http://bactra.org/notebooks Cosma's Notebooks en http://bactra.org/notebooks/1997/05/05#adaptation <blockquote>He marvelled at the fact that cats had two holes cut in their fur at precisely the spot where their eyes were. <br>---G. C. Lichtenberg, <cite>Aphorisms</cite> G26</blockquote> What, exactly, does it mean for something to "adapt"? What kinds of adapters (adaptors?) are there, and how do they adapt? (<a href="darwin-machines.html">Darwin Machines</a> are one sort; <a href="claude-bernard.html">Bernard Machines</a> another.) How good are they at it? How do they improve? Is it a good idea to make machines adapters? How about <a href="arch-design.html">buildings?</a> <ul>Recommended: <li><a href="ashby.html">W. Ross Ashby</a>, <cite>Design for a Brain</cite> <li><a href="claude-bernard.html">Claude Bernard</a>, <cite>Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine</cite> <li><a href="http://www.well.com/user/sbb/">Stewart Brand</a>, <cite>How Buildings Learn</cite> <li><a href="darwin.html">Charles Darwin</a>, <cite>On the Origin of Species</cite> [Try to get the first edition; Harvard publishes a fascimile with an excellent introduction by Ernst Mayr.] <li><a href="dawkins.html">Richard Dawkins</a> <ul> <li><cite>The Selfish Gene</cite> <li><cite>The Extended Phenotype</cite> <li><cite>The Blind Watchmaker</cite> </ul> <li><a href="dennett.html">Daniel Dennett</a>, <cite>Darwin's Dangerous Idea</cite> <li>T. H. Frazzetta, <cite>Complex Adaptations in Evolving Populations</cite> [Has a certain ring to it, no? --- Thoughts on evading the "what good is half a wing?" problem beloved of creationists] <li><a href="john-holland.html">John Holland</a> <ul> <li><cite><a href="evol-comp.html">Adaptation in Natural and Artificial Systems</a></cite> <li><cite>Hidden Order: How Adaptation Builds Complexity</cite> </ul> <li>Herbert <a href="simon.html">Simon</a>, <cite>The Sciences of the Artificial</cite> <li>Gerd Sommerhoff, <cite>Analytical Biology</cite> [Attempts to define adaptation rigorously. Highly suggestive and plausible, but he perversely assumes determinism, and it's not obvious to me how to reformulate his ideas stochastically.] <li><a href="darcy-thompson.html">D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson</A>, <cite>On Growth and Form</cite> <li>Bruce Wallace and Adrian M. Srb, <cite>Adaptation</cite> <li>George C. Willams, <cite>Adaptation and Natural Selection; a Critique of Some Current Evolutionary Thought</cite> </ul> <ul>To read: <li>R. McNeill Alexander, <cite>Optima for Animals</cite> <li>John R. Anderson, <cite>The Adaptive Character of Thought</cite> <li>Rick Belew and Melanie Mitchell, <cite>Adaptive Individuals in Evolving Populations: Models and Algorithms</cite></a> <li>Josh Bongard, Victor Zykov and Hod Lipson, "Resilient Machines Through Continuous Self-Modeling", <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1133687"><cite>Science</cite> <strong>314</strong> (2006): 1118--1121</a> <li>Robert Brandon, <cite>Adaptation and Environment</cite> <li>G. D. Hale Carpenter, <cite>Mimicry</cite> <li>Michael Conrad, <cite>Adaptability: The Significance of Variability from Molecule to Ecosystem</cite> <li>Paul Sheldon Davies, <cite>Norms of Nature: Naturalism and the Nature of Functions</cite> <li>Rene D'Hulst and G. J. Rodgers, "Efficiency and persistence in models of adaptation," <a href="http://arxiv.org/abs/cond-mat/0105189">cond-mat/0105189</a> <li>Ren&eacute; Dubos <ul> <li><cite>So Human an Animal</cite> <li><cite>Man Adapting</cite> </ul> <li>John Dupre (ed.), <cite>The Latest on the Best: Essays on Evolution and Optimality</cite> <li>William FitzPatrick, <cite>Teleology and the Norms of Nature</cite> [Well, can you think of a <em>bigger</em> adaptation?] <li>Verne Grant, <cite>The Origin of Adaptations</cite> <li><a href="http://mugwump.pitzer.edu/~bkeeley/">Brian L. Keeley</a>, "Fixing content and function in neurobiological systems: The neuroethology of electroreception", <cite>Biology & Philosophy</cite> <strong>14</strong>: 395--430 [<a href="http://mugwump.pitzer.edu/%7Ebkeeley/work/PUBS/fcf/FCF_pap.htm">HTML preprint</a>] <li>Merrell, <cite>The Adaptive Seascape</cite> <li>Donald J. Ortner, <cite>How Humans Adapt: a Biocultural Odyssey</cite> <li>Jay Schulkin, <cite>Rethinking Homeostasis: Allostatic Regulation in Physiology and Pathophysiology</cite> <li>Jay Schulkin (ed.), <cite>Allostasis, Homeostasis and the Costs of Physiological Adaptation</cite> [<a href="http://cambridge.org/0521811414">Blurb<a>] <li>Eduardo D. Sontag <ul> <li>"Adaptation Implies Internal Model," <a href="http://arxiv.org/abs/math.OC/0203228">math.OC/0203228</a> <li>"Adaptation and regulation with signal detection implies internal model," <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0167-6911(03)00136-1"><cite>Systems and Control Letters</cite> <strong>50</strong> (2003): 119--126</a> </ul> <li>J. E. R. Staddon, <cite>Adaptive Dynamics: The Theoretical Analysis of Behavior</cite> [<a href="http://mitpress.mit.edu/0-262-19453-8">Blurb</a>] <li>Marc Toussaint, "Self-adaptive exploration in evolutionary search," <a href="http://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0102009">physics/0102009</a> <li>Andreas Wagner, <cite>Robustness and Evolvability in Living Systems</cite> [<a href="http://pup.princeton.edu/titles/8002.html">Blurb, chapter 1</a>] </ul>