Design for a Brain: The Origin of Adaptive BehaviourTHE book is not a treatise on aIl cerebral mechanisms but a pro poscd solution of a specific problem: the origin of the nervous system's unique ability to produce adaptive behaviour. The work has as basis the fact that the nervous system behaves adap tively and the hypothesis that it is essentiaIly mechanistic; it proceeds on the assumption that these two data are not irrecon cilable. It attempts to deduce from the observed facts what sort of a mechanism it must be that behaves so differently from any machinc made so far. Other proposed solutions have usuaIly left open the question whether so me different theory might not fit the facts equaIly weIl: I have attempted to deduce what is necessary, what properties the nervous system must have if it is to behave at once mechanisticaIly and adaptively. For the deduction to be rigorous, an adequately developed logic of mechanism is essential. Until recently, discussions of mechan ism were carried on almost entirely in terms of so me particular embodiment-the mechanical, the electronic, the neuronie, and so on. Those days are past. There now exists a weIl-developed logic of pure mechanism, rigorous as geometry, and likely to play the same fundamental part, in our understanding of the complex systems of biology, that geometry does in astronomy. Only by the dcvelopment of this basic logic has thc work in this book been made possible. |
Contents
The Problem | 1 |
Dynamic Systems | 13 |
The Organism as Machine | 30 |
Copyright | |
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action activity adaptation amoeboid animal arrow assumed basic behave brain canonical representation cause cerebral cortex change value Chapter co-ordination complex concept confluent connexions consider constant corresponds cortex defined definition determined developed diagram of immediate displaced disturbance dx/dt dynamic system environment equations equilibrial equilibrium essential variables example experiment experimenter fact feedback field follows functions gene-pattern give given happens Homeostat immediate effects independent input interacting kitten learning limits line of behaviour living organism machine magnet main variables mechanism method motor cortex move movement multistable system muscles natural selection nervous system neurons nexion noticed observed occur P₁ P₂ parameter-values parameters part-functions particular polystable system position possible primary operations problem properties random reacting reaction relation representative point retroactive inhibition selection simple specified state-determined system step-function form step-mechanisms stimulation subsystems Suppose temperature tion trial ultrastable system uniselector unstable usually whole x₁ zero