Evolutionary creativity

The evolutionary history of symbiotic nitrogen fixers is therefore a tale of coevolution, which occurred in the shadow of their hosts, chasing their growing roots, and striving for adaptation. It is an example of how bacterial genetics has managed to keep pace with the creative power of eukaryotic sexual recombination. Mobile replicons, insertion elements, and symbiotic islands prone to move have helped rhizobia to succeed in their pursuit. The race, naturally, is not over and, looking at it from a distance, what we have. seen, compared to what we have yet to see, is probably just a cloud of dust. 

It is intriguing that Mo is an important element in biology despite its scarcity at the Earth s surface—indeed, no element of similar scarcity is so biochemically ubiquitous. The reason for this paradoxical combination is unknown. Possible explanations include the unique chemical character of this element, evolutionary adaptation to the abrmdance of Mo in oxygenated oceans relative to other transition metals, a legacy of prebiotic chemical evolution in Mo-rich environments (e.g., in association with sulfide minerals), or some combination of these factors. Regardless, this paradox has inspired creative hypotheses about the importance of Mo in evolution (Crick and Orgel 1973 Anbar and Knoll 2002). 

Viewing the relationship between culture and psychopathology within an evolutionary framework, Hammer and Zubin (1966) also suggest some possible culturally adaptive functions of schizophrenia. They point out that the characteristics of the mentally ill occur in most people, and symptoms such as anxiety, guilt, shame, and depression are often harnessed to socially useful purposes. Similarly, Bowers and Freedman (1966) and Ludwig (1966) emphasize the healing function of schizophrenic states and consider them a major avenue of new knowledge and creative experience. 

Bentley PJ, Corne DW (2002) Creative evolutionary systems. Academic, San Diego... 

Kicinger was extremely happy and proud when he discovered that his computer program (based on his evolutionary developmental algorithm) has developed several designs in which macrobracings were used. In this way, the creative power of computational bioinspiration was demonstrated. 

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