Gunnar_Zarncke comments on Natural selection defeats the orthogonality thesis - Less Wrong

-13 Post author: aberglas 29 September 2014 08:52AM

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Comment author: aberglas 09 October 2014 08:03:31AM 0 points [-]

It is absolutely the fact that gene drift is more common than mutation. Indeed, a major reason for sexual reproduction is to provide alternate genes that can mask other genes broken by mutations.

An AGI would be made up of components in some sense, and those components could be swapped in and out to some extent. If a new theorem prover is created an AGI may or may not decide to use it. That is similar to gene swapping, but done consciously.

Comment author: ChristianKl 09 October 2014 09:25:21AM 0 points [-]

It is absolutely the fact that gene drift is more common than mutation. Indeed, a major reason for sexual reproduction is to provide alternate genes that can mask other genes broken by mutations.

Both have nothing to do with natural selection. Genetic drift is when a gene get's lucky and spreads to the whole population even though it provides no advantage. Alternatively a gene like human vitamin C enzymes that's useful but for which there isn't strong selection pressure can die in gamblers ruin.