The Evolution Parallel
Speciation occurs when a same species is separated into two or more groups and enough generations pass so that either group has differentiated enough that it can no longer create viable offspring with the other group. As natural selection biases adaptations that are more suited for a particular environment, the groups end up becoming more different.
A great metaphor for this is socks.
For myself, I’ve given up on the exercise of looking for pairs and just wear the same type of sock. However, after so many washes, an individual sock may become so different and incompatible when compared with a new sock. It’s like I’m wearing different socks altogether.
OK, so what can we take from this?
We learn through metaphor. Something is just like x but in a different situation.
Now the twist… we can use generative AI to come up with very powerful metaphors for us to understand complex topics, or at least help shape our understanding.
Prompt to try: What are a few metaphors for how [insert highly technical topic] works?
This is one way to supercharge our own learning of topics. We can start to see patterns of how different things in nature and technology are analogous.
