[extropy-chat] limits of computer feeling

[Eugen Leitl]

On Tue, Mar 20, 2007 at 11:03:01AM -0700, Jef Allbright wrote:
> On 3/20/07, Rafal Smigrodzki <rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com> wrote:
> > It is interesting to note that we may be undergoing a transition from
> > a Darwinian evolution to an almost exclusively Lamarckian mode.

Sorry, I see no evidence Lamarck can outperform Darwin. Just being
a good idea doesn't make it true, unfortunately. 

> > Acquired and desired characteristics will become heritable and will

Fitness still applies (Lamarckian agents compete with Darwinian), so
merely desired won't cut it. You have to guess the future fitness landcape.
Computationally, a hard task.

> > provide the vast majority of the variability between individuals that
> > is necessary for selection to occur.
> 
> And the emerging field of epigenetics, part of the trend toward
> considering systems in both evolutionary and developmental terms
> ("evo/devo"), lends credence to the long-held suspicion that there's
> something more fundamental behind Darwinian evolution.

Darwin is just about replication. Errors and limited resource context
automatically emerge in this spacetime. Of course, it takes a long time
before mere replicators become effective Darwinian agents.

You can't find something more basic/fundamental than this.

-- 
Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a> http://leitl.org
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