bounded and open-ended evolutionary systems

Compiled with AI assistance and selectively reviewed. Please consult the cited passages; the books remain the authoritative source. About this companion

Editorial synthesis · provisional

Definition

Bounded and open-ended evolutionary systems differ in whether change approaches limits within a substantially explored possibility space or continues generating new functions and niches for further elaboration. RB1 uses abiotic mineral diversification and life as qualified contrasts. Openness is conditional rather than a promise of infinite growth, and the existence of some cumulative histories is compatible with widespread simplicity, stasis, decline and local loss.

Explanation

Bounded systems can approach attractors or asymptotic limits beyond which additional complexity offers no functional advantage. Mineral evolution sharpens the point: a finite repertoire may become substantially explored, with long stasis. AB’s native notes preserve this abiotic qualification rather than treating every geochemical change as literally Darwinian or indefinitely creative.

Life is presented as unusually open-ended because retained innovations create new functions, niches and reachable possibilities. RB2’s Kampis account supplies a related distinction between moving through a fixed state space and changing the space itself. This remains an account of generative organization, not an assurance that every lineage or organism increases in complexity.

RB1’s revised scope permits bounded, stalled and low-complexity systems to remain globally prevalent. PB’s running-maximum warning also blocks a tautological proof of accumulation. The proposal therefore keeps two senses and their empirical limits without assigning a numerical threshold, unlimited rate or inevitable future trajectory absent from the local evidence.

Scope and attribution

Retain separate senses, context dependence and the coexistence of cumulative pockets with wider simplicity.

AB — The Actual Book

Native notes preserve bounded abiotic growth and the more modest later formulation.

Occurrence locators: Notes: 239.

PB — The Possible Book

A running historical maximum is no proof of substantive selective growth.

Occurrence locators: 151.

RB1 — The Real Book, Volume I: The Possible Is Real

Bounded repertoire and possibility-generating evolution are contrasts within a conditional account.

Occurrence locators: 228, 242, 260, 261, 262, 267, 268.

RB2 — The Real Book, Volume II: Becoming Is Being

Kampis distinguishes a fixed landscape from its endogenous modification.

Occurrence locators: 121, 132, 133.

Background used in the editorial explanation

Named theories and mechanisms are distinguished from neighboring background, homonyms and the author’s own synthesis. Reproduced AI passages retain their separate voice.