Is the electric blue gene a man made trait?
- Thread starter FluffySackson
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if the blue gene is natural then surely electric blue must be natural lol... its down to the matter of whether ebdj is/was a 'natural' hybrid between two species to whether its a true jd or not.
as far as man made, other than cross breeding two species then re introducing them to the wild decades ago i dont see how they can be, what is man made!? some frankenstien scientist messing with genetics? i think not. maybe in thailand.
as far as man made, other than cross breeding two species then re introducing them to the wild decades ago i dont see how they can be, what is man made!? some frankenstien scientist messing with genetics? i think not. maybe in thailand.
The debate isn't about the color blue, in fish, people, or anything else. 
EBJD have never been collected in the wild. Nor is there any documentaion that exists that suggests that someone has seen one in the wild. The entire history of this fish is based on some incomplete DNA work, and one mans word. A man now long dead, hence the mystery surrounding the origin of this fish. We don't even know the history of the original pair of JD's that produced these blue morphs, other than they were supposedly given to Hector Luzardo as a gift, from a friend.
EBJD have never been collected in the wild. Nor is there any documentaion that exists that suggests that someone has seen one in the wild. The entire history of this fish is based on some incomplete DNA work, and one mans word. A man now long dead, hence the mystery surrounding the origin of this fish. We don't even know the history of the original pair of JD's that produced these blue morphs, other than they were supposedly given to Hector Luzardo as a gift, from a friend.
We might get a possible clue, if the actual first breeder (creator???) would fess up to the technique used in producing (line breeding) the more recent "electric blue acara".
So it comes down to how you want to see it. In terms of absolute certainty, it's just not there. There's the Luzardo story of how the fish came into the hobby. There's been some genetic work that hasn't demonstrated hybrid genes, but hasn't 100% ruled out the possibility of hybridization somewhere up the line. There's the reasonable argument that since the EB fry are weak and survive only when separated and carefully raised apart from normal fry you won't see EB fish in the wild, they're simply too weak to survive, and if they were appearing occasionally in people's tanks, Hector Luzardo was the first to notice the smaller, weaker fry and think they might be interesting enough to raise separately and see what they turned out to be.
You could consider all of that as plausible enough and fitting together well enough to pretty much explain these fish our you could go the other way and use whatever element of uncertainty to doubt them. Maybe Hector Luzardo was a breeding wizard who thought it would be cool to develop an unusually blue JD and spent years tinkering to get them or maybe it was purely serendipity. Maybe the 'blue gene' arose due to artificial tank conditions or inbreeding, maybe it happens in the wild but the fry never survive, maybe it was a unique sequence variation (mutation) or maybe it's a recurring variation. But you can't debate uncertainty into fact, at some point you simply have to acknowledge the uncertainty, something some people are wired to do better than others.
So, it's in the eyes of the beholder.
You could consider all of that as plausible enough and fitting together well enough to pretty much explain these fish our you could go the other way and use whatever element of uncertainty to doubt them. Maybe Hector Luzardo was a breeding wizard who thought it would be cool to develop an unusually blue JD and spent years tinkering to get them or maybe it was purely serendipity. Maybe the 'blue gene' arose due to artificial tank conditions or inbreeding, maybe it happens in the wild but the fry never survive, maybe it was a unique sequence variation (mutation) or maybe it's a recurring variation. But you can't debate uncertainty into fact, at some point you simply have to acknowledge the uncertainty, something some people are wired to do better than others.
So, it's in the eyes of the beholder.
...There's one sense in which you could say they're a man made fish even if the gene variation is 100% natural to the species, which is that it took/takes human intervention to select them and get them to survive... but then from there you could say selection influences/pressures are always different in a tank than in the wild...
I'd say it's pretty obvious they're line bred from a blue morph. When you breeed a regular female JD to an ebjd male- what happens? Any weird recessives pop out? -Ever? Or do you get some regular jacks and some extra blue ones? Is there even another cichlid in question that MIGHT even remotely be a possible blue gene contributor to the EBJD? What basis at all is there for the EBJD hybrid theory? Occams razor tends to work better than waiting on "trends" in the scientific community to work themselves out. But yeah until a DNA analysis proves they're 100% JD or we find a written confession and some vintage footage it's all we got- I'm sure experts will still manage to change their minds about it a few more times just like with latin names.
Personally, I accept the standard account for them as it stands: a rarely evident but naturally occurring genetic 'mistake' or variation that you can't expect to find in the wild because the fry are weak and don't survive and neither do they survive with normal fry in a tank. The only reason we have them now is by chance someone thought there was something interesting about them and decided to separate enough of them to find out what they would turn into. Makes sense with no further explanation required, as these fish are well known to be a weaker strain and challenging to grow to size, even with everything in their favor. Could also be the genetic variation was the result of tank inbreeding and doesn't occur at all in the wild.
However, the occam's razor principle is not considered as proof but as a 'heuristic maxim'. It might be used to shift the burden of proof but in itself it doesn't prove anything. So while I accept the conventional explanation for EBJD, and don't see what all the fuss is about, you can't debate away the possibility of hybrid genes imo, even though I agree with what I understand from your basic argument-- what would be the blue fish to contribute the gene(s) for EBJD... don't know, carpintis escondido? how about turquoise discus?
...Actually, some of the science literature views occam's razor as an historical artifact (William of Occam, 14th century) that points in the wrong direction as often as not.
However, the occam's razor principle is not considered as proof but as a 'heuristic maxim'. It might be used to shift the burden of proof but in itself it doesn't prove anything. So while I accept the conventional explanation for EBJD, and don't see what all the fuss is about, you can't debate away the possibility of hybrid genes imo, even though I agree with what I understand from your basic argument-- what would be the blue fish to contribute the gene(s) for EBJD... don't know, carpintis escondido? how about turquoise discus?
...Actually, some of the science literature views occam's razor as an historical artifact (William of Occam, 14th century) that points in the wrong direction as often as not.
Too much arguing to read through the whole thing but to keep it simple. Man made gene no. It is a trait that man has bred for. Same with the red severum you mentioned in original post that is not a man made gene but a line bred trait.
The EBJD could occur in the wild if the parents and surroundings allowed it. I read the original EBJDS were created by removing the parents from a clutch of eggs then removing the lighter colored fry that were being killed off to see what happened, and what he got were EBJD.
The EBJD could occur in the wild if the parents and surroundings allowed it. I read the original EBJDS were created by removing the parents from a clutch of eggs then removing the lighter colored fry that were being killed off to see what happened, and what he got were EBJD.
