[MD] Is it serious?

[plattholden at gmail.com]

On 27 May 2009 at 17:43, craigerb at comcast.net wrote:

> [Platt] 
> 
> 
> > I...wonder why life forms (genes) have an urge to survive. 
>   
> Start with the senario that 1/3 of the genes in an environment have the urge to 
> survive, 1/3 don't care & 1/3 have the urge to self-destruct.  Assuming all 
> reproduce at the same rate, after 1 generation, the ratio of the respective 
> genes will be 2:1:0, for generation +2, it will be 4:1:0,...for generation +n, it will be 
>   n 
> 
> > I...wonder why life forms (genes) have an urge to survive. 
>   
> Start with the senario that 1/3 of the genes in an environment have the urge to 
> survive, 1/3 don't care & 1/3 have the urge to self-destruct. Assuming all 
> reproduce at the same rate, after 1 generation, the ratio of the respective 
> genes will be 2:1:0, for generation +2, it will be 4:1:0,...for generation +n, it will be 
>   n 
> 
> 2 :1:0. 
>   n 
> 2   becomes a large number very quickly. 
> 

Sorry, I don't get the point. I'm mathematically challenged. I thought the 
question was why do any genes have an urge to survive, 1/3 or 
otherwise?

Platt