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Alife Digest Number 114
Alife Digest, Number 114
Wednesday, November 10th 1993
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~ Artificial Life Distribution List ~
~ ~
~ All submissions for distribution to: alife@cognet.ucla.edu ~
~ All list subscriber additions, deletions, or administrative details to: ~
~ alife-request@cognet.ucla.edu ~
~ All software, tech reports to Alife depository through ~
~ anonymous ftp at ftp.cognet.ucla.edu in ~ftp/pub/alife (128.97.50.19) ~
~ ~
~ List maintainer: Greg Werner ~
~ Artificial Life Research Group, UCLA ~
~ ~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Today's Topics:
Calendar of Alife Related Events
IWANN 93 Proceedings available
Alife methods in image procesisng/compression
The 14th International Congress on Cybernetics
Autopoiesis matters
WWW-server on Cybernetics and Systems Theory
****************************************************************************
Subject: Calendar of Alife Related Events
Neural Information Processing Systems, Denver, CO Nov 29-Dec 2, 1993 v98
A. L.: A Bridge towards a New AI,San Sebastian, Spain Dec 10-11, 1993 v113
Vancouver Cognitive Science Conference, BC, Canada Feb 11-12, 1994 v111
Third Conf on Evolutionary Programming, San Diego, CA Feb 24-25, 1994 v103
AAAI Spring Symposium, Stanford CA Mar 21-23, 199 v110
Cybernetics and Systems Research, Vienna April 5-8, 1994 v101,103
Florida AI Research Symposium, Pensacola Beach, FL May 5-7, 1994 v113
Integrating Knowledge and Neural Heuristics May 9-10, 1994 v111
Intnl Conf Knowledge Rep and Reasoning, Bonn, Germany May 24-27, 1994 v101
IEEE Computational Intelligence, Lake Buena Vista FL Jun 26-Jul 2, 1994 v106
Alife IV, Cambridge MA July 6-8, 1994 v108
Simulation of Adaptive Behavior, Brighton, UK Aug 8-12, 1994 v101
Intnl Congress on Cybernetics, Namur, Belgium August 21-26, 1995 v114
****************************************************************************
------------------------------
From: Joan Cabestany <cabestan@eel.upc.es>
Subject: Proceedings available
After the last edition of IWANN'93 (International Workshop on Artificial
Neural Networks) held in Spain (Sitges) during June 1993, some books with
the Proceedings are still available at special price.
Reference:
New Trends in Neural Computation (IWANN'93 Proceedings)
J.Mira, J.Cabestany, A.Prieto editors
Lecture Notes in Computer Science number 686
SPRINGER VERLAG 1993
Price: 9000 pesetas (spanish currency)
Method of payment:
VISA Card number _________________________ Expiration date _______________
Name of card holder ______________________________________________________
Date ____________ Signature ___________________________________
Send this form to
ULTRAMAR CONGRESS
Att. Mr. J.Balada
Diputacio, 238, 3
08007 BARCELONA Spain
Fax + 34.3.412.03.19
------------------------------
From: hurd@math.gatech.edu (Lyman Hurd)
Subject: Alife methods in image procesisng/compression
Can anyone point me towards references about the use of A-life
techniques (classifier systems, genetic algorithm,...) applied to
image segmentation, feature recognition, image compression or related
fields. Both still and moving pictures (object discrimination,
motion compensation) are of interest.
Thanks for any pointers,
Lyman Hurd
Iterated Systems, Inc.
Norcross GA
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 29 Oct 93 08:57:38 GMT
From: cyb@info.fundp.ac.be (CYB)
Subject: The 14th International Congress on Cybernetics
will be held in Namur (Belgium)
August 21-26, 1995
Information:
International Association for Cybernetics
place Ryckmans
B 5000 Namur
tel +32-81-73 52 09
fax +32-81-23 09 43
e-mail cyb@info.fundp.ac.be
------------------------------
From: "Mark W. Tilden" <mwtilden@math.uwaterloo.ca>
Following the plow of requests, here is the latest info on the next
BEAM Robot Games.
