[ECSS] This Week's Academic Talks

[coslov a. (ac10g08)]

Hello there!

So here's what's happening this week!

WEDNESDAY 2pm-3pm
STACS (formerly known as Helpdesk) will be giving an introduction to Linux on Level 4 Mountbatten (the seminar room) this Wednesday (24th) from 2pm to 3pm. Toby Hunt will be showing you how to use Linux in your studies. There will be plenty of time for questions, especially on how to use virtual machines.

THURSDAY 6pm-7pm
Adam Davies will be talking about "The Evolution of Complexity: An Adventure Quest?" from 6pm to 7pm in Seminar Room 1 (Building 58, ground floor) this Thursday (25th). Here's the spiel:

Evidence from computer simulations of evolution and lab experiments suggest that simple natural selection as Darwin described it might not be enough to explain the rich organic complexity we see around us. In other words, it appears that Darwinian evolution might be missing something, or perhaps contain a hidden assumption that is important for the evolution of complex life. Recent work suggests that this missing factor may be a particular form of structured environmental variation that is provided ‘for free’ in natural environments, but has so far been missing from simulations. Here we describe how evolution through such changing environments appears similar to an ‘adventure quest’, where species ‘pick up’ solutions to different problems in different environments, and then combine these solutions in a modular fashion to create complexity.

And that's all from ECSS this week folks!

Alina Coslov
ECSS Marketing Officer
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