Re: poly: ESS for HPLD

In a message dated 12/5/97 8:46:04 PM, carlf@atg.com wrote:

>Suppose we had two adjacent replicators on the frontier, one of which
>agrees with your argument and decides to drop out of the race. Its
>neighbor gets to take up twice as much of the frontier, and the ideological
>purity of the frontier is preserved. Evolution favors replicators which
>are pigheaded enough that they absolutely cannot be talked out of putting
>all their resources into replication.

If it's just 2, yes, it's race time. But if there are 3, the one that drops
out is the most successful replicator. Since we're considering each
oasis as a separate entity, for coordination reasons, there are effectively
dozens or hundreds of competitors for each new spot.

>Well, once the Serengeti is filled with grazers, they're just giving up one
>grass blade for another. But there are always more grass blades, just like
>there are always more oases. The Serengeti also supports parasistic
>nematodes that live and reproduce inside a single grass blade; it's a
>perfectly acceptable lifestyle. It's just that evolution also rewards the
>replicators that use up as well as husband their resources.

Both chronic and temporary parasitism work, depending on circumstances. When
your host is immortal and transmission uncertain, keeping your host around
is probably a good idea. After all, they have eternity (essentially) to
design nanoviral infections of adjacent systems.
Received on Sat Dec 6 05:14:33 1997