Darwinian Demon

The Darwinian demon (English darwinian demon ) is a thought experiment. It is intended to illustrate that organisms have to compromise in terms of their adaptation to the environment. The Darwinian demon is after Charles Darwin, the British naturalist and founder of evolutionary theory, named.

Description

The Darwinian demon is an idealized hypothetical ( female ) body, which maximizes all of the parameters of his fitness. He has an infinite life expectancy and unlimited fertility. It starts immediately after his birth with the reproduction. During his endless life he has a very high reproductive rate with very many descendants. He can spread indefinitely and find partners for pairing anywhere, anytime. These assumptions are violated no law of physics. If all resources would be available without restriction, it is argued, would exist the Darwinian demon.

The fact that such a being does not exist, show that resources are limited for each organism. He has to adapt to the given boundary conditions of its environment in order to ensure the survival and success of its kind. The existing resources (energy ) he has between his own growth, divide the retention of its basic functions and reproduction. This results in a problem of allocation of scarce resources ( allocation problem ). Every organism must solve for themselves this allocation problem. After the life-history theory ( life history theory ) different strategies ( life cycle strategies) to be tracked.

The thought experiment and the term Darwinian demon come from the year 1979 by the British Richard Law. The name was chosen by him in analogy to the well-known Maxwell's demon.