Dear Pedro,
It's been a long time since I've responding to a FIS post, but this one catches my attention, since my own work is grounded in neurobiology. Your project looks very interesting, but I caution you not to get too caught up in a purely cognitive perspective. Along with the bottom-up principles you seek, I truly believe emotion, relationship and the operations of the limbic system comprise the most centrally organizing top-down force. Developmentally, left-brain, conscious, verbal and cognitive processes aren't even online for the first two years. I am a big proponent of interpersonal neurobiology, by which resonance and emotional attunement by caretakers is critical for emergent function. Best, Terry Marks-Tarlow > Date: Fri, 25 Sep 2009 12:29:57 +0200 > From: [email protected] > To: [email protected] > Subject: [Fis] Neurodynamic Central Theory > > Dear FIS colleagues, > > Thanks to Karl and Joe for their responses. Sorry that I cannot answer > them, but herein is the draft we are currently working in. We continue > looking for partners (the easiest if they belong to the European Union). > Comments are welcome... > > best wishes > > Pedro > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > * > * > > *TOWARDS A NEURODYNAMIC CENTRAL THEORY--REVISITING CAJAL'S "LAW OF > MAXIMUM ECONOMY"* > > > > Arguably, one of the most dramatic absences in the contemporary > scientific system occurs in the neurosciences. The ongoing > neurocomputational, neuromolecular, neuroinformatic and neuroimaging > revolutions (to name but a few of the emerging disciplines responsible > of the enormous experimental data-accumulation taking place in > neurosciences) have not been accompanied by a parsimonious theoretical > synthesis yet. Thereupon, the lack of a central neurodynamic theory > playing a "circulating role" between all the neural fields, similar to > the Darwinian theory's central role in the biological realm (or > classical mechanics in physics), is creating an intellectual vacuum that > negatively influences on the neurosciences themselves, humanities and > the social sciences. > > The theoretic development herein envisioned will be grounded, > historically, in Cajal's law of "maximum economy in space, time, and > interconnecting matter" (Textura, pp. 95-106), which will be revisited > from different perspectives. On the one side, both M. Leyton (1992, > 2001) and K.P. Collins & P.C. Marijuán (1997) have proposed overarching > optimization principles related to symmetry-operations in the neural > maps that somehow imply minimization of excitations (echoing ideas > already discussed by Freud himself, and more recently by Barlow, > Rossler, Edelman, and Arbib; see also Cherniak, Griffin, Chen, etc. > about structural optimization). Then, the emergence of the Action / > Perception cycle as a basic building block to organize adaptive behavior > would be inscribed within the "closure" operations of the ongoing > neurocomputational minimization processes performed upon the excitation > /inhibition collective variable, topologically distributed, defined both > globally and locally as a sort of "entropy" in the neuronal mappings and > rhythms (Gibson, Turvey, Kelso, Buzsáki). Further, the integration of > such basic minimization processes within the main brain architectures > --cerebellar, thalamocortical, limbic, frontal-- has to be achieved in a > way that simultaneously produces the outcomes of adaptive behavior, > meaning, memory contents, and the possibility of frontal "conceptual" > guidance. Recent works of authors such as Rodolfo Llinás, Alain Berthoz, > Jeff Hawkins, Tomás Ortiz, and Joaquín Fuster (e.g., the "cognits" > proposal) would imply advancements in those particular areas for the > proposed scheme. > > Indeed, the quest for a neurodynamic optimization principle in the > neurosciences, and the central theory to be elaborated upon, that we > must credit to Cajal's insights one hundred years ago, appears as a > long-term interdisciplinary enterprise. If finally successful, it would > boost our present understanding of information processes in the Central > Nervous System and in a plethora of related disciplines, from > neuro-robotics to social fields... > > Note: FISers Michael Leyton, Andrei Khrennikov, Fivos Panetsos, Rafa > Lahoz, and Pedro Marijuan are already involved in this tentative > project, Tomás Ortiz and Joaquin Fuster, quite probably, can be enlisted > too. > > -- > > ------------------------------------------------- > Pedro C. Marijuán > Grupo de Bioinformación / Bioinformation Group > Instituto Aragonés de Ciencias de la Salud > Avda. Gómez Laguna, 25, Pl. 11ª > 50009 Zaragoza. España / Spain > Telf: 34 976 71 3526 (& 6818) Fax: 34 976 71 5554 > [email protected] > ------------------------------------------------- > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > fis mailing list > [email protected] > https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
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