Evolution in APS is not driven by a single mechanism such as natural selection, nor by a simple combination of independent processes.
Instead, it emerges from the coordinated interaction of multiple aspects of viability-oriented organisation:
- Persistence establishes the existence of viable systems
- Variation introduces structured differences within those systems
- Inheritance stabilises viable organisation across generations
- Selection filters outcomes based on their consequences for persistence
- Adaptation reorganises activity in the present to sustain viability under changing conditions
These are not independent causes, but interdependent aspects of a single, organised process.
Selection does not operate without persistence.
Variation is not evolutionarily meaningful without inheritance.
Adaptation is required for systems to persist long enough for selection to occur.
Evolution is therefore not the result of a privileged mechanism, but the emergent outcome of coordinated, multiscale organisation unfolding over time.
Key Point. Evolution in APS is a structured process of transformation grounded in the interdependence of persistence, variation, inheritance, selection, and adaptation.