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Credit: Unsplash / Chad Kirchoff |
At the population level, natural selection envisions these organisms locked in mortal competition with each other, with a few individuals emerging victorious at the expense of the rest of the population. They pass on their genes while the “weaker” genes are eliminated. Evolutionary scientists imagine that the survivors were lucky enough to be endowed with superior genes through random mutations.To read the entire article, click on "Engineered Adaptability: New Distributed Problem-Solving Model for Population Adaptation".
In stark contrast, an engineering-based model would suggest that both the individual and the population are vitally important. Thus, in order to arrive at optimal solutions to environmental challenges, individuals and populations work together in a targeted, non-random approach to problem solving. Such a model has the potential to liberate biologists from the selectionist mindset. What characterizes this mindset?
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