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- Dual channel evolution
–
- Rainer von Königslöw, Ph.D.-
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- Two populations
- Parent generation
- Mates to produce offspring
- Offspring production is not equiprobable across all individuals in=
the
parent generation (selection)
- Information is passed through DNA, and mostly determines the struc=
ture
and function of the offspring (creation)
- Offspring generation
- Adds information from learning to the information from the DNA
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- Structure and internal functions
- External functions
- Basic innate capabilities for locomotion, perception, etc.
- Skills for future action such as running, recognizing food, predato=
rs,
desirable mates
- Constrained by innate capabilities
- Partially determined by DNA
- Partially determined by learning
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- Action
- When running, it includes stumbling over rocks, avoiding roots, etc=
.
- It is never twice precisely the same
- It has reactive components such as stumbling
- Capability and skills for a future action
- The bones and muscles may be healthy enough to allow running
- The individual may have the experience and knowledge to run from he=
re
to there
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- Capabilities for actions
- Capabilities for physical action such as running is represented by
bones, joints, and muscles
- Capabilities for perception such as recognizing a prey is represent=
ed
by eyes and ears
- Skills for running and skills for recognizing a particular kind of p=
rey
are represented by programs or scripts in an ‘inner
language’
- The ‘inner language’ blends choreography with conditions
and geometry
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- The structure and function of such an ‘inner language’=
li>
- The feasibility of such a representation is evaluated with a series=
of
simulation programs (animation)
- For this presentation we will assume that the feasibility is
established
- A program in this ‘inner language’ is an action sequence
(skill) that incorporates conditions & recognizing objects
- A program is an action plan that is interpreted or executed to produ=
ce a
specific action
- A program is encoded in bits that are stored in memory
- The bits can come from the DNA or from learning
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- Statements in the inner language that specify physical action have t=
o be
translated into muscle control that produce joint rotations
- Perceptions such as recognizing a potential prey have to be translat=
ed
into geometric forms that can be used in conditions in inner language
statements
- The translation mechanisms require information, bits that come from =
the
DNA or from learning
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- Translating instructions requiring physical action such as walking i=
nto
a sequence of coordinated joint rotations by controlling muscle tens=
ion
- Translating a pixelated image from the eyes into a form that can be
scaled and rotated so that it can be recognized, labelled, and used for acti=
on
sequences
- Translating vision into action sequences that can be executed (for
imitation), or that can be used to make predictions (to catch prey,
avoid predators)
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- We investigate 4 types of learning:
- Solo learning
- Social learning
- Learning by imitating
- Symbol-based learning
- We investigate the feasibility of using ‘inner language’
mechanisms to acquire information through learning
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- Learning by an individual where other individuals of the species need
not be present
- A good example may be babies randomly moving their arms and legs
- They might be learning how to control coordinated action – wh=
ich
in turn helps in translating inner language instructions into actio=
n
- Play and exploration demonstrate how new action sequences can be cre=
ated
- Language is good at that: “green dreams sleep furiously”=
;
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- Learning where other members of the same species are present and hav=
e a
role in the learning, but not as teacher
- Play may be a good example, where young individuals learn social and
fighting skills
- Between-individual communication is discussed below
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- Learning where one or more other members of the same species are pre=
sent
and have a role in the learning as demonstrator
- Mimicry & apprenticeship are good examples
- The learning requires mapping visual perception of the
demonstrator’s action into an inner language representation th=
at
can be executed to produce mirrored action by the imitator
- The feasibility of doing this with the integration of vision into t=
he
inner language is evaluated with a series of simulation programs
(animation)
- For this presentation we will assume that the feasibility is
established
- This type of learning has interesting implications for information
passing in evolution that will be the focus of the remainder of this
presentation
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- This type of learning involves symbolic representations such as
information in books
- It involves a teacher - student relationship, but the teacher can be
remote in location and time
- It only applies to very few species, and therefore will not be explo=
red
further in this presentation
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- Typically the leader or demonstrator is a parent or a member of the
parents’ generation
- Imitation (mimicking) means that the action sequence making up the
demonstration is perceived, interpreted, recorded as action plan, and
executed
- it is information that is passed from the demonstrator to the imita=
tor
- Assuming the recording is kept, the imitator can become the
demonstrator by reusing the information
- Information is passed from the parent generation to the offspring
generation, and on to further generations, by the method of imitatin=
g a
leader
- This adds to, and complements, the information passed through DNA=
li>
- There may be ‘random’ variations in the information beca=
use
of the perception, interpretation, memory storage, and execution of =
the
action sequence
- Perception is not perfect, and the inner language representation is
compressed, with loss of detail
- Some action sequences that are demonstrated might give survival and
reproduction advantages to the imitator
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- I am just starting to work on demonstrating the feasibility of passi=
ng
information about action sequences using the perception – acti=
on
functionality of the inner language
- It would be interesting to find biological examples where this proce=
ss
might apply
- It would be interesting to investigate how early in the tree of
evolution this might have arisen
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- For some species there are two parallel information paths from the
parent generation to the offspring generation
- DNA
- Demonstrating and imitating action sequences
- Both are subject to the same evolutionary processes of selective cop=
ying
(creation, selection, and destruction)
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- Pack behaviour is beneficial when hunting prey that is larger than t=
he
predator
- Groups of individuals exhibiting similar behaviour (possibly
synchronized), might have defensive advantages
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- The behaviour of individuals that are more successful in hunting, et=
c.
