The traits of evolved organisms are usually a reasonable approximation of fitness-maximizing, because they’re the output of billions of years of a fitness-maximizing process; I’m with you on not being willing to call it “coincidence”. But this seems silly:
Your cognitive algorithms, executed in a human body, maximize its inclusive genetic fitness.
My cognitive algorithms are the results of a process which maximizes inclusive genetic fitness. This does not mean these algorithms themselves maximize that.
On the margin, a large fraction of the outputs of this process definitely don’t maximize fitness. Otherwise, there would be nothing for selection to eventually weed out!
My cognitive algorithms are the results of a process which maximizes inclusive genetic fitness. This does not mean these algorithms themselves maximize that.
I’m using “maximize” loosely. I agree with your observations.
The traits of evolved organisms are usually a reasonable approximation of fitness-maximizing, because they’re the output of billions of years of a fitness-maximizing process; I’m with you on not being willing to call it “coincidence”. But this seems silly:
My cognitive algorithms are the results of a process which maximizes inclusive genetic fitness. This does not mean these algorithms themselves maximize that.
On the margin, a large fraction of the outputs of this process definitely don’t maximize fitness. Otherwise, there would be nothing for selection to eventually weed out!
I’m using “maximize” loosely. I agree with your observations.