Okay, lets take out the word 'individual' if its such a problem to think about.
Come on, this sounds like I come up with this "individual" issue. Obviously it is such a problem. If it was something like water or carbon, you wouldn't ask your original question in the first place. So it is problematic...
Are cells subject to the same Natural Selection pressure as is an organism?
Let's see, we are talking about levels in here. And let's give some examples in order to clarify the abstract term of "Natural Selection pressure": Lack of water, too hot or too cold climate, overpopulation, lack of food, lack of sexual partners are some of the pressures for species, and we are not exception. And you are asking if cells are subject to the same -or even "similar"- pressure.
Yes, but not in the same levels. If a member of a species feel the pressure of lack of enough drinking water, this member will feel thirst, an urgency to find water and some other physical and emotional pressures. What will an "individual cell" feel? Nothing. Because they don't have feelings, they are not subject to understanding the situation. They are just replicating according to a certain mechanism. Yet, the pressure represents itself as "change" in dynamics. Cell will be pushed to survive without enough water. This new situation will pressure its division rate; the signals from other cells will differ. So it's all about translation of the same situation in different level: Lack of water is thirst and pain for an individual member of a species, but the very same situation reaches individual cell as lack of command or too much command for its ordinary cycle. It gets the pressure; only because it can not isolate itself from the wider environment.
Well isn't that you making qualifications? The goal of 'reproduction' is to 'produce'. Cell division is production of more cells. The fact it doesn't involve sex or sperm/egg doesn't mean that it isn't accomplishing the proliferation that reproduction supposedly does.
"The goal of reproduction is to produce" is human politics; it has nothing to do with cell division. Forget about cells, even animals don't have the concept of "reproduction" and they have even brains and feelings. Cell division is a very mechanic repetition. They don't have goals; they have built-in codes. They perform in a different dimension. If I wanted to imagine a "goal" for a cell, this would rather be protein reproduction rather than reproduction of themselves. Body needs protein and cells work for this. If a cell can not produce enough amount of protein (or produce too much protein) it is replaced by its fresher copies. You see sometimes "too much production" can be harmful for the overall system and this cell must die and small amount producers must come. Again, I refuse to think a "goal" for cells. They are more like computer chips.
So under your definition a twins born are one in the same thing? Secondly again, if they are the same doesn't matter because they are all subject to the Selection pressures in the end.
This is a very good example for my concerns. You see, that's why I was insisting to clear the definition of "individual", not because trying to be an ass-hole: Twins are the product of cell division, but what results from this are two individuals (they can not be divided any more in human terms). This is why there is a great discussion on abortion: Because some people claim that embryo is going to become an "individual", and some people say embryo is not an individual.
For the second part of this question; they share same code package of DNA, natural selection resulted in this way; but this is not the whole story, it's just a part of it: The question of “what makes an individual?” is much complicated issue than a cell mutation... They (twins) are definitely not same. Because if you really push to define this sameness, I can confidently claim that you and I are same. We might be sharing much more things than a couple of twins. Because what makes an individual does not start or end using the same genetic footprint, having similar types of upbringing, sharing same types of likes or dislikes, attending same school or not... I am not trying to mystify it neither trying to make it more complicated. It's already comprehensive than a cell division.
Instead of concentrating on the 'individual' as a unique entity, I was more interested in the evolutionary aspect of it.
You were trying to find some parallelism between a member of a species and cells, and how do they get affected and you come up with this word; I find it normal, there is nothing wrong about it. Let’s ignore this word and concentrate on subject from a different perspective: Evolution is not a magical regime or aura; it’s a condition of change through time. Evolution is not only for the living things, but everything (including planets, galaxies, energy in nature or human made technology, language, etc.) are subject to it. Nothing can escape it.
Cells form the living things but they are not subject to same issues as living organisms, they perform at different level, level of chemistry. I will dare to say that cells are not alive: They are like transistors in a computer. Computer chips interpret electricity different than a CPU fan or USB sockets. Computer chips does not do any computation, they just open and close the doors according to their circuit system. This is how I see cells. But computer chips don’t divide for the time being…
Natural Selection doesn't 'change an individual' it changes population.. So whatever happened to the 'individual' is pointless in the end, all that matters for this discussion is that this 'individual' is subject to selection. 'Individual' doesn't equal 'unique'.
Let’s make an agreement: If you are really complaining about the word “individual” making this topic unnecessarily complicated; and if you really want not to circle around this word for the sake of this thread/subject I can understand and follow this. But if you ask for this and keep engaging the same problematic word over and over again, then I will ask you define the word.
'The Blind Watchmaker'? It is not 'someone' that is posited by a move towards selective advantage. Natural Selection is a blind mechanism that selects that which allows an organism to survive better. As such evolutionarily speaking systems would only develop and evolve due to their advantage (or get passed along if neutral) because only by 'gradual' 'step by step' changes will something evolve. And since it is Evolution by Natural Selection, that which is selected is directly correlated to survival benefit. And note that when I'm talking about a 'system' in the current context of 'self-destruction' we're talking about the cell regulation mechanisms that are utilized within the cell or an organism for its survival.
I refrain “Blind watchmaker”, because it is still a “maker” with a purpose. Ask this question: What is the overall aim of the internet? Or technology in general? And don’t forget, there are conscious beings, creators, inventors behind all these things. Although they belong to same species and we can understand what is going on in individual examples, we can not easily say that this is the aim of the entire mechanism. And any theory is bound to collapse as soon as a new invention or stupidity arises within the system. We can not pinpoint the overall aim: not because it is blind, not because it too big or this or that: Because simply there is no any. They survive depending on what they are made of, how they transform their environment and how their environment transforms them. They become ancestors, ideas, models for future inventions and projects, but there is no general aim to cover the entire system, because all the “makers” –blind or not- can interfere a certain part, they are temporal, they are limited, they depend on other mechanisms.
You can adapt this analogy to the system of “how does evolution perform among living things”. By the way, in order to talk about “self destruction”, one must be “self” first. Cells are not selves…
Lets make it: Is a unicellular organism an individual which is selected upon under evolutionary theory? (Better?)
Still individual, still individual… Answer is no. Unicellular organism is not an individual, and being or not being an “individual” is not a subject of modern evolutionary theories (forget the modern, even Darwin’s book was “Origins of Species”). Individuals are subject to evolution only if they are members of a species. Because in order to be a subject for evolution, first you have to be part of species.
