Connectionists: how the brain works?
Danko Nikolic
danko.nikolic at googlemail.com
Wed Mar 19 18:03:17 EDT 2014
Hi Brian,
Practopoiesis is not a theory of the entire organism such that it
would be some sort of an overkill for explaining the brain and behavior.
Practopoiesis is primarily a theory of how the brain creates behavior.
It was just to my surprise to discover post hoc that these same
principles apply to the rest of biology (including genotype-phenotype
relation).
You asked:
"Personally, I just want to create a happy being that can think
faster than me and answer my philosophical questions and lend a hand
with solving physics problems. How will practopoiesis help me do this,
beyond me using basic heuristics from psychology, such as just taking a
quick look at lesion studies and psychopathologies, which can help
inform which parts of the brain, and which details I need to include?"
Practopoiesis tells you why the current approaches did not work so far.
It explains what was missing. It also describes some of the properties
of this missing component so that one could go ahead and look for it in
the brain. Also, it describes the contribution of this component to
working memory, attention, semantics and to a few other aspects of
cognition (I am not sure about happiness though).
You wrote:
"For example, I already have a quite functional system that seems to
accomplish the same thing as practopoiesis. I call the "genotype" the
first principle component, and the "phenotype" all the rest of the
components."
The first principle component of brain network variance is an
interesting idea of compressing a brain model. You could use it also in
a practopoietic system. However, practopoiesis tells you that you will
need something else in addition. The network of the brain, irrespective
of whether it is compressed or not, can produce only one traverse.
Plasticity can add another traverse. So, you would then have in total
two traverses. Practopoiesis tells you that you need in total three
traverses. You can think of it as three stages of transition from
genotype to phenotype, whereby in each new transition, the previous
phenotype plays a role of genotype of the new phenotype, and so on. Thus
you would need to scan three different levels of the brain: network +
plasticity + one more named 'anapoiesis' (and then perhaps one can use
your idea and compress each by PCA). Practopoietic theory explains why
you need three and why one or two are not enough.
Danko
On 3/19/2014 9:55 PM, Brian J Mingus wrote:
> Hi Danko,
>
> I think I grok what you are saying and this sounds like a useful
> contribution to me. That said, I don't think most folks are interested
> in understanding the entire organism, and indeed, such an endeavor
> would seem to require an almost complete description of reality.
> Personally, I just want to create a happy being that can think faster
> than me and answer my philosophical questions and lend a hand with
> solving physics problems. How will practopoiesis help me do this,
> beyond me using basic heuristics from psychology, such as just taking
> a quick look at lesion studies and psychopathologies, which can help
> inform which parts of the brain, and which details I need to include?
>
> For example, I already have a quite functional system that seems to
> accomplish the same thing as practopoiesis. I call the "genotype" the
> first principle component, and the "phenotype" all the rest of the
> components.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Brian
>
>
> On Wed, Mar 19, 2014 at 2:38 PM, Danko Nikolic
> <danko.nikolic at googlemail.com <mailto:danko.nikolic at googlemail.com>>
> wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>
> The problem of detailed vs. abstract forms that is being discussed
> is in the heart of practopoietic theory: It addresses that problem
> in a way similar to the distinction between genotype and
> phenotype. For example, if the basic architectural principles of
> cortex would correspond to genotype, then the specific variation
> due to a particular sensory modality would correspond to
> phenotype. Practopoiesis generalizes these
> genotype-phenotype--like relations to all levels of system
> organization: It defines hierarchical organization of cybernetic
> knowledge, each higher level possessing more specific version of
> the knowledge provided by the preceding one.
>
> Practopoiesis suggests that the most interesting part is not a
> choice of describing the system either with detailed or with
> abstract operations. Instead, the process of transition from
> abstract to details is the important one to understand. This
> transition process, called 'traverse', is responsible for
> development of the organism, learning new knowledge, execution of
> cognitive operations, and generation of behavior. In each case,
> some general knowledge gets instantiated into more specific one.
> Practopoiesis explains how this happens within a hierarchy, and
> what the role of a continuous interaction with the environment is.
>
> Danko
>
>
>
> On 3/19/2014 9:07 PM, Brian J Mingus wrote:
>> Hi Jim,
>>
>> Focusing too much on the details is risky in and of itself.
>> Optimal compression requires a balance, and we can't compute what
>> that balance is (all models are wrong). One thing we can say for
>> sure is that we should err on the side of simplicity, and adding
>> detail to theories before simpler explanations have failed is not
>> Ockham's heuristic. That said it's still in the space of a Big
>> Data fuzzy science approach, where we throw as much data from as
>> many levels of analysis as we can come up with into a big pot and
>> then construct a theory. The thing to keep in mind is that when
>> we start pruning this model most of the details are going to
>> disappear, because almost all of them are irrelevant. Indeed, the
>> size of the description that includes all the details is almost
>> infinite, whereas the length of the description that explains
>> almost all the variance is extremely short, especially in
>> comparison. This is why Ockham's razor is a good heuristic. It
>> helps prevent us from wasting time on unnecessary details by
>> suggesting that we only inquire as to the details once our
>> existing simpler theory has failed to work.
