast cancer, and stupidity?

Steve Watson on the Sandwalk

 

Larry Moran
PZ Myers
John Wilkins
Ryan Gregory
The God Delusion
Cody
John Hawks
Michael Barton
Seanna Watson

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Seanna Watson on the Sandwalk

 

Larry Moran
PZ Myers
John Wilkins
Ryan Gregory
The God Delusion
Cody
John Hawks
Michael Barton

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Evolutionary Psychology Crap in New Scientist

 

Here are the opening paragraphs of an article published in the most recent issue of New Scientist [Domestic violence gets evolutionary explanation].

What can evolution tell us about domestic violence? Two researchers in the US suggest such violence has ancient origins and that establishing evolution's role could help to better identify those at risk. Others argue that the research makes simplistic assumptions, and warn that some people will interpret the research as an excuse for violence.

Each year more than 500,000 women in the US alone report to the police violent attacks by current or former male partners. There is a reason why domestic violence is so widespread, says David Buss, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Texas in Austin: it carries a selective advantage, tied with reproductive success. In other words, men who are violent are trying to make sure that their partner has his child and not another man's.

Let's think about this for a minute.

In order for violence against women to have a selective advantage there has to be an important genetic component. Let's imagine a time back in hunter-gather days when there were two groups of men who differed in their violence-against-women alleles. One group was kind and considerate toward their female companions. They treated them with respect. The other group treated women as property and often beat them in order to prevent imagined infidelity. Somehow the violent group managed to mate more frequently and/or have more children than the kind group so the allele for kindness and respect was eliminated from the population.

Lots of things had to happen in order for this scenario to play out as the evolutionary psychologists imagine. For example, women had to prefer to have children with men who would beat them. (Or maybe they were forced to mate with the violent men.). Furthermore, there had to be no consequences for the men who beat their mates. The other members of the group had to tolerate that behavior even if they found it repulsive.

If the scenario is correct then most men—including you and I—have to carry the violence-against-women allele since it was selected in the past. This seems very strange since most men don't beat their wives.¹ I guess we have learned to suppress the genetic urge. But why would we do that if it's a selective advantage to engage in domestic violence?

There's something seriously wrong with evolutionary psychology. And there's something seriously wrong with respectable science magazines who promote this crap.

There's also something seriously wrong with men who engage in domestic violence. They are assholes who deserve very little sympathy from the rest of society. I suspect they got no sympathy in ancient hunter-gather societies either. There is no gene that makes you act like an asshole. That's all due to nurture and it can be changed if we put our minds to it.

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1. At least I think this is true. When was the last time you beat your wife or girlfriend?

Young Earth Creationism in the 21st Century

 

We discussed Young Earth Creationism in our last class. As most of you know, the Young Earth Creationist believes that the universe was created about 10,000 years ago and that all modern species (or kinds) were created simultaneously at that time. This view is compatible with the Genesis story in the Bible.

How is it possible for someone in the 21st century to ignore all the scientific evidence supporting an Earth that has been around for 4.5 billions years and an universe that is even older? We tried to come up with the most common ways that Young Earth Creationists can rationalize the obvious conflict.

The most obvious explanation is that they are completely unaware of the massive amount of scientific evidence that conflicts with their belief. In other words, they simply don't see a conflict between science and their religion because they have never been taught proper science. I suspect this is true of the vast majority of Young Earth Creationists.

But there's a subset of them who know the science. They have to come up with some sort of explanation that makes their position compatible with the findings of science. We identified two sorts of explanation that seem to apply.

1. Reject the scientific evidence as unreliable and try to discredit scientists. This path gives rise to talking points about the errors in carbon-14 dating and the fact that atheist scientists are blinded by their "religion."

2. Rely on faith and revelation as superior paths to knowledge. This means that the scientific "evidence" must be wrong even though the flaws aren't obvious. It must be wrong because it conflicts with God's word and there's no more reliable indicator of truth than the word of God.

(Sometimes the superiority of faith leads to the conclusion that God must have deliberately created an Earth with the illusion of age. It's not clear why God did this but we are not in a position to question God's wisdom in this matter.)

The BioLogos Foundation has, until recently, promoted theistic evolution. This worldview tends to accept scientific evidence as much as possible. Theistic Evolutionists, for example, are perfectly happy with a 4.5 billion year old Earth.

