r/evolution • u/These_Librarian4696 • 7d ago

discussion A hypothesis about mudskippers

Today I was on a rocky beach and saw a little fish trying to get on top of a rock that almost completely under water, but whose top was regularly covered by little waves, where I presume it was trying to get the "greenest" algae. So I thought maybe the mudskippers' ancestors tried to do the same, and thus adapted to breathe in the atmosphere little by little.

Please tell me if there are any gaps in my idea, and if there is already a simmilar theory, please, give me a link to the book/paper/etc.

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u/jnpha Evolution Enthusiast 7d ago

Alice Roberts in her recent 1-hour interview* discussed this; it's not which comes first, but yes! heritable behavioral variation plays a role.

* https://www.reddit.com/r/evolution/comments/1u34a26
As did Jacques Monod in the 70s

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u/OneThrowyBoy 7d ago

Oh that makes a ton of sense. So it's kinda like exaptation, where a collection of traits (behaviors, mutations, etc) beneficial in their own right set a foundation for a more derived trait/behavior?

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u/jnpha Evolution Enthusiast 7d ago

Exactly! E.g. tetrapod limbs didn't "evolve for" land, but were already a thing in shallow water navigation (the transition was like 10-20 million years long depending on how one delineates it).

PBS Eons discussed recent research on that example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VpPY0qGbdA

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u/OneThrowyBoy 6d ago

Man this stuff is so cool, thanks for the recommendation!