TY - JOUR T1 - Theoretical and Empirical Support for Bilateral Decrementation JF - bioRxiv DO - 10.1101/064493 SP - 064493 AU - Idan S. Solon Y1 - 2016/01/01 UR - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2016/07/18/064493.abstract N2 - The theory is introduced that individuals in many species practice dual strategies, which are, herein, called amplification and reservation. In amplification, individuals respond to various feedback about their relative fitness (hereafter, “fitness” is used to mean general ability against biotic and abiotic stressors) by adjusting their ability to reproduce in the direction of their relative fitness, such that fitter individuals garner an even greater reproductive share than otherwise. In reservation, fitter individuals, in particular, refrain from functioning maximally against the natural enemies most likely to rapidly evolve a set of mutations that eliminates the practicing allele. This reservation primarily 1) allows the identification of holders of the practicing allele that are fittest against these “lethal enemies,” which helps restrict reproduction to these holders and 2) attenuates selection upon holders of mutant alleles and, especially, these lethal enemies by allowing the less fit individuals in these mutant and enemy populations to garner a greater reproductive share than otherwise. That is, the dual strategies of amplification and reservation increase the selection intensity upon the practicing individuals and decrease the selection intensity upon their mutant conspecifics and lethal enemies, which promotes the frequency and persistence of these strategies. At least ten empirical phenomena are characterized by, heretofore, paradoxical decrementations in inclusive fitness and are explained by this theory of bilateral decrementation. Bilateral decrementation offers a nascent example of volitional selection practiced in nature and the prevalence with which it is practiced confers empirical support for robust selection at higher levels than kin (e.g., spatial, group). ER -