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Information, Computation, Cognition. Agency-Based Hierarchies of Levels

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Fundamental Issues of Artificial Intelligence

Part of the book series: Synthese Library ((SYLI,volume 376))

Abstract

This paper connects information with computation and cognition via concept of agents that appear at variety of levels of organization of physical/chemical/cognitive systems – from elementary particles to atoms, molecules, life-like chemical systems, to cognitive systems starting with living cells, up to organisms and ecologies. In order to obtain this generalized framework, concepts of information, computation and cognition are generalized. In this framework, nature can be seen as informational structure with computational dynamics, where an (info-computational) agent is needed for the potential information of the world to actualize. Starting from the definition of information as the difference in one physical system that makes a difference in another physical system – which combines Bateson and Hewitt’s definitions, the argument is advanced for natural computation as a computational model of the dynamics of the physical world, where information processing is constantly going on, on a variety of levels of organization. This setting helps us to elucidate the relationships between computation, information, agency and cognition, within the common conceptual framework, with special relevance for biology and robotics.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The deep learning model (Hinton et al. 2006) involves “learning the distribution of a high level representation using a restricted Boltzmann machine to model each higher layer” (Smolensky 1986).

  2. 2.

    Some of the issues discussed here have been discussed by the author in a recent book Computing Nature and in the book Information and Computation. This paper presents a synthesis of the previously developed arguments.

  3. 3.

    This “processing” can be either intrinsic (spontaneously going on) within any physical system or designed such as in computing machinery.

  4. 4.

    For majority of computationalists, computing nature is performing discrete computation. Zuse for example represents his calculating space as cellular automata, but the assumption about the type of computation is not essential for the idea that “the universe <computes> its next state from the previous one” (Chaitin 2007).

  5. 5.

    Sub-symbolic computations take place in neural networks, as signal processing which leads to concept formation following pattern recognition.

  6. 6.

    The expression “registered” is borrowed from Brian Cantwell Smith (1998).

  7. 7.

    More on current understanding of information can be found in the Handbook of the Philosophy of Information (Benthem van and Adriaans 2008).

  8. 8.

    Even though Maturana and Varela identify process of life with cognition, Maturana refuses the information processing view of cognition. It should be noted that it is based on traditional concept of information.

  9. 9.

    Characterized by chance or indeterminate elements, Merriam-Webster online dictionary.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Chalmers University of Technology & University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden

    Gordana Dodig-Crnkovic

  2. Mälardalen University, Västerås, Sweden

    Gordana Dodig-Crnkovic

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  1. Gordana Dodig-Crnkovic
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Correspondence to Gordana Dodig-Crnkovic .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Future of Humanity Institute Department of Philosophy & Oxford Martin School, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK

    Vincent C. Müller

  2. Anatolia College/ACT, Thessaloniki, Greece

    Vincent C. Müller

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Dodig-Crnkovic, G. (2016). Information, Computation, Cognition. Agency-Based Hierarchies of Levels. In: Müller, V.C. (eds) Fundamental Issues of Artificial Intelligence. Synthese Library, vol 376. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-26485-1_10

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