The Third BEAM Robot Games are scheduled for March 4-6th, 1994 at the
CNE Automotive Building in Toronto as part of the Canadian Home Hobby
show. Those that have competed before or sent their Real-mail
addresses will receive flyers and details by Real mail. For those that
wish further details, contact:
Canada First Inc.
797 Don Mills Road,
Mony Life Building, 10th floor,
Don Mills, Ont.,
Canada
M3C-3S5
Phone: 416/696-5488
Fax: 416/696-7395
They will also be the contacts for the next rulebook, shirts, buttons
and upcoming videos. They are, alas, not on Internet yet. If you send
this company your real-mail address, you will get a detailed flyer on
or before Dec 93. As well, they will have a booth at the fall home
Hobby show (Nov 5-7 at the Toronto International Centre) where the new
Guide will be sold or orders taken if the printers haven't delivered
yet. The new BEAM Rules guide will include an expanded get-started
section, previous show dossier, where, how, and rule supplements.
The Automotive Building is a massive auditorium so hopefully we won't
run into space problems like we did at the Science Centre. There is
consequently no limit to the size of robots allowed at this show,
provided it can be moved by truck.
Me, I'm off to Los Alamos NM to carry on my sinister Robotics research,
but I will be around for the games.
Is all. See you there.
------------------------------
From: George Kampis <gk@cfnext.physchem.chemie.uni-tuebingen.de>
Subject: Autopoiesis matters
Autopoiesis matters
In a recent note, <mcmullinb@vax1.dcu.ie (Barry McMullin)> suggested
new computer simulations for autopoiesis. As a long-time follower of
autopoietic theory, let me be critical with respect to what such a
simulation can bring us, and let me make some remarks about the very
concept of autopoiesis at the same time.
1. Autopoiesis - Its Contribution
Defined by Maturana and Varela in (1973), autopoiesis means
"organizational closure" (well, yes the *word* itself means
self-production), a state where the preconditions and the results of
existence coincide, in a self-referential way.
Although vague and often misinterpreted, and resting heavily on less
known earlier developments, the notion is an important one,
characterizing life on the basis of a *dynamic* instead of a
*structural* existence, and focusing on a mutuality between the
products and the producers of the living state -- in the small, on the
mutuality between the genes and the proteins, or the knowledge and the
knower.
2. The Computer Model
Let me be very explicit: taking the above definition seriously, there
can be no such thing as an algorithm for an autopoietic system.
Algorithms are prototyped by machines where there is no feedback from
the outputs towards the defining primitives. No formal system can
depend on axioms that it produces as theorems. An algorithm is, by
definition, an "allopoietic" system, one that produces something else
than itself, whereas an "autopoietic" system should be the way around.
So, for instance, the model described in (BioSystems 1974, vol 5,
187--196) depicts a unidirectional process, which proceeds from a
given input towards a given output. So, this Uribe model is clearly
not an autopoietic system at all. There is no organizational closure
in it. The model does not produce its basic components, only a few
derived ones. Who produces * (the catalyst), for instance (on p.
189-90)? It has to be introduced in the system by hand, and it is not
subject to any production or degradation process. What we see here is
a dependent or controlled process, and not an autonomous process. In
fact any autocatalytic reaction system shows more "autonomy", as there
are at least *cycles* in autocatalysis.
It would be false to look for a tricky outway now, by means of fabrics
that allow for a "better" simulation, where we would have, instead of
the above seen straightforward and crude dependence on what in
chemistry is called a pool substance (one that is never deployed), a
situation where the supporting scaffolding becomes better concealed
behind the clumsiness of an intricate definition and behind the use of
a vast amount of different compounds. The issue is not a matter of
degrees but a matter of principles. There will be no better
simulation, there is no algorithm for self-reference.
3. But Why Autopoiesis?
Here we come to a different issue: what is it that we want, after all?
