The Replicator-Optimization Mechanism: A Scale-Relative Formalism for Persistence-Conditioned Dynamics with Application to Consent-Based Metaethics
Murad Farzulla
TL;DR
The paper addresses the problem of cross-domain dynamical similarities by introducing the Replicator-Optimization Mechanism (ROM), a scale-relative bookkeeping framework that parameterizes dynamics with a scale-specific kernel $(\rho_S, w_S, M_S)$. It advances three main contributions: (i) a scale-relative kernel parameterization that enables domain-spanning instantiation, (ii) a consent-friction instantiation mapping friction, legitimacy, and belief-transfer to ROM for political philosophy, and (iii) a derivation path from social contract theory that converges on the same formal structure as biological formulations. The work also supplies an explicit bridge principle linking descriptive dynamics to instrumental normativity, discusses pathologies such as latent versus observed friction, and presents testable predictions and an empirical validation program. Overall, ROM provides a coordinate system for formalizing and comparing cross-domain dynamics, offering a principled, testable framework and a normative-relevant lens for governance and institutional design.
Abstract
This paper formalizes a widely used dynamical class--replicator-mutator dynamics and Price-style selection-and-transmission--and makes explicit the modeling choices (scale, atomic unit, interaction topology, transmission kernel) that determine how this class instantiates across domains. The backbone is known; we do not claim to have discovered selection. The novel contributions are threefold: (i) a scale-relative kernel parameterization where atomic units are themselves parameters, enabling systematic instantiation across physics, biology, economics, cognition, and social organization; (ii) a consent-friction instantiation for political philosophy, where friction is the primitive, legitimacy functions as survival probability, and belief-transfer functions as mutation kernel; and (iii) a derivation path from social contract theory rather than from biology or physics, arriving at the same formal structure via an independent route. We provide a bridge principle connecting descriptive dynamics to instrumental normativity: if agents prefer lower expected friction, then "ought" claims are shorthand for policies that reduce expected friction under the specified dynamics. This conditional structure avoids the is-ought fallacy while grounding normative discourse in empirically tractable dynamics. We address pathological cases (authoritarian stability, suppressed friction) through explicit modeling of latent versus observed friction. The framework generates testable predictions through operationalization of friction, legitimacy, and belief-transfer dynamics, and is falsifiable at the level of measurement apparatus rather than formal structure.