Posted by alexandra_k on August 9, 2013, at 20:38:51
In reply to Re: help, posted by no rose garden on August 9, 2013, at 20:22:50
I think coke is better too.
The idea is that you can't have two different species filling the same ecological niche. What will happen is that one of the species will have a slight competitive advantage and so the other species will be driven into extinction.
For instance... If you take two strains of bacteria that both feed on the same food. Then you put equal proportions of them one on each half, say, then drop in the food (not enough for everyone) then eventually one of the species will take over / the other will die out.
So that is meant to be why if you introduce a new species into a region and it fills the same niche as a native then the native sometimes goes extinct. Because of competitive exclusion.
It is controversial how much you can talk about the evolution of things like... Ideas. Or cultural artifacts... Like tools. Maybe it is just a metaphor... Or maybe there is more to it and we can come to understand aspects of society by (carefully) applying, or otherwise exploring, aspects of evolutionary biology.
Because... Culture has to be grounded in biology at the end of the day... Somehow or other.
So... Coke vs Pepsi vs Dr Pepper. Same niche... (Or perhaps not - perhaps they capture different markets, perhaps that is the solution). Or something...
Discuss?
If you feel like. Or go do something else.... The latter is starting to seem preferable to me, right now :-)
poster:alexandra_k
thread:1048661
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20130612/msgs/1048678.html