>>> Comp-Neuro Mailing List <cneuro@bbb.caltech.edu> 05/21/99
09:15pm >>>
>From ASIM.ROY@asu.edu Fri May 21 16:08:00 1999
Date: Sun, 16 May 1999 11:12:09 -0700
From: Asim Roy <ASIM.ROY@asu.edu>
To: "'cneuro@bbb.caltech.edu'" <cneuro@bbb.caltech.edu>,
"'dmurchie7@home.com'" <dmurchie7@home.com>
Subject: RE: Some more questions in the search for sources of control in t he
brain
Dear David,
Here are several comments/questions on your note.
1) You "agreed" to my statement: "It is perhaps now an accepted fact
that the brain controls the rest of the body." I would be curious to know on
what basis you "agreed" to that statement? The basic question is, how was it
ever "scientifically" determined "that the brain controls the rest of the
body?" I am asking this question because the answer might give us some clues
on how to determine who the controller is, if there is one, in any unknown
system. So I would really like to know from anyone how this question was
settled by this science.
2) If you "agree" to the statement "that the brain controls the rest of the
body," then further observations can be made. First, it is thus possible for
natural, living systems to have "controllers" in them. And this "controller"
conjecture may not be that stupid a conjecture after all, given the fact
that the whole science of genetics is the search for "controllers" in these
systems. So the "controller" concept is definitely valid at the lowest
(genetic) level of these systems. (I suppose there is enough factual
evidence in genetics to not dispute this theory.) And if we "agree" "that
the brain controls the rest of the body," (as I stated above, I am still
looking for the scientific evidence to support this statement) then the
"controller" concept is also valid at the macro level of these systems. I
think if the notion of "controllers" is valid at the lowest (genetic) and at
the highest (the brain as a whole) levels of abstractions in these systems,
then the intermediate levels (subparts of the brain) could also be based on
the same kind of principles and mechanisms. That possibility can't be ruled
out.
3) So these questions about sources of control in the brain are an attempt
to find such controllers at these intermediate levels, a level higher than
genetics. I think there might already be enough evidence in different
neurobiological studies to support such a conjecture. We need to look at
these studies much more carefully. My hunch is that the
neurotransmitter/neuromodulator system is the source of control in the
brain. I hope some more people will come forward pointing to recent
neurotransmitter/neuromodulator studies that show the controlling nature of
this subsystem.
And some of the ideas used in genetics to determine who does what - altering
genes, etc. - could also be the basis for determining the "controllers" at
this next higher level of abstraction. I think the Univ. of Washington study
was attempting to do just that.
4) These are not philosophical questions at all. Our engineering of
human-like robots and human-like autonomous learning systems may be stalled
until we straighten out some of these ideas. So these are not just abstract
questions and arguments, they have real implications for engineering and
science.
With best regards,
Asim Roy
Arizona State University