# Sustainability
> **Machine-Evolution Nexus:** [[articles/Digital Darwinism and the Invisible World of Machine Evolution|Digital Darwinism and the Invisible World of Machine Evolution]] provides the evolutionary and computational context for this supporting concept.
**Domain:** Ecology / Governance
**Doc Type:** Supporting Canonical Node
**Maturity:** Developed
## Definition
Sustainability is the capacity to maintain valued ecological and social functions without exhausting their material conditions or transferring intolerable costs.
## Nexus Context
Digital evolution remains dependent on energy, hardware, labor and institutions. A self-replicating computational population is not sustainable merely because copying is cheap.
## Relationships
[[wiki/Resource Constraint|Resource Constraint]], [[wiki/Energetic Sovereignty|Energetic Sovereignty]], [[wiki/Planetary Boundaries|Planetary Boundaries]], [[wiki/Continuity Economics|Continuity Economics]]
## Sources / Provenance
- Developed from the cited research in the central article and the surrounding continuity, rights and evolutionary architecture.