Dear George
Unfortunately for you, your hypothesis isn't your hypothesis, but a well
known fact: ANY genotype of ANY species is overwhelmingly likely to exhibit
phenotypic variation depending on what environment it is raised in. This is
known as PHENOTYPIC PLASTICITY - what happens is that different genes get
EXPRESSED depending on the environment. For example, exactly the same
genotype of some plants can produce a completely different looking plant
depending on the environment it happens to grow in - not just different
size, but such different phsyiognomy that it would not be recognisable to
the inexpert eye as the same species, let alone the identical genotype.
Another thing you have to realise is that being big is not an advantage if
it means, for example, that you stick out and are therefore more likely to
get eaten. If your environment doesn't include a key predator (that is, a
herbivore if you are a plant) then being big might have advantages, like
maybe you are better able to compete for light, but if there are herbivores
around, it may be best to stay small. The small plant should not be
considered to have a 'growth deficit' - its size is optimal for its
environment, which happens to include herbivores. You could argue that an
environment with herbivores is a sub-optimal environment for the plant, its
ideal environment being one without herbivores, but the same argument would
apply to an environment without competitors, in which there was no
advantage to being big! Adaptation is all about overcoming constraints and
being big is just one solution to a number of problems. Being small is
equally a solution to a different set of problems. THERE IS NO SUCH THING
AS AN IDEAL TYPE THAT IS NOT RELATIVE TO A GIVEN ENVIRONMENT.
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