- #1
honestrosewater
Gold Member
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(Actually, perhaps I should have dropped the sexual selection part from the title.)
Okay, stupid question that I'm curious about but don't know how to ask: Does anyone know whether there's any connection between a trait being dominant or recessive and a trait being preferred by mates?
That is, is it ever clear that something analogous to the following occurs: Say monkeys have a dominant trait T and a recessive trait t. The tt monkeys tend to choose other tt monkeys. And maybe TT monkeys prefer TT or Tt monkeys? Or maybe TT monkeys don't show a preference, but tt monkeys do. Or something - anything - like that.
What might be going on in these situations, if they did happen? It seems like this would be a case where organisms can compare parts of their DNA to each other, looking for a match that would best preserve their own DNA. That is, for instance, two tt parents produce tt offspring. tt and TT parents produce Tt offspring. So two tt parents getting together better preserves each parent's genes. ?? I realize it may not be that simple, but I don't know how much more complex it is. This is just stuff I remember from high school biology class.
Okay, stupid question that I'm curious about but don't know how to ask: Does anyone know whether there's any connection between a trait being dominant or recessive and a trait being preferred by mates?
That is, is it ever clear that something analogous to the following occurs: Say monkeys have a dominant trait T and a recessive trait t. The tt monkeys tend to choose other tt monkeys. And maybe TT monkeys prefer TT or Tt monkeys? Or maybe TT monkeys don't show a preference, but tt monkeys do. Or something - anything - like that.
What might be going on in these situations, if they did happen? It seems like this would be a case where organisms can compare parts of their DNA to each other, looking for a match that would best preserve their own DNA. That is, for instance, two tt parents produce tt offspring. tt and TT parents produce Tt offspring. So two tt parents getting together better preserves each parent's genes. ?? I realize it may not be that simple, but I don't know how much more complex it is. This is just stuff I remember from high school biology class.
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