Related papers: Evolutionary Transitions and Top-Down Causation
The interplay between causal mechanisms and emerging collective behaviors is a central aspect of understanding, controlling, and predicting complex networked systems. In our work, we investigate the relationship between higher-order…
Many complex adaptive systems contain a large diversity of specialized components. The specialization at the level of the microscopic degrees of freedom, and diversity at the level of the system as a whole are phenomena that appear during…
Evolution and learning are two of the fundamental mechanisms by which life adapts in order to survive and to transcend limitations. These biological phenomena inspired successful computational methods such as evolutionary algorithms and…
An important feature of many complex systems, both natural and artificial, is the structure and organization of their interaction networks with interesting properties. Here we present a theory of self-organization by evolutionary adaptation…
Tipping points are one of the hot topics in modern physics of complex systems. But what is a tipping point? A generic definition declares it as ``a state of the system where a small change in its parameters can lead to a significant change…
Complex systems are difficult to study not only because they are nonlinear, multiscale, and often nonstationary, but because their scientifically relevant organization is often invisible at the level of individual components, pairwise…
This paper presents a general theory that aims at explaining timescales observed empirically in technology transitions and predicting those of future transitions. This framework is used further to derive a theory for exploring the dynamics…
The process of evolutionary emergence of purposeful adaptive behavior is investigated by means of computer simulations. The model proposed implies that there is an evolving population of simple agents, which have two natural needs: energy…
Downward causation is self-causation, the causel effect from the whole to its parts, and is considered a promising theory for the problem of mental causation. However, it remains to be clarified how an irreducible but supervenient downward…
Conformational transitions are ubiquitous in biomolecular systems, have significant functional roles and are subject to evolutionary pressures. Here we provide a first theoretical framework for topological transition, i.e. conformational…
We show that fluid organizations display higher levels of cooperation than attainable by groups with either a fixed social structure or lacking one altogether. By moving within the organization, individuals cause restructurings that…
The evolution of complexity has been a central theme for Biology [2] and Artificial Life research [1]. It is generally agreed that complexity has increased in our universe, giving way to life, multi-cellularity, societies, and systems of…
Recent experiments have been able to visualise chromosome organization in fast-growing E.coli cells. However, the mechanism underlying the spatio-temporal organization remains poorly understood. We propose that the DNA adopts a specific…
Instances of critical-like characteristics in living systems at each organizational level as well as the spontaneous emergence of computation (Langton), indicate the relevance of self-organized criticality (SOC). But extrapolating complex…
Evolutionary games are a developing sub-field of game theory. This branch of game theory is used in the study of the adaptation of large, but finite, populations of agents to changes in the environment. It assumes that each agent has no…
Competitive systems can exhibit both hierarchical (transitive) and cyclic (intransitive) structures. Despite theoretical interest in cyclic competition, which offers richer dynamics, and occupies a larger subset of the space of possible…
Explainability, in particular, the ability for robots to explain why they have made a decision or behaved in a certain way, is a critical tool in helping users understand the robots they interact and coexist with. Behaviour trees are a…
Ecological models traditionally explain stability and coexistence through pairwise interactions among species. These interactions can also involve groups of three or more species, higher-order interactions, which recent theory suggests can…
In recent years, various decentralized organizational forms have emerged, posing a challenge for organizational design. Some design elements, such as task allocation, become emergent properties that cannot be fully controlled from the top…
Consciousness spans macroscopic experience and microscopic neuronal activity, yet linking these scales remains challenging. Prevailing theories, such as Integrated Information Theory, focus on a single scale, overlooking how causal power…