This emphasis on Theistic Evolution seems to be changing as Jerry Coyne points out in a recent article on his blog website: Templeton-Funded BioLogos cleans house, promotes young-earth creationist, begins slide into irrelevance. BioLogos now has a video promoting a Young Earth Creationist named Aaron Daly [A Young Earth Creationist Perspective].

Watch the video and see if you can figure out how a seemingly rational person can believe in something that is totally discredited by science.

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Michael Barton on the Sandwalk

Michael Barton blogs at The Dispersal of Darwin.

Larry Moran
PZ Myers
John Wilkins
Ryan Gregory
The God Delusion
Cody
John Hawks

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John Hawks on the Sandwalk

 
I post pictures of anyone on the Sandwalk. Technically speaking, John Hawks isn't exactly "on" the Sandwalk but I assume he went for a stroll shortly after this picture was taken.

Larry Moran
PZ Myers
John Wilkins
Ryan Gregory
The God Delusion
Cody

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Is WiFi Harmful to Children?

 

There are many things that are harmful to children—poverty and war come to mind. There's also superstition and ignorance.

Believe it or not, there are many parents who think that electromagnetic radiation from WiFi transmitters is harming their children. They want it removed from schools because their children are becoming sick when they are at school.

Steve Thoms at Skeptic North has a post on this issue [Why, Wifi? Why?]. He explains why some people believe stupid things and how they go about defending those beliefs in a scientific society. He also raises questions about the "evidence" of illness caused by WiFi.

Worth reading—especially for the students in my course.

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Should Creationism Be Banned?

 
A bunch of British scholars have issued a Joint statement on creationism and evolution in schools. The list of signatories include all the usual suspects: Richard Dawkins, David Attenborough, Steve Jones, Michael Reiss, Steven Rose, John Sulston, Lewis Wolpert, etc.

Creationism and "intelligent design" are not scientific theories, but they are portrayed as scientific theories by some religious fundamentalists who attempt to have their views promoted in publicly-funded schools. There should be enforceable statutory guidance that they may not be presented as scientific theories in any publicly-funded school of whatever type.

But this is not enough. An understanding of evolution is central to understanding all aspects of biology. The teaching of evolution should be included at both primary and secondary levels in the National Curriculum and in all schools.

Nobody can argue with the second part of the statement; of course evolution should be taught.

I want to challenge the first part of the statement. Should the British government pass a law banning the teaching of creationism and/or Intelligent Design Creationism as science?

The first thing that troubles me is the idea of a legal ban on teaching anything at all. I don't think this is a good idea even for ridiculous ideas such as homeopathy or astrology. Do we really want lawyers and legislators making decisions about what should be taught as science and what shouldn't? Neither of those groups are competent to make such decisions.

Besides, enforcing a legal prohibition against teaching Intelligent Design Creationism as science only plays into the hands of the creationists. What are we afraid of? Are we worried that the creationist challenge is so strong that science may not be able to withstand the assault without protection from the courts?

There's another issue that's even more troubling. We could read between the lines of the joint statement and come up with the following logic ...

We the undersigned have adopted a particular version of what science is and we have adopted a particular definition of intelligent design. We agree on a particular (unstated) definition of "scientific theory." According to these views and definitions, intelligent design is not science and should not be taught as science in our schools.

Problem is, there are many different definitions of science and why should we believe this group of signatories over another? There are also many different ways of defining intelligent design and some of the definitions fit my view of what science is. It may be horrible science but it can't just be dismissed as non-science.

On this blog we often discuss books by Intelligent Design Creationists. Most of what's in The Myth of Junk DNA or The Edge of Evolution, for example, is pure science by any definition. It turns out to be bad science—or a very misleading version of science—but on the surface it seems to apply rational thought, evidence, and skepticism to the problem of evolution.

I'm very uncomfortable with the idea that those books should be banned from science classes.

There's another reason why banning bad science is wrong. Study after study has shown that in order to correct student misconceptions you need to address those misconceptions directly. For example, if a student comes into a classroom thinking that creationism is correct, they will not be swayed by simply presenting the evidence for evolution. That's necessary but not sufficient. You also have to show them why their creationist views are wrong and that means bringing up those incorrect views in science class.

