Michael Levin
Developmental and synthetic biologist; Distinguished Professor at Tufts University and director of the Allen Discovery Center there. Known for work on bioelectric signalling in regeneration and for co-creating xenobots. Writes the Forms of life, forms of mind blog.
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Their wordsI argue that morphogenesis is not a mechanical process captured by emergence of complexity, but a fundamentally cognitive one: living matter constitutes an agential material whose multi-scale problem-solving capacities cannot be fully captured by conventional mechanistic or cellular automaton models.
↗Forms of life, forms of mindthoughtforms.life 1st of 3 in this piece
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Our reading
Evolution of agential materials has different dynamics than the evolution of passive substrates.
Their wordsMoreover, evolution acting on competent, agential materials has distinct dynamics from evolution of passive substrates, with important consequences for evolvability.
↗Forms of life, forms of mindthoughtforms.life 2nd of 3 in this piece
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Their wordsBut, developmental biology also tells us there is no bright red line - no magic point in which we tick over from being chemico-physical machines to cognitive agents with minds; what it reveals is a gradual process of metamorphosis.
↗Forms of life, forms of mindthoughtforms.life 3rd of 3 in this piece
- 2 months earlier
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Their wordsThese patterns are causal in physics, biology, and computer science because, a) if they were different, facts in the physical world would be different, and b) they serve as best explanations for why the physical world is the way it is.
↗Forms of life, forms of mindthoughtforms.life 1st of 2 in this piece
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Their wordsTherefore, physicalism is insufficient in an important way and we need to investigate this latent space of patterns.
↗Forms of life, forms of mindthoughtforms.life 2nd of 2 in this piece
- 2 months earlier
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Their wordsthat transition is, like all important transitions, a continuum, and advancing clinical science (as well as bioengineering) has continued to demolish prior barriers-of-no-return.
- 4 months earlier
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Their wordsMost critically, it means that discovery in the biosciences will involve use of tools of cognitive science, and learning how to communicate/collaborate with the material, not simply micromanage it as we do with (seemingly) passive matter.
↗Forms of life, forms of mindthoughtforms.life 1st of 2 in this piece
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Their wordsI suppose, in a sense I agree that an intelligence ratchet (paper coming in a few months) is embedded all the way down, as a free gift of the math.
↗Forms of life, forms of mindthoughtforms.life 2nd of 2 in this piece
- 19 months earlier
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Their wordsI have written a lot about the fact that biological systems, like us, are basically collective intelligences.
↗Forms of life, forms of mindthoughtforms.life 1st of 3 in this piece
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Their wordsI expect, but can't prove (although I bet someone could) that due to Gödel and Turing limits, we could never definitively prove that we were part of a larger system with significant cognition.
↗Forms of life, forms of mindthoughtforms.life 2nd of 3 in this piece
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Our reading
The miracle of sentience and the beauty of life in the universe also involves a lot of suffering.
Their wordsI think so, yes. I don't see any way to gloss over the fact that the miracle of sentience and beauty of life in the universe also involves a lot of suffering.
↗Forms of life, forms of mindthoughtforms.life 3rd of 3 in this piece