Car Evolution
Car Evolution
Suppose a particular car is designed and built. No other car is created. The car is then copied by technicians multiple times over many years, say one thousand. Errors in the copying are sometimes made, resulting in a car slightly different from the original. Suppose a million new cars are built, so many errors creep in. The cars are sold to consumers following their preferences. Some of the errors are not favored by any consumers, but some become popular. We can imagine that the original is slowly changed over time, to such an extent that no true replicas remain. The transformation could be quite drastic. What we have is a gradual metamorphosis from an original design that mindlessly produces diversity, which is then selected for and produces new models of car. We have an evolution of car species that mirrors the evolution of animal species. The same logic applies to both.
By the replicator–variation–selection framework, your suggested car evolution and natural selection share some logic, but “car evolution” and “organism evolution” are fundamentally different.
Cars do not reproduce themselves, organisms do. Consumers intentionally pick better versions of cars, nobody picks better organisms (the selection pressure comes from the organism’s ability to adapt to environmental conditions, not from some connoisseur that directs the evolutionary chain). Finally, an initial blueprint is needed for the first car, none is needed for the first organism. Your analogy does not seem to satisfy the fundamentals of natural section, but it is whimsical.
Also, on a practical note, the evolution of cars would halt rapidly from the damage to the reputation of the manufacturer – see Chrysler.
You say nothing new to me–of course cars don’t reproduce themselves! The analogy is intended to pertain to only certain features of biological evolution, specifically the logic of errors and selection. You are wasting my time with these comments. I won’t allow any more comments at this low level.
I have a larger theory of this concept, which I have tried to develop for years. Molecules evolved into life forms, and ultimately intelligent enough life forms such as humans. The molecules didn’t have the direct resources or pathways to develop newer more complex molecules and megastructures, so they had to form intelligence first in order to develop even more interesting things such a silicon chips, -as you correctly mentioned cars – satellites etc. In other words we are just catalysts for the purpose of serving our molecular masters – rather than the other way around.
Bit like the gene-centered view of evolution–they are the real masters.
Yes same concept, i have probably nicked Dawkins’s idea and applied it externally
The Selfish Molecule.