Please distribute to others who may be interested...
You are hereby invited to a seminar in our sixth
interdisciplinary
<http://ecco.vub.ac.be/?q=node/108>series on
Evolution, Complexity and Cognition (ECCO)
Time: Thursday, Nov. 19, 2-4 pm.
Place: Room B 0.036
(building B, level 0, close to the human sciences
computer rooms), on the
<http://www.vub.ac.be/english/infoabout/campuses/index.html>VUB
Campus Etterbeek (Brussels, Belgium), in
collaboration with MOSI. Coffee available. Free
entrance: everybody welcome!
Is algorithmic the nature of Nature?
<http://www.mathrix.org/zenil/>Hector Zenil
(University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne)
We propose a test based on the theory of
algorithmic complexity and an experimental
evaluation of Levin's universal distribution to
identify evidence in support of or in
contravention of the claim that the world is
algorithmic in nature. To this end statistical
comparisons are undertaken of the frequency
distributions of data from physical
sources--repositories of information such as
images, data stored in a hard drive, computer
programs and DNA sequences--and the output
frequency distributions generated by purely
algorithmic means--by running abstract computing
devices such as Turing machines, cellular
automata and Post Tag systems. Statistical
correlations were found and their significance
measured.
Upcoming Seminars
26 Nov. (to be confirmed)
Mehmet Tezcan (IES, VUB):
Autopoiesis in the EU: 'Governance by committee'
Dec. 2 (Wed.)
Solomon Marcus (Romanian Academy of Sciences):
Mistakes and failures as a source of creativity
More info about the ECCO seminar program: http://ecco.vub.ac.be/?q=node/108
--
Francis Heylighen
Evolution, Complexity and Cognition group
Free University of Brussels
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/HEYL.html
"... a wealth of information creates a
poverty of attention" - Herbert A. Simon
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbert_Simon>
