Database Reference
In-Depth Information
1: ADULTS
2: EGGS
1:
2:
140.00
2
1:
2:
70.00
2
1
2
1
2
1
1:
2:
1
0.00
0.00
6.00
12.00
18.00
24.00
Days
Fig. 3.2
3.2 Optimal Insect Switching
Few attempts are made to consider anything in nature other than humans as be-
having in some optimal way. We are loathe to consider any kind of optimal
behavior in plants or animals since we think that such behavior requires intelli-
gence...intelligence of the kind we believed to be the sole domain of humans.
We need not think of intelligence as a prerequisite of optimal behavior at all.
It is well known in engineering that the configuration of a structural member can
be accurately calculated from a theory stating that the member deforms in such a
way as to minimize its internal strain energy. A steel beam can do this, without
knowledge of differential equations or modeling!
Yet in some real sense, we accept that evolution produces certain forms of effi-
cient behavior. The idea that energy is most efficiently used in nature is an example.
We can find such efficiencies in the field. Following millennia of evolution, a plant
possesses an optimal switching time between time spent growing roots, stems, and
leaves, and time spent growing seed. We can imagine that the plant that behaves this
way would have the most offspring in the next generation and so be the most likely
plant present in future times. But it is surely not only the amount of offspring that a
species produces that determines their prevalence in the future. The care with which
each offspring is produced and engendered must have some effect as well. Think of
the oak tree compared to the maple. The oak produces relatively few, well-packaged
seeds while the maple sends thousands of relatively unclad seeds into the wind. Here
we examine one species in our search for the first indications of an optimal strategy.
Precisely what are we suggesting when we say that a plant or an animal switches
optimally? We are really admitting that such behavior does not require intelligence
of any kind. We are saying that evolution favors efficient strategies. Our problem
