title: Splendor and misery of adaptation, or the importance of neutral null for understanding evolution.
abstract: The study of any biological features, including genomic sequences, typically revolves around the question: what is this for? However, population genetic theory, combined with the data of comparative genomics, clearly indicates that such a "pan-adaptationist" approach is a fallacy. The proper question is: how has this sequence evolved? And the proper null hypothesis posits that it is a result of neutral evolution: that is, it survives by sheer chance provided that it is not deleterious enough to be efficiently purged by purifying selection. To claim adaptation, the neutral null has to be falsified. The adaptationist fallacy can be costly, inducing biologists to relentlessly seek function where there is none.
authors.affiliation: National Center for Biotechnology Information, National Library of Medicine, Bethesda, MD, 20894, USA. koonin@ncbi.nlm.nih.gov.
authors.forename: Eugene V
authors.initials: EV
authors.lastname: Koonin
mesh_terms: D000222:Adaptation, Physiological / Q000235:genetics*; D005075:Biological Evolution; D005828:Genetics, Population; D023281:Genomics; D012641:Selection, Genetic; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA