Is Self-Replication Required for the Growth of Knowledge?

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Tyler Mills’s avatar
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What is the distinction between replication and self-replication?

Tyler Mills’s avatar

The distinction is where the knowledge for performing the replication is physically located.

Replication is: an entity in an environment being recreated or copied because of the environment (which can include the entity, as in the case of self-replication). The general case.

Self-replication is the special case of replication where: an entity is replicated as caused by aspects of itself alone. The knowledge for its replication is within it.