December 2, 2006
BUT ALL THREE ARE AUTISTIC (via Bryan Francoeur):
When two butterflies become one new one (Roxanne Khamsi, 12/01/06, New Scientist)
A new butterfly species that lives high in the Sierra Nevada mountains of the western US has turned out to be a rare creature indeed: it arose through the merging of two distinct species. It is one of very few hybrid species that can successfully breed.Lycaeides Melissa and Lycaeides idas – the genetically distinct butterfly species that initially gave rise to the new hybrids – do not regularly mate. But Zachariah Gompert at Texas State University in San Marcos, US, and colleagues found that when they do mate, they produce offspring that are able to breed with each other and produce further generations.
It is an unusual finding. Normally, new species will arise as offshoots of existing ones. The branches of the evolutionary tree do not typically merge.
Hilarious that they don't drop the pretense that they're discussing species here. And then they wonder why no one takes Darwinism seriously anymore? Posted by Orrin Judd at December 2, 2006 10:27 AM
do not regularly mate
How do they know this? Do they put two batches of each type in a motel bar with free drinks and free keys to the rooms and watch to see who leaves with whom?
Going to the article, I find the paragraph I expected to find:
L. melissa lives in the Great Basin on the east side of the mountains, while L. idas occupies wet meadows at mid-elevation on the west side. The new species lives above the tree line, in between these two “parental†species.
So they look a little different and live in geographically distinct areas, and this so-called hybrid is found between the two populations. This is "Science Made Stupid", and all because of this inability for biologists to admit that their Linnean classifications are mostly subjective (and ego-driven), and to admit that they can make mistakes. (In this case, how about doing some Real Science and testing the hypothesis that they are all just one species, huh?)