CONCEPT
Extended Phenotype (Dawkins)
The gene's reach beyond the body — beaver dams, spider webs, AI systems — artifacts shaped by replicators to propagate themselves, extending phenotypic expression into the environment.
Richard Dawkins's Extended Phenotype (1982) thesis holds that a gene's phenotypic effects are not bounded by the organism's skin. The beaver's dam is as much a phenotypic expression of beaver genes as the beaver's teeth — built by those genes, selected because it serves their propagation. This principle applies to any artifact produced by organisms: tools, nests, burrows, and now computational systems. Dawkins considered The Extended Phenotype his most important intellectual contribution, a clarification and extension of the gene's-eye view that dissolved the conceptual boundary between organism and environment. In the AI context, the extended phenotype framework reveals large language models as extended phenotypes of the human meme pool — artifacts built by the accumulated cultural information of the species, serving the propagation of patterns rather than any individual builder's welfare.
In The You On AI Field Guide
The standard phenotype consists of the organism's observable traits — eye color, height, metabolic rate — produced by genes interacting with developmental environments. Dawkins's innovation was to