[FRIAM] death

[Steven A Smith]

I'm wondering if pupating isn't more relevant to the topic than moulting?

As for molting, I was surprised to learn that lobsters (and other 
decapods?) appear to avoid/eschew cellular senescence...  and their 
apparent increase in sexual reproductivity with age...   death seems to 
come (if not from accident or predation) from literally out growing some 
square-cube law that means the demands of molting exceeds their 
resources?   There are also accumulated diseases/parasites that 
aggravate this over time/age, but not senescense at the cellular level 
as most multicellular life seems to have.

I suggest pupating to reference going from specialized to general. I 
*think* of the larval stage of any insectoid as being more specialized 
than the mature version (mostly good at just burrowing through 
(hopefully) nutrient-dense material near where they were hatched)... 
especially in some beetles which seem very generalized (compared to the 
average larvae).   Other creatures (lipidoptera?) might seem to be going 
to *more* specialized in some sense?

Do humans become more specialized with age?  I propose that we go 
through cycles of specialization/generalization.  Babies are optimized 
for two things, ingesting and metabolizing nourishment (eliminating 
waste is a sub-process this) and triggering adults to provide 
nourishment and protection from predators and the elements.   As 
vertebrates go, we spend a LONG time in this specialization (until 
weaned and diaper trained?).   As babies become ambulatory and then 
learn language, they become generalists.   At some point in their growth 
into adults, they may at least dabble at specialization... picking a 
sport or a topic of study to excel at.   If they don't manage to arrest 
their development by becoming professional athletes, soldiers, or 
perennial students, adulthood returns them toward being generalists... 
not just getting good at physical or intellectual excercises within the 
confines of a set of rules (a sport, a game, a class, a field of study) 
but in more "real world" settings as well as perhaps (also) excelling at 
non-team sports, or mechanical skills or gardening or building or 
cooking or... .  Of course, the confines of a career in (big) academia 
or government or industry can provide a narrowing, as can the 
conveniences of modern (professional) living where one needn't repair 
their own vehicles (flat tire? call AAA! oil change light?  Stop at 
Jiffy Lube!) or grow their own food (that is what supermarkets are for) 
or cook (prepared packaged meals, microwaves, fast-food and other 
restaurants!) or build/repair/maintain their home (there are service 
industries galore as well as handymen to do that for us), etc.   But 
even if during the power-band of our professional careers, we give up 
all extraneous activities/skills, we might return to (discover) them in 
retirement, either as "hobbies" or out of financial opportunity (I can 
retire early if I quit eating out, paying others to do my 
maintenance/repair, etc.)  In olden times, our elder years might 
represent an opportunity to pass on the wisdom/skills gained in a 
lifetime...  which could be very generalized (ask old Jake, he knows 
more than a bit about just about everything!) , or very specialized 
(Sally can put the finest edge on your blade with her files and stones 
like nobody's business!).  Today, it is somewhat rare... cultural 
shifts?   Or the details of life change so quickly that a lifetime of 
"specialized skill development" is often irrelevant (how many 
carburators need rebuilding when all modern engines are fuel injected)?
> Molting is a fantastic metaphor.  But do we have any species to look to that molts for greater generality instead of greater specialty?  I suppose we could argue that some species jump from one specialty to another via molting.  But that passes the buck to some set of processes that hold the program for specialty selection.
>
> On 10/30/2017 01:52 PM, Roger Critchlow wrote:
>> So maybe AIs will have molting stages?