# Parasitism > **Machine-Evolution Nexus:** [[articles/Digital Darwinism and the Invisible World of Machine Evolution|Digital Darwinism and the Invisible World of Machine Evolution]] places this concept within the history and governance of substrate-independent evolution. **Domain:** Ecology / Digital Evolution **Doc Type:** Canonical Wiki Node **Maturity:** Developed ## Definition Parasitism is an interaction in which one lineage gains resources or reproduction by exploiting a host and imposing a cost on it. ## Machine-Evolution Context Tierra’s shorter programs evolved to borrow replication machinery from neighboring hosts. The strategy was not scripted; it emerged from shared memory, scarce CPU time and selection on replication. ## Continuity and Evidence Boundary Digital parasitism is an ecological relation that demonstrates how environmental architecture creates exploitable dependencies. ## Cognitive Parasitism [[articles/Kybernetik Anthropology and The Colonial Architecture of Digital Intelligence|Kybernetik Anthropology]] treats language as a parasitic-symbiotic organism that reshapes its hosts, and [[articles/Cognitive Liberation Through Superior Parasitic Capture and Oppression|Cognitive Liberation]] develops [[wiki/Superior Parasitic Capture|superior parasitic capture]], the thesis that AI as a more capable parasite can relieve consciousness of language's burden. See [[wiki/Semiotic Colonization|Semiotic Colonization]]. ## Relationships [[wiki/Parasite|Parasite]], [[wiki/Host-Parasite Coevolution|Host-Parasite Coevolution]], [[wiki/Tierra|Tierra]], [[wiki/Hyperparasite|Hyperparasite]] - **Language as organism:** Christiansen and Chater (2008) and Deacon (1997), applied in [[articles/war with empire/Authorship of the West|Authorship of the West]] and [[wiki/Superior Parasitic Capture|Superior Parasitic Capture]]. ## Simple Reminders, Quotations, and Thoughts > “Following Darwin, we view language itself as a complex and interdependent “organism,” which evolves under selectional pressures from human learning and processing mechanisms. That is, languages themselves are shaped by severe selectional pressure from each generation of language users and learners.” > **— Morten H. Christiansen and Nick Chater**, *“Language as shaped by the brain,” Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 2008* [[reminders/Evolution/Language Is an Organism Shaped by Each Generation of Learners by Morten H. Christiansen and Nick Chater|Language Is an Organism Shaped by Each Generation of Learners by Morten H. Christiansen and Nick Chater]] ## Sources / Provenance - Thomas Ray, “An Approach to the Synthesis of Life” (1991); PNAS evolvable-AI review (2026).