COEVOLUTION AS AN EVOLUTIONARY GAME

Coevolution is modeled as a continuous game where the fitness‐maximizing strategy of an individual is assumed to be a function of the strategy of other individuals who are also under selection to maximize fitness. An evolutionary stable strategy (ESS) is sought such that no rare alternative strategies can invade the community. The approach can be used to model coevolution because the ESS may be composed of a coalition of more than one strategy. This work, by modeling frequency‐dependent selection, extends the approach of Roughgarden (1976) which only considered density‐dependent selection. In particular, we show that the coevolutionary model of Rummel and Roughgarden (1985) does contain frequency‐dependent selection, and thus, their application of Roughgarden's criterion for evolutionary stability to a model for which it is not applicable leads to the erroneous conclusion that the ecological and evolutionary processes are in conflict.

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