Abstract
AbstractThe original computers were people using algorithms to get mathematical results such as rocket trajectories. After the invention of the digital computer, brains have been widely understood through analogies with computers and now artificial neural networks, which have strengths and drawbacks. We define and examine a new kind of computation better adapted to biological systems, called biological computation, a natural adaptation of mechanistic physical computation. Nervous systems are of course biological computers, and we focus on some edge cases of biological computing, hearts and flytraps. The heart has about the computing power of a slug, and much of its computing happens outside of its forty thousand neurons. The flytrap has about the computing power of a lobster ganglion. This account advances fundamental debates in neuroscience by illustrating ways that classical computability theory can miss complexities of biology. By this reframing of computation, we make way for resolving the disconnect between human and machine learning.
Funder
national science foundation
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Subject
Cell Biology,Molecular Biology,Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics,Biophysics
Cited by
18 articles.
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1. Selected Results from Physical Information Theory;The Physical Signature of Computation;2024-06-01
2. Satisfaction of Criterion PCE;The Physical Signature of Computation;2024-06-01
3. Glossary;The Physical Signature of Computation;2024-06-01
4. Conclusion;The Physical Signature of Computation;2024-06-01
5. Computation and the Mind;The Physical Signature of Computation;2024-06-01