--- abstract: "The improbability of a spontaneously generated self-assembling molecule has suggested that life began with a set of simpler, collectively replicating elements, such as an enclosed autocatalytic set of polymers (or protocell). Since replication occurs without a self-assembly code, acquired characteristics are inherited. Moreover, there is no strict distinction between alive and dead; one can only infer that a protocell was alive if it replicates. These features of early life render natural selection inapplicable to the description of its change-of-state because they defy its underlying assumptions. Moreover, natural selection describes only randomly generated novelty; it cannot describe the emergence of form at the interface between organism and environment. Self-organization is also inadequate because it is restricted to interactions amongst parts; it too cannot account for context-driven change. A modified version of selection theory or self-organization would not work because the description of change-of-state through interaction with an incompletely specified context has a completely different mathematical structure, i.e. entails a non-Kolmogorovian probability model. It is proposed that the evolution of early life is appropriately described as lineage transformation through context-driven actualization of potential (CAP), with self-organized change-of-state being a special case of no contextual influence, and competitive exclusion of less fit individuals through a selection-like process possibly (but not necessarily) playing a secondary role. It is argued that natural selection played an important role in evolution only after genetically mediated replication was established.\n\n " altloc: - http://www.vub.ac.be/CLEA/liane/papers/soo.htm - http://repositories.cdlib.org/postprints/1090/ chapter: ~ commentary: ~ commref: ~ confdates: ~ conference: ~ confloc: ~ contact_email: ~ creators_id: [] creators_name: - family: Gabora given: Liane M. honourific: Dr. lineage: '' date: 2006 date_type: published datestamp: 2007-06-07 department: ~ dir: disk0/00/00/55/83 edit_lock_since: ~ edit_lock_until: ~ edit_lock_user: ~ editors_id: [] editors_name: [] eprint_status: archive eprintid: 5583 fileinfo: /style/images/fileicons/text_html.png;/5583/1/soo.htm full_text_status: public importid: ~ institution: ~ isbn: ~ ispublished: pub issn: ~ item_issues_comment: [] item_issues_count: 0 item_issues_description: [] item_issues_id: [] item_issues_reported_by: [] item_issues_resolved_by: [] item_issues_status: [] item_issues_timestamp: [] item_issues_type: [] keywords: 'autocatalysis, acquired characteristics, natural selection, protocell, self-replicating automaton, origin of life' lastmod: 2011-03-11 08:56:51 latitude: ~ longitude: ~ metadata_visibility: show note: ~ number: 3 pagerange: 443-450 pubdom: TRUE publication: Journal of Theoretical Biology publisher: ~ refereed: TRUE referencetext: |- Accardi, L., Fedullo A., 1982. 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Biol. 220, 323-343. relation_type: [] relation_uri: [] reportno: ~ rev_number: 8 series: ~ source: ~ status_changed: 2007-09-12 17:10:47 subjects: - bio-evo - bio-theory succeeds: ~ suggestions: ~ sword_depositor: ~ sword_slug: ~ thesistype: ~ title: 'Self-other organization: Why early life did not evolve through natural selection' type: journalp userid: 352 volume: 241