A model of autopoiesis at any rate, whatever that might be, or a model
of the living state? Autopoiesis may just not be the right concept to
begin with, if we want *models*. Autopoiesis is not a modeling
methodology at all, it is just a way, and it is a different way, of
looking at things. It is different metaphysically, much as Zen
buddhism is different from science. As it is a wrong question to ask,
what the point in Zen buddhism is, for if you ask that, you know
nothing about Zen buddhism, and, with this start, you will probably
never learn anything, it might be similarly wrong to ask for a model
of autopoiesis. Autopiesis is just a third kind of metaphysics,
besides physicalism and vitalism, containing elements of both but
making allies with neither.
This metaphysics can be best characterized as that of the Kantian
"Ding an sich", the Thing to Itself. This metaphysics involves
self-reference as a third logical primitive besides "truth" and
"falsity", as indeed implied by Varela s own work (see his Principles
of Biological Autonomy, North-Holland, 1979). In such a system, you
have no mathematical decidability, and hence no possibility for
modeling any more. Whereas this system has a high emotional and
intellectual attractiveness for an adventure of thought, it may be a
cul-de-sac with respect to various goals of ordinary science.
So why adopt this system? What do we learn by that for our models?
What should be done differently with it than without it? In its
original form, this approach is just not accessible for such a
treatment. But that does not mean no treatment of life itself (or
perhaps, Life Itself, smile) is possible.
4. Processes, Not Units
What we may need, then, is a *constructive* instead of *descriptive*
characterization (as in autopoiesis) of the circularity between the
system and its components. For instance, the circle from genes to
proteins and back can be cut off, by making reference to the process
that brings it about. There is clearly no self-reference and hence
nothing "autopoietical" at all in the process in which a given gene
yields a given protein, or a given protein contributes to the
expression of a gene. It is only our perspective (a false perspective
now), a birds-eye view that defines the cell (or the brain, for that
matter) as a global and self-referential unity instead of a web of
local causal processes.
To go for a causal description and to reject the object description is
not reductionism. It can be process thinking (in the tradition of
Heraclitus and Whitehead) instead of the essentialist thinking of
Parmenides and Plato. It is thinking in terms of emergent integrities
instead of in terms of persistent unities. From the causal point of
view, the cell is not a *thing*, it does not *exist*, in this sense.
There are various ways of trying to characterize emergent integrity.
There is connectionism, that tries to transcend the static symbolic
descriptions of the unity called brain, by going to levels below. It
may be an attempt, nothing more. In my view, it is an attempt that
fails, in its essential points. Yet the idea is there. Then there is
dynamical structuralism, with all its oddities, but with its emphasis
on temporal becoming, and on the unfolding of trajectories, instead of
the existence of pre-fixed solutions. How long it can go along that
road is another question. But again, the attempt is there. (Artificial
Life is, at best, something that pertains to dynamic structuralism, in
its present form - maybe it can be called "computational
structuralism").
And there is, somewhere in this list, a suggestion by myself, which
offers to consider the logic of component production on its own.
Developed under the name "component-systems", this theory depicts
productive processes of the kind that may interest the biologist, the
brain theorist and the cognitivce scientist, as complex and
unpredictable dynamic processes, that generate radically new
variables, yet at the same time can be *understood* and in an at least
approximative sense simulated while resting on some ordinary
metaphysics of materialism.
Or there are so many other candidates. Autopoiesis is, in the form
described, an old hat, not necessarily promoted even by its inventors
today - they just dont seem to use this word any more (instead, Varela
uses *enactment*, for instance). But that would be another story.
-- George Kampis
kampis@ludens.elte.hu
Acknowledgment
I thank Barry McMullin for FAXing me p.189 of the cited 1974 paper -on
travel, and deprived from my bureau, this was an important help.
