Cognition and biology: perspectives from information theory

A Novel Fractional-Order Chaotic Phase Synchronization Model for Visual Selection and Shifting

Visual information processing is one of the fields of cognitive informatics. In this paper, a two-layer fractional-order chaotic network, which can simulate the mechanism of visual selection and shifting, is established. Unlike other object selection models, the proposed model introduces control units to select object. The first chaotic network layer of the model is used to implement image segmentation. A control layer is added as the second layer, consisting of a central neuron, which controls object selection and shifting. To implement visual selection and shifting, a strategy is proposed that can achieve different subnets corresponding to the objects in the first layer synchronizing with the central neuron at different time. The central unit acting as the central nervous system synchronizes with different subnets (hybrid systems), implementing the mechanism of visual selection and shifting in the human system. The proposed model corresponds better with the human visual system than the typical model of visual information encoding and transmission and provides new possibilities for further analysis of the mechanisms of the human cognitive system. The reasonability of the proposed model is verified by experiments using artificial and natural images.

Life, cognition and metabiology

At the biological level, what is innate is the result of an evolutionary process and is "programed" by natural selection. Natural selection is the "coder" (once linked to the emergence of meaning). This coupled process is indissolubly correlated with the continuous construction of new formats in accordance with the unfolding of ever-new mathematics, a mathematics that necessarily moulds coder's activity. Hence, the necessity of articulating and inventing a mathematics capable of engraving itself in an evolutionary landscape in accordance with the opening up of meaning. In this sense, for instance, the realms of non-standard models and non-standard analysis represent, today, a fruitful perspective in order to point out, in mathematical terms, some of the basic concepts concerning the articulation of an adequate intentional information theory.

A new formal perspective on 'Cambrian explosions'

The 'Cambrian explosion' 500 Myr ago saw a relatively sudden proliferation of organism Bauplan and ecosystem niche structure that continues to haunt evolutionary biology. Here, adapting standard methods from information theory and statistical mechanics, we model the phenomenon as a noise-driven phase transition, in the context of deep-time relaxation of current path-dependent evolutionary constraints. The result is analogous to recent suggestions that multiple 'explosions' of increasing complexity in the genetic code were driven by rising intensities of available metabolic free energy. In the absence of severe path-dependent lock-in, 'Cambrian explosions' are standard features of blind evolutionary process, representing outliers in the ongoing routine of evolutionary punctuated equilibrium.