Briefly, Bateson's Rule asserts in its simplest form that when an assymetrical lateral appendage (e.g., a right hand) is reduplicated, the resulting reduplicated limb will be bilaterally symmetrical consisting of two parts each a mirror image of the other and so placed that a plane of symmetry could be imagined between them.

In his attempt to demonstrate a sort of order which the biologists of his day had largely ignored he was guided by the notion, never clearly formulated, that the place to look for regularity in variation would be precisely where variation had its impact upon what was already regular and repetitive. The phenomena of symmetry and metamerism, themselves strikingly regular, must surely have been brought about by regularities or "laws" within the evolutionary process and, therefore, the variations of symmetry and metamerism should precisely exemplify these laws at work.

In the language of today, we might say that he was groping for those orderly characteristics of living things which illustrate the fact that organisms evolve and develop within cybernetics organizational and other communicational limitations. (SEM 379-380)

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