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shortly after IBM’s offering. Univac, however, also had a newer variant of computer that made use of a new memory mechanism: core memory. This constituted what we would call a significant mutation event; not quite comparable to the invention of the transistor, but certainly a new technology enabling smaller, faster and more reliable computers.

The marketing decision by Univac was to defer introduction of the core memory based machine in the United States; releasing it instead in Europe. In the United States, they concentrated on selling the drum memory machine, in direct competition with the IBM 650. The result was that the Univac drum machine was nowhere near the success of the IBM 650, but the core memory machine was a big hit in Europe. By the time that U.S. customers enticed Univac to market their core memory machine in the United States, IBM had a very competitive core memory variant ready for the market. The bottom line is that the core memory upgrade to the earlier, drum memory oriented computers was more than an enhancement; it was a new species. Consequently, it made obsolete the earlier machine and replaced it in the marketplace rather than building upon its success.

Natural Selection

Through natural selection, the characteristics of living organisms are judged to be beneficial or not. As specified by their DNA, the succeeding generations of an organism contain both an extensive history of their ancestors as well as the blueprint for their own construction and that of their progeny. Through a variety of mechanisms, the characteristics of an organism can change, either within a generation or between generations. As we noted above, these changes may be due to genetic variability, to mutations in germ cell DNA during the propagation from parent to child or, in very special cases, to changes in the current generation of a specific cell. In any of these cases, the dominant factor that determines whether characteristics are passed to succeeding generations is the degree to which they prove useful in allowing the current generation to live and procreate. As a consequence, if characteristics in general are passed from one generation to the next, then beneficial characteristics tend to be more plentiful in succeeding generations. Essentially, this defines the fact of their being beneficial.

The characteristics of an organism that are continually judged or evaluated for every member of every generation of a species fall into two main categories: first are the characteristics of each entity that impacts its interactions with the physical environment in which it exists, and second are the characteristics of each entity that impacts its interactions with the members of other species found within the physical environment, or with other members of its own species. If a characteristic or a combination of characteristics help the entity survive within the environment, then that characteristic may be termed good. Below, we will consider much simpler characteristics or at least much simpler thought experiments in order to better understand the concept of natural selection. Our goal is simply to illustrate the basic concepts of natural selection and to attempt to convey the tenuous, statistical nature of the evolution process.

For humans, the characteristics that impact interactions with the environment are much wider in scope than for other species, due to the fact that people have proven more adept at modifying the terms of their interactions with the environment than members of other species. This is not to say that other species do not alter the context of their interactions with the environment. Many species migrate within or between ecosystems to obtain more favorable conditions for certain periods of their lifecycles. Termites build mounds for protection from the natural elements as well as predators, and birds of many species build an incredible variety of domiciles (nests) to further

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