Take irreducible complexity as an example. If students think that irreducible complexity refutes evolution then you aren't ever going to change their minds by ignoring irreducible complexity in class. What you have to do is explain the concept and demonstrate why it's bad science (or non-science if you prefer). You can't do this if you are legally prohibited from mentioning intelligent design in a science class.

We need to teach students what science is and what science isn't. The appropriate place to do this is in science class. You can't teach this concept without giving some examples of non-science or pseudoscience and that's a good thing because it directly addresses any misconceptions students might have.

Similarly, if Intelligent Design Creationism is mostly bad science (instead of non-science) then the best way to teach the difference between good science and bad science is to use examples and Intelligent Design Creationism is an excellent example because so many students think it's good science. Banning it from the science classroom is just bad pedagogy.

It's also counter-productive. By protecting it from direct critical analysis in a science class you are actually giving a free pass to the anti-science forces outside the classroom.

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The Protein Engineer

 
Two former undergraduate students of mine have started a blog called The Protein Engineer.

A blog started by two graduate students, 11000 kilometres apart, on a quest to discover, or otherwise invent, the holy grail of bioengineering: rational protein design.

Our blog consists of weekly reviews of important papers within the cutting edge field that is an amalgam of theoretical and experimental biology, fused with a heavy dose of computational engineering. At the same time, our posts are accessible to even the keen undergraduate in science or engineering.

In nature, new proteins are created by means of mutations and recombination in the DNA, a process that can take thousands of years, and only then, whose purpose serves only strengthen the fitness of the host organism, a purpose often ill-suited for industry or medicine. Protein engineering aspires to create new proteins within a year or less, using powerful computational and experimental techniques such as simulation and directed evolution to create custom-tailored proteins designed especially for industry or medicine.

But more importantly, we hope to fascinate our readers with the immense possibilities of protein engineering. So that perhaps one day, you too, will become a proteneer.

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Countries That Execute Their Own Citizens

 
Most civilized, democratic countries have abolished capital punishment. This is especially true of those countries with a Christian tradition.

The last execution in Canada took place in 1962 and the last one in Mexico was in 1961. Here's a short list of other countries with the last year of execution: Australia (1967), Israel (1962), Brazil (1876), Argentina (1916), United Kingdom (1964), France (1977), and Italy (1947).

[Blue: capital punishment abolished for all crimes; Green: abolished for all crimes expect some committed in exceptional circumstances; Brown: abolished in practice; Red: legal form of punishment]

The United States differs from its geographical and cultural neighbors. Why does the United States still carry out executions in 2011 when the practice has ceased in all those countries with a similar cultural and religious background?

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When Will They Ever Learn?

 

In my class on Scientific Misconceptions and Controversies we discuss the ways in which scientific reasoning is used and misused in debates and discussions.

As a general rule, you can divide scientific debates into two main categories: (1) genuine scientific controversy that hasn't been resolved, or (2) misconceptions or misunderstandings of the science by one or more of the sides. The third category is genuine fraud.

Sometimes it's really hard to decide when a misconception turns into lying (fraud). This is particularly true in the evolution/creation debate where some of the most outlandish claims by the creationists have been refuted again and again but continue to be used. Are those creationists so stupid that they just don't understand why they are wrong or is it more likely that they know they are wrong but are just taking advantage of the ignorance of their audience to promote a good-sounding talking point?

Here's an example from Denyse O'Leary, one of the leading IDiots based right here in Toronto [Darwin lobby: We have the bumper sticker. We win.].

In August we noted that National Center for Science Education was running a bumper sticker contest

They may have declared their winner. Folk have been seeing this bumper sticker around town:

We have the fossils. We win.
That would be good news for Darwin, who didn’t think the fossil record supported him, but hoped it would, one day.

The trouble is, that has been the trade secret of paleontology (Stephen Jay Gould) that it doesn’t support him. It supports sudden, rapid emergence, which almost certainly means a non-Darwinian origin for change in life forms.

The issue is whether the fossil record, taken as a whole, supports the transformation of one type of organism into another. The answer is overwhelmingly "yes." There are dozens of excellent examples including our own species.

These examples have been described in detail in an attempt to educate the creationists but all this to no avail. They continue to repeat the myth that the fossil record does not support evolution in spite of the enormous efforts made by evolution supporters to correct their ignorance.

At some point we need to stop attributing this behavior to mere stupidity and ignorance and start recognizing it for what it is—a lie. Denyse knows the truth but continues to repeat a false claim.

