Brinedew

Unpublished draft
  1. “seflish gene” view of evolution predicts we’d see fish dissolve into individual cells when fish heartbeat stops
    1. Each fish cell individually benefits from detaching and existing as a single-celled plankton
    2. Each fish cell has genes necessary to become fish sperm cell and potentially fertilize some random egg laying around
    3. Just sitting there and allowing random organisms eat you seems hardly optimal for the cell
  2. There are, in fact, multicellular organisms that do routinely dissolve into single cells
    1. They are called facultative multicellulars
    2. But they are always small and unsophisticated
    3. Seems like to evolve a large complex multicellular body you need to abandon facultativity.
    4. Why can’t facultatives make complex modular bodies?
  3. De-darwinization involves a series of debilitating pre-commitments
    1. Two types of body formation: aggregative and clonal
    2. 2x2 square of multicellular bodies: aggregative vs. clonal on one axis, facultative vs obligate on the other
    3. In a clonal body, each cell is a clone of the germline cell
    4. Evolution can’t just break “genes that help you live while unicellular” - those are necessary for stuff like reproduction and regeneration. The organism must have these genes, but somatic cells shouldn’t be allowed to use them.
    5. So to make itself a complex body without any subservient agent going opportunistic, germline cell must be capable of “tying itself to the mast” with various debilitating pre-commitments to not use its “unicellular gene arsenal” apart from certain conditions.
    6. Pre-commitment 1 that makes the individual cell worse
    7. Pre-commitment 2 that makes the individual cell worse
    8. Pre-commitment 3 that makes the individual cell worse
    9. …
    10. More complex bodies produce less-viable in vitro cultured cells
  4. When these pre-commitments break, it’s called cancer
    1. Re-darwinization
    2. Transmissible cancers
    3. SCANDAL hypothesis