I came across this blogpost from evolgen which is a part of a discussion with John Hawks on increased rate of evolution. It seems to me that the term “neutral mutation” is central in this discussion. However, looking at the effect of Hsp90 as described in my previous posts (and future posts to come), – is it possible that some of these “neutral” mutations aren’t neutral at all, but rather deleterious or beneficial mutations masked by a heat shock protein ?

I am in over my head when it comes to in-depth analysis of population genetics data, but still, to me, – the action of mutation masking Hsp’s (if this is truly a valid evolutionary phenomenon) may seem to bridge these two opponents as well as solving a lot of other controversies surrounding the rate of molecular evolution vs. phenotypic/morphological evolution.