------------------------------
From: fheyligh@vnet3.vub.ac.be (Francis Heylighen)
Subject: WWW-server on Cybernetics and Systems Theory
As part of the World-Wide Web server of the Principia Cybernetica
Project, it is our intention to make a maximum of information about
Cybernetics and Systems Theory (CYBSYS) available to the public over
the Internet. Presently the server already contains the "Glossary on
Cybernetics and Systems Theory" developed by the American Society for
Cybernetics, an extensive list of CYBSYS journals with addresses of
editors, publishers, and comments, an extensive list of national and
international CYBSYS organizations, and some general background or
introductory material about CYBSYS. In the future we plan to add a
detailed bibliography of major CYBSYS books and papers.
We would appreciate any additional material, or comments or criticisms
about the existing material. We would especially like to add more
dictionary or glossary -like material, containing (cross-referenced)
definitions of basic CYBSYS concepts and principles, in order to add
it to the existing hypertext. If anybody has such material available
in electronic form, or knows how to get in contact with someone who
has, please contact me at the above email address.
How to use the server:
World-Wide Web (WWW) is an extension to, and integration of, other
Internet services, such as telnet, newsgroups, ftp, gopher and WAIS.
WWW combines extreme power (it does everything the other systems do
and more), with maximal simplicity and ease of use. WWW allows you to
fetch files ("documents"), containing hypertext links to other,
related files, which may reside in different parts of the world. By
selecting one of the links, you automatically fetch the linked files.
In that way you can navigate through a world-wide network of
interconnected documents, without having to type in any commands. WWW
also offers multimedia support on the appropriate platforms:
hypertexts may contain color images, sounds and even animations.
WWW software is freely available for all major computer platforms, and
only requires an Internet connection. More information about WWW can
be found by anonymous ftp to info.cern.ch, (directory: /pub/www/doc
for "paper copies" of articles on WWW in PostScript and ASCII forms).
An even better introduction can be got by directly logging in to the
Web, using telnet to one of the following hosts (in mainframe systems,
the command is normally "telnet " followed by one of the following
addresses or IP numbers):
info.cern.ch
(IP number 128.141.201.74) No password required.
eies2.njit.edu
(IP number 128.235.1.43) Log in as www. A full-screen browser
vms.huji.ac.il
(IP number 128.139.4.3). Log in as www.
kufacts.cc.ukans.edu
Login as www
ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
Full screen browser, requires a vt100 terminal. Log in as www.
Free WWW-software ("browsers") can be found by anonymous ftp at the
following places:
ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu, in directory /Mosaic or /Mac/Mosaic
Mosaic multimedia browser for X-Windows, Mac and Microsoft Windows.
fatty.law.cornell.edu, in directory /pub/LII/cello
Browser for Microsoft Windows.
info.cern.ch, in directory /pub/www/bin
Several browsers (Mac, NeXt, Dec...).
Once you are connected to WWW, the Cybernetics and Systems Theory Server
can be found as part of the Principia Cybernetica Web, which is on the
geographical list of all WWW-servers under "Europe: Belgium", or on the
following WWW-address ("URL"):
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/
The Cybernetics and Systems server itself can be directly reached through
the following address:
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/CYBSYSTH.html
General info about WWW can be found at the following addresses:
http://www.vuw.ac.nz:80/non-local/gnat/www-faq.html
Frequently asked questions about WWW
http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/Summary.html
Summary of WWW
http://pulua.hcc.hawaii.edu/guide/www.guide.html
Introductory guide to WWW/Cyberspace
http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/TheProject.html
An overview of the WWW-development project
Retrieving WWW-files by email
People who are not directly connected to the Internet, yet can use
email (e.g. through Bitnet or CompuServe) can still retrieve WWW-files
by sending a message to the address:
listserv@info.cern.ch
The message should consist of one or more lines, each containing the
command "SEND" followed by the WWW-address (URL) of a desired
document. E.g. for the CYBSYS default home page a command line would
read:
SEND http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/CYBSYSTH.html
The SEND command returns the hypertext document with the given W3 address,
formatted to 72 character width (ASCII, text-only), with links numbered. A
separate list at the end gives the document-addresses of the linked
documents, which can then be requested by a subsequent message. In this
way, you can navigate through the web, albeit only at mail speed.
End of ALife Digest
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