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Extended Mind: Special Section in TEOREMA

Here is a bunch of extended mind papers in the Spring issue of Teorema.

Web Stigmergy

Stigmergy yet again – well, there is no escaping it. While I wouldn’t call stigmergy a new paradigm (that’s too pompous – in any event, paradigms only have shape in a historical sense), stigmergy is one of the most fruitful mechanisms around that speaks to distributed cognition. Check out this paper nicely titled “Standing on the…

Stigmergy Installation

Check out this installation supported by the Welcome Trust. People walking along Euston Road will encounter an unusually arresting reflection of themselves in a new light installation, ‘Reflex’, created by rAndom International. The work inhabits the windows of the Wellcome Trust as though it were a living organism. Reacting to viewers, passers-by and traffic on…

Friedrich Hayek

Born on this day in 1899

Brain-Body-Mind

Here is the recently published book by my chum Erol Başar who as it happens is also contributing to my forthcoming edited book entitled Hayek in Mind: Hayek’s Philosophical Psychology. Not surprisingly,  there is much reference to Hayek’s The Sensory Order peppered throughout Erol’s book most notably in section 2.12 (pp. 39-41). Other distinguished neuroscientists who appreciate…

Stigmergic Simulations

Here are some terrific stigmergic simulations by architectural student Yang Chenghan that I chanced across: The first is a 3D simulation deploying 45-70 agents (source code) The second a 2D simulation deploying 20-30 agents (source code) Here are some great synthetic stigmergic stills Yang has created.

Determining the Role of Geospatial Technologies For Stigmergic Coordination in Situation Management: Implications of the Wireless Grid

Here’s a nice poster from Janet Marsden at Syracuse: Abstract — Geospatial technologies in conjunction with wireless grids will offer a context for locating and coordinating team activities in such a way that the nature of each team member’s effort may be known and understood by other members. This constructed group knowledge enables teams to respond to unforeseen and emergent contingencies…

Swarm Intelligence: special issue

The new issue of Swarm Intelligence is now available. The excerpt below from the editors’ introduction – they may not realise it, but it this is as Hayekian as one can get: Swarm Cognition is a novel multidisciplinary approach that encompasses research in neurosciences, cognitive psychology, social ethology and swarm intelligence, with the aim of studying cognition…

Amygdala volume and social network size in humans

Not a deep surprise but still nice to see some empirical work coming through. Check out this brief report just published online in Nature Neuroscience. The upshot: participants with larger amygdalas typically had more people in their social lives and maintained more complex relationships.