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Lab Times Screws Up the Discussion of Junk DNA

 

Lab Times is a magazine that reports on news for life scientists in Europe. Their current issue (Sept. 14, 2011) has an "analysis" called Past, present and future Everything you ever wanted to know about the non-coding stretches of DNA. The author is Frederick Gruber who appears to be a science writer drawing on information supplied by various researchers.

You know the article is going to be misleading as soon as you read the opening paragraph.

When the first draft of the human genome finally became available, there were many surprises, one of them being the ridiculously large amount of DNA that did not code for proteins – or anything at all. It seemed like the genome was just a huge chaotic mess sprinkled with tiny nuggets!

The reason this is misleading is because it totally misrepresents the history of the human genome. It's been four decades since we first became aware of the fact that only 1-2% of the human genome encoded proteins. This was hardly a surprise—in fact it was one of the principle arguments against sequencing the human genome. (What was the point of wasting all that money on DNA sequences that were mostly junk?)

One of the unfortunate characteristics of the junk DNA deniers is that they are completely unaware of the historical arguments in favor of junk DNA (e.g. False History and the Number of Genes, Genetic Load, Neutral Theory, and Junk DNA). Everyone who understood the problem was quite happy to find verification when the first draft of the human genome was published. It's exactly what the knowledgeable experts predicted.

The article raises the standard question that seems to have only recently occurred to some researchers; namely, what is all that DNA doing? It's mostly junk—at least that's the conclusion reached by many scientists back in the 1970s and most of what we've discovered since then has supported that view.

Transposon Insertions in the Human Genome

Transposons are mobile genetic elements that jump around in our genome (and the genomes of every species). They are known by various names such as "jumping genes" or mobile genetic elements.

Our genome has several different types of transposons [Transposons: Part I, Transposons: Part II, Retrotransposons/Endogenous Retroviruses]. Most of them are defective in one way or another so they can no longer "jump" to another location but some subfamilies have remained functional and these will spread to new locations. About 44% of our genome consists of active transposons and (mostly) defective transposons [What's in Your Genome?]. Most of these sequences have no function—they are junk DNA.

The development of new, cheap, sequencing technologies and the availability of an annotated standard human genome reference sequence has made it possible to look for new transposon insertions in a large number of individuals. The results can help confirm or refute the idea that most of our genome is junk.

A recently published article in PLoS Genetics describes the results of such an analysis (Stewart et al. 2011). It's part of the 1000 Genomes Project.

They detected a total of 7,310 insertions that were present in only a subset of the 179 genomes that were analyzed. About 85% of these were Alu elements, 12% were L1 LINES, and 3% were SVA's. This is consistent with earlier work that catalogued the number of active transposons in the human genome. As expected, very few of these insertions occurred in exons (39) and only 3 occurred in coding regions. This strongly suggests that there is strong selection against disruptions of coding regions. It implies that most of the detectable insertions occur in regions where disruption of the sequence has no effect on the viability of the the individual. In other words, insertions occur predominantly in junk DNA.

The authors examined the sequences of two families in order to assess the frequency of new transposon insertions. Earlier data indicated that a new insertion arises only once in every twenty births so it's not a surprise to find that the offspring in these two families showed no new insertions relative to their parents.

A data set of this size allows for an assessment of the rate of fixation of various new mobile element insertion (MEI) alleles in the population. The authors conclude,

MEI alleles propagate within population groups much like other predominantly neutral polymorphisms. MEI allele frequency spectra from the low coverage samples are in general agreement with expectations from the standard neutral model for allele drift in a population.

What this means is that most (perhaps all) of the insertion alleles are segregating as though they have no effect on the fitness of the individuals that carry them. This is further support for the idea that large parts of the genome are junk.

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Stewart, C., Kural, D., Strömberg, M.P., Walker, J.A., Konkel, M.K., Stütz, A.M., Urban, A.E., Grubert, F., Lam, H.Y., Lee, W.P., Busby, M., Indap, A.R., Garrison, E., Huff, C., Xing, J., Snyder, M.P., Jorde, L.B., Batzer, M.A., Korbel, J.O., Marth, G.T. (2011) A comprehensive map of mobile element insertion polymorphisms in humans. PLoS Genet. 2011 Aug;7(8):e1002236. Epub 2011 Aug 18. [doi:10.1371/journal.pgen.1002236]