Could fictional species benefit from limited inbreeding?

There are quite a few known drawbacks to incest. However, incest can be helpful when trying to help a desired trait spread.

Incest does happen in nature to some degree but it's not exactly actively sought out.

How (if at all) could selective incest become a beneficial part of the development of a species?

This concerns both an intelligent species, knowingly commiting incest or using it on domesticated animals (but only for practical purposes) as well as non intelligent species doing it out of instinct in appropriate scenarios. These situations could include when an individual shows very strong genetics or the environment changes rapidly and an individual seems more adapted to the new environment than others.

I'm looking at this question from a purely genetic perspective, the social implications of incest being common within an intelligent species should be considered out of scope and kept out of the answers unless necessary. Likewise, inbreeding for aesthetical purposes is not useful and not on topic. Discussing drawbacks should only be done to illustrate how these drawbacks can be overcome or at least outweighed.

posted about 10 years ago

overactor‭

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