Trigger Happy
But nothing could be certain in the great evolutionary game. Some seemingly successful species found it impossible to adapt swiftly enough to catastrophic changes in the environment, and died out. They were the dinosaurs. (By copying their “code” and letting it gestate under laboratory conditions, however, we can actually bring these fossils to life again, and let them roam happy, if confused, in virtual amusement parks.)
Nor was this evolution a gradual and inexorable expansion of possibilities and types. There seems to be no final goal to the random machinations of Nature. Some species of game, for example, turned at certain points down evolutionary blind alleys and failed to develop, concentrating instead, like the peacock, on attracting partners with ever more lurid visual displays. Other species merged, pooling resources and erasing previous distinctions to become the great games that we know and love.
The narrative of these manifold splittings and fusings, this
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