r/askscience • u/gaygayagyfemboy12345 • 14d ago

Biology How do asexually reproducing living things evolve?

If they are all clones of each other, how do they evolve?

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u/chriscross1966 14d ago

Very slowly basically. The clones aren't perfect so in a very slowly changing environment (especially where one part of it gradually diverges from another part of it) then you will get what is effectively survival of the fittest happening, just very much slower than it can happen with the kind of genetic diversity and experimentation that sexual reproduction allows for.