So I’ve been meaning to read more about evolutionary theory for some time, because though I’ve been aware of it, I haven’t really understood the inner workings. The Selfish Gene had been recommended to me by my friend, if middling poker player, Ethan Fingerman (who will gladly talk about transposons, at length, but I digress). So I went out to the local Barnes & Noble to pick up said tome, only to find that all 6 copies that were “in the Store” could not be found. So instead I picked up The Blind Watchmaker. It was a really interesting read.
There are some rather more intriguing applications of evolutionary theory. I know that I’m not the first to discuss this, but what really struck me was the evolutionary nature of technology and economy. Science has its own form of mutation and natural selection. New hypothesis typically arise from people believing that they know more than the rest of us (acting as a form of mutation). Then others will test that hypothesis until they break it, or it becomes an accepted theory in the current body of belief (acting as a form of natural selection). The same can be said of innovation and the market. Individuals or corporations create innovations (mutations), and then the market decides whether those individuals or corporations will succeed (natural selection).
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