Predicting Evolutions Next Best Move With Simulator

30 October 2008

 From monkeys to man to martians via mutations. Biologists hope to use a simulator to predict the next evolutionary change. Biophysicists at Rockefeller University have created a simulator to cause mutations at the genetic level, select the ones with the best results, then repeat the process over several generations to attempt to derive a new and better organism.

"That’s what we selected for; we instructed our algorithm to find a network that after responding to some input, always comes back to its initial value, or level of working. That’s perfect adaptation."

This study attempts to bring more support for the process of Natural Selection however is lacking the entire process of “natural” selection. Artificial selection can be used to monitor for the best results, capture and preserve them for many generations until a final desired product is produced.

This "un-natural" selection is the same as the process used in the art of programing. A programmer starts with a small amount of code and over several sub-versions adds and removes lines of code to add new features or fix existing features. The entire time the programmer retains the knowledge of the past code and it's effects on the final product. Once the programmer is satisfied with the code he releases the final version with all the bugs removed.

Natural Selection by definition is a "natural" process that lacks all knowledge of the events that are happening and does not have a desired final product. This means that all the sub-versions have to contain a predominant feature that makes their survival mandatory. Without this predominance the mutation has a much larger chance of being lost in the next generation because both parents do not have the same mutation, or it would not be in the germ part of the genetic code and therefore not be passed down at all.

Un-natural selection has been used many times in the past to produce the desired results in animal kinds but has no empirical way to prove vertical evolution.
 - An intelligent programmer shifting around existing complex information does nothing to show the original source of the information.
 - A more accurate simulation would start with nothing, add random data, test the results and repeat without ever saving the results of the test.
 - Since all things tend toward disorder (Second Law of Thermodynamics) the simulator should default to the simplest result and not the most complex.
 - Shifting of genetic information may create new species of animals, but does not produce new kinds of animals.
 - Variation is not evolution.


http://www.sciencedaily.com​/releases/​2008/10/​081030201857.htm