Visualizing Evolution

Anne Thessenannethessen@gmail.com

Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.

- Theodosius Dobzhansky(1900-1975)

Aristotle’s “Chain of Being”

Blooded

Humans Live Bearing Egg Layers

Bloodless

Insects Crustacea Molluscs

• Hierarchical “Ladder of Life” according to complexity of structure and function

• Final causes drove natural processes• Graded scale of perfection rising from plants

to humans• Eleven grades arranged according to “the

degree to which they are infected with potentiality”

Aristotle 384 BC to 322 BC

Drawing by Franciscan missionary, Didacus Valades published in Rhetorica Christiana.

Great Chain of Being 1579

• Order imparted by omnipotent Christian deity

• Included inanimate objects• Humans are at the top, under

supernatural beings

• God created the world perfectly, “Whatever is, is right”• To try to be something

we are not is to break the chain

Ladder of LifeHumans

Viviparous Quadrupeds

Birds

Egg-laying Quadrupeds

CetaceansFishMollusks (Cephalopods)

Crustaceans

Mollusks (Bivalves)

Jellyfish & Sponges

Higher Plants

Lower Plants

Inanimate Objects Alexander Pope (1688-1744)

God

Technology Check - Microscope• First detailed account of living

tissue based on use of microscope was in 1644

• The word “cell” is coined by Robert Hooke 1665

• Anton van Leeuwenhoek describes “animalcules” in 1674-1676

Technology Check - Taxonomy• Carolus Linnaeus published a comprehensive account

of all known species • First edition 1735• Starting point for zoological nomenclature• Contains about 10,000 species

Carolus Linnaeus (1707-1778)

Technology Check - Taxonomy• Carolus Linnaeus published a comprehensive account

of all known species • First edition 1735• Starting point for zoological nomenclature• Contains about 10,000 species

Carolus Linnaeus (1707-1778)

Philosophy Check - Enlightenment• Europe 1600s-1700s• Lincean Academy founded 1603• Reform society using reason• Challenge ideas grounded in tradition and faith• Scientific method

Evolution of Species by Natural Selection

Charles Darwin (1809-1882)

On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection - 1859

• Species were not created by a supernatural being in their current state

• Species derive from other species

• Humans are not the best thing since sliced bread

Haeckel’s tree of life published in Generelle Morphologie der Organismen (1866) with the three branches Plantae, Protista, Animalia

Early Phylogenetic Trees

Ernst Haeckel (1834-1919)

Tree from Haeckel’s Anthropogenie oder Entwicklungsgeschichte des Menschen published in 1874

Early Phylogenetic Trees

Ernst Haeckel (1834-1919)

• Grouping species based on shared characters• Term “clade” coined in 1940• Imply relationship based on shared character states• A tree is a hypothesis

Technology Check - Cladistics

• Digital computers invented 1940-1945• First computer algorithms for cladistics written in

1965• First software package for phylogenetic analysis 1980

Technology Check - Computers

• DNA first isolated 1869• Frederick Griffith demonstrated that DNA carried

genetic information 1928• Watson and Crick publish structure of DNA using

Rosalind Franklin’s images 1953• DNA sequencing methods first developed in 1977

Technology Check - DNA

Trees contain information on the relative timing of nodes only when the nodes are on the same path from the root (i.e., when one node is a descendant of another).

These trees depict equivalent relationships despite being different in style.

How to Read a Phylogenetic Tree

Baum. 2008. Reading a phylogenetic tree: the meaning of monophyletic groups. Nature Education

How to Read a Phylogenetic Tree

Baum. 2008. Reading a phylogenetic tree: the meaning of monophyletic groups. Nature Education

The information on patterns of evolutionary descent is the same regardless of the lengths of branches.

"Evolution of patterns on Conus shells." By Zhenqiang Gong, Nicholas J. Matzke, Bard Ermentrout, Dawn Song, Jann E. Vendetti, Montgomery Slatkin, and George Oster. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 4 January 2012.

Page 2012. Space, time, form: viewing the tree of life. Trends Ecol & Evol 27(2):113-120.

• Non-directed web shape• Humans not at apex (there is no apex)• Supernatural and mythological beings not included• Mostly contains microscopic organisms• Much more complicated, more content• Trees are hypotheses that change due to type of

analysis

Earth History

http://www.scotese.com/earth.htm

Dendrobatidae in Amazon http://fr.academic.ru/dic.nsf/frwiki/1328251

Geophylogeny of Hawaiian katydids constructed using GenGIS.http://lter.limnology.wisc.edu/cidimensions/node/56

Phylogeny Mapping Tools

Salamanders, GeoPhyloBuilderhttp://iphylo.blogspot.com/2007/06/earth-not-flat-official.html

Phylogeny Mapping Tools

Evolution EducationAbout half of Americans do not accept the reality of evolution

Common Evolution Misconceptions

• Everything wants to be human• Individuals evolve• Evolution is random• Less complex organisms have evolved less than

more complex organisms• Humans came from monkeys• Microevolution is different from macroevolution• Linnaean taxonomy = genetics

http://darwinbookcats.wordpress.com/2011/04/18/phylogenies-and-evolution-tree-thinking/

How Can Visualizations Help?

TimeMisconceptions• Everything wants to be

human• Less complex organisms

have evolved less than more complex organisms

Legacy• Reading from left to right• Humans at apex

http://darwinbookcats.wordpress.com/2011/04/18/phylogenies-and-evolution-tree-thinking/

How Can Visualizations Help?

Tim

e

Misconceptions• Everything wants to be

human• Less complex organisms

have evolved less than more complex organisms

Legacy• Reading from left to right• Humans at apex

How Can Visualizations Help?Misconceptions• Modern species evolved

from other modern species

Legacy• Reading from left to right

How Can Visualizations Help?• Research– Show lots of information in proper context over

space and time– Communicate uncertainty– Quantitative and Qualitative

• Education– More transparency– Directly address popular misconceptions– Design around legacy thinking

https://www.facebook.com/OpenTreeOfLife?hc_location=timeline

Questions?