might be copied
- Such individuals have to be identified
- Parts or all of their action sequences have to be imitated
- Such a process should speed up evolution, since successful action
sequences can be propagated slightly faster than by successive
generations
- There are risks of copying spuriously successful actions, thus
increasing instability
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- Parallel processing, involving two or more individuals (information
processing)
- For most tasks (action sequences) known as division of labour
- Example: One individu=
al (or
group) flushes out and chases (herds) potential prey while the other
hides and waits and then brings the prey down, so all can feed
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- Remembering, selecting, and executing the appropriate action sequenc=
e
- Signaling between individuals to coordinate the selection of
complementary action sequences
- Signaling between individuals to coordinate the timing and the geome=
try
for the respective actions
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- I started out with imitation, copying an action sequence
- Further work is planned for the future, once the mechanism for
perception is properly simulated
- It would be interesting to investigate how early in the tree of
evolution this parallelism might have arisen, and what species might=
be
involved
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- Intergenerational and between-individual information processing, if
feasible, and if corroborated through observations on the behaviour =
of a
variety of species, is antecedent to much of human learning and
cooperation
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- First the inner language components:
- verb phrase for the action, noun phrase for visual objects, connect=
ives
for conditionality and conjunctions
- There must have been simple geometric indicators for directionality=
- Timing indicators may have come later, with initial timing coordina=
tion
handled by conditionality
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- The order in the chronology are based on estimates of the language
functionality and complexity required to model the behaviour:
- Much of the behaviour below has not yet been modeled successfully=
li>
- I am still working on imitation
- The order may be revised as more progress is made on demonstrating =
the
feasibility of the behaviour with the inner language
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- Solo and social learning second:
- Language is used to generate novel action sequences
- More or less randomly generated sequences can be selected and recor=
ded
for reuse
- Language is used to encode the learned sequences and conditions
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- Imitation based on visual observation might be third:
- The actions and positions of a leader are observed
- Limb positions and joint angles are extracted from the observation<=
/li>
- And action sequence is generated that produces the observed limb
positions and joint angles
- The motion sequence might be recorded for reuse later
- This enables learning from individuals of the parent generation
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- Conditional imitation based on visual observation might be fourth:=
li>
- The actions of leaders or others are observed during danger or
migration
- The special conditions may be signaled by observing behaviour patt=
ers
- The actions of the leader or the others are imitated
- Group action during special circumstances might be beneficial
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- Selective conditional imitation might be fifth:
- The actions of a successful individual are observed
- The success might be based on hunting, gathering, mating
- The actions of this successful individual are imitated selectively<=
/li>
- Less successful individuals are imitated less frequently
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- Predicting the behaviour of others might be sixth
- Observation and language is used to generate hypothetical action
sequences for others
- The hypothetical action sequence is simulated to predict future pat=
hs
and positions
- An action sequence is generated that takes into consideration future
paths and positions
- This capability improves hunting and avoiding predators
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- Division of labour – cooperating with others might be seventh:=
- Once the behaviour of others can be predicted, collaboration is
possible with appropriate signals to indicate which individual has
which role
- Collaboration is beneficial in hunting and in raising offspring
- Role playing may have additional benefits
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