If replicating is a synonym for reproducing, then the question becomes
what's the difference between replicating and self-replicating? If I (an
"other") take something and make another one, then it HAS BEEN replicated,
but it is not "replicating". When a virus replicates via bacterial
biochemical mechanisms, it is, in fact, a causal agent in its own
replicating, and thus self-replicating. It seems to me that all replicating
is at least partially self-replicating.
>> you could not necessarily
>> say that 'a self-producing system can arize without self-reproduction'.
>> Intuitively, it could be possible that self-producing systems could only
>> arize by a previous self-reproducing system...but the ability to replicate
>> was lost in the re-producing process.
Worker bees are self-producing but not self-reproducing. So are strict
homosexuals and celibates.
O---------------------------------------------------------------------------->
| Cliff Joslyn, NRC Research Associate, Cybernetician at Large
| Mail Code 522.3, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD 20771 USA
| joslyn@kong.gsfc.nasa.gov http://groucho.gsfc.nasa.gov/joslyn 301-286-2598
V All the world is biscuit-shaped. . .