If you want to make a living flower, you don't build it - you grow it from the seed. Christopher Alexander.
- Evolution is a behavior that emerges in any system that has:
- Mutation
- Heredity
- Selection
- Evolutionary systems often generate unexpected solutions. Nature selects for good enough. It affects almost everything (life, [[ideas]], communities, [[systems]], ...).
- Nature ended up: resilient to disturbances, decentralized, redundant, diverse, and self-healing.
- Every [[culture]] is the gradual accumulation of useful environmental adaptations combined with random memetic drift.
- [[Systems]] that evolve organically are usually, but not always, well-adapted to their purpose. Cultures, ancient traditions, and long-lasting institutions contain irreplaceable wisdom that's hard to pin down if you're designing them from scratch.