>>
>> Brian
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Mar 19, 2014 at 12:42 PM, james bower <bower at uthscsa.edu
>> <mailto:bower at uthscsa.edu>> wrote:
>>
>> Actually, the previous statement is only true in its most
>> abstract form -which in that form also applies to the heart,
>> the kidney and trees too. So not sure what use that is.
>> (trees used cellular based communication to react to
>> predation by insects - and at least mine look like they are
>> in pain when they do so).
>>
>>
>> the further statement about similar developmental processes
>> for cortical like brain structures is also only true in its
>> most abstract sense. In particular, the cerebellum has a
>> quite unique form of cortical development (very different
>> from the frontal cortical structures. cell migration
>> patterns, the way cellular components get connected, as well
>> as general timing - all of which are almost certainly
>> important to its function. The cerebellum, for example,
>> largely develops entirely postnatally in most mammals. It is
>> also important to note that cerebellar development is also
>> considerably better understood than is the case for cerebral
>> cortex.
>>
>> Again, as I have argued many times before - in biology
>> (perhaps unfortunately) the devil (and therefore the
>> computation) is in the details. Gloss over them at your risk.
>>
>> Jim
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Mar 19, 2014, at 12:50 PM, Juyang Weng <weng at cse.msu.edu
>> <mailto:weng at cse.msu.edu>> wrote:
>>
>> > Mike,
>> >
>> > Yes, they are very different in the signals they receive
>> and process after at least several months' development
>> prenatally, but this is
>> > not a sufficiently deep causality for us to truly
>> understand how the brain works. Cerebral cortex, hippocampus
>> and cerebellum are all very similar in the mechanisms that
>> enable them to develop into what they are, prenatally and
>> postnatally.
>> >
>> > An intuitive way to think of this deeper causality is:
>> Development is cell-based. The same set of cell properties
>> enables cells to migrate, connect and form cerebral cortex,
>> hippocampus and cerebellum while each cell taking signals
>> from other cells.
>> >
>> > -John
>> >
>> > On 3/14/14 3:40 PM, Michael Arbib wrote:
>> >> At 11:17 AM 3/14/2014, Juyang Weng wrote:
>> >>> The brain uses a single architecture to do all brain
>> functions we are aware of! It uses the same architecture to
>> do vision, audition, motor, reasoning, decision making,
>> motivation (including pain avoidance and pleasure seeking,
>> novelty seeking, higher emotion, etc.).
>> >>
>> >> Gosh -- and I thought cerebral cortex, hippocampus and
>> cerebellum were very different from each other.
>> >>
>> >
>> > --
>> > --
>> > Juyang (John) Weng, Professor
>> > Department of Computer Science and Engineering
>> > MSU Cognitive Science Program and MSU Neuroscience Program
>> > 428 S Shaw Ln Rm 3115
>> > Michigan State University
>> > East Lansing, MI 48824 USA
>> > Tel: 517-353-4388 <tel:517-353-4388>
>> > Fax: 517-432-1061 <tel:517-432-1061>
>> > Email: weng at cse.msu.edu <mailto:weng at cse.msu.edu>
>> > URL: http://www.cse.msu.edu/~weng/
>> <http://www.cse.msu.edu/%7Eweng/>
>> > ----------------------------------------------
>> >
>>
>>
>>
>
> --
>
> Prof. Dr. Danko Nikolic
>
>
> Web:http://www.danko-nikolic.com
> Mail address 1: Department of Neurophysiology Max Planck Institut
> for Brain Research Deutschordenstr. 46 60528 Frankfurt am Main
> GERMANY Mail address 2: Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies
> Wolfgang Goethe University Ruth-Moufang-Str. 1 60433 Frankfurt am
> Main GERMANY ---------------------------- Office: (..49-69)
> 96769-736 Lab: (..49-69) 96769-209 Fax: (..49-69) 96769-327
> danko.nikolic at gmail.com <mailto:danko.nikolic at gmail.com>
> ----------------------------
>
>
--
Prof. Dr. Danko Nikolic
Web: http://www.danko-nikolic.com
Mail address 1:
Department of Neurophysiology
Max Planck Institut for Brain Research
Deutschordenstr. 46
60528 Frankfurt am Main
GERMANY
Mail address 2:
Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies
Wolfgang Goethe University
Ruth-Moufang-Str. 1
60433 Frankfurt am Main
GERMANY
----------------------------
Office: (..49-69) 96769-736
Lab: (..49-69) 96769-209
Fax: (..49-69) 96769-327
danko.nikolic at gmail.com
----------------------------
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