 Wilkins et al. (2012) argue that, over time, in a reactor with limited incoming chemical species, hypercycles (as defined by Eigen et al. 1991) of reactions will tend to include reaction types that are more stable and capture more source molecules and energy than variant reaction types, leading to the evolution by natural selection of replicator-like molecules as well as energetically efficient “metabolic” molecules. Recent work in biochemistry has added strength to that suggestion (Altstein 2015). Hence, given that no replicator is required for selection (in this case, chemical), replicator molecules can be seen as the outcome of selective evolution, not a necessary prior condition for it. In effect, the evolution of replicators is the first major transition of evolution, despite the view of Szathmáry and Maynard Smith that replicators needed to come first (Maynard Smith &amp; Szathmáry 1995; Szathmáry &amp; Maynard Smith 1997). Bourrat (2014) further developed this idea into a series of agent-based models. He showed that replication is an attractor in populations lacking heritability once small random mutations increasing or decreasing the fidelity of character inheritance are introduced.