`Toward an Scientific Framework for the Origin of Evolutionary Processes: Biological and Cultural

这项研究将探索如何使用描述生物和文化进化起源的模型建立进化过程，捕捉它们的抽象结构。虽然文化表现出累积性、适应性和开放性的变化，即，它是如何进化的，没有公认的理论来解释它是如何进化的。我的团队将对文化进化出现背后的认知转变进行数学建模，采用用于模拟生命起源的框架。当催化分子相互作用时，它们的多样性增加，某些子集达到临界点的概率也增加，在临界点上，每个成员都有一个催化途径。这种相变被称为自催化闭合，因为虽然没有分子自催化，但它们共同催化彼此。我认为一个类似的阶段转变，被称为概念闭合，可以解释那种认知结构的出现，这种认知结构使复杂文化成为可能，它涉及两个转变。第一个是知识和经验的心理表征的递归重组能力的开始。这在生命模型的起源中起着催化反应的作用。它导致了语义空间中附近表征之间的局部连接集群。第二个转变是自发地在有利于死记硬背的聚合思维模式和有利于洞察力的发散思维模式之间转换的能力的开始。发散性思维被建模为表征之间增加的反应性。它使语义上遥远的表示之间形成关联。这使得表征不可避免地多样化，并且某些子集达到临界点，在那里存在通向每个成员的催化途径。这两个转变导致了能够进化文化的整合认知结构。由于表征是概念的复合物，为了在递归重构期间对表征之间的反应进行建模，我将使用一个已建立的概念交互理论，该理论捕捉了它们的上下文性质。它还可以描述干涉和纠缠，这些现象不仅在量子力学中观察到，而且在人们如何使用概念的研究中也观察到。我的团队将利用神经科学的最新发现，从大脑活动的角度来解释这些转变。我们将比较和对比生物和文化进化的起源。这些过程既有有趣的相似之处，也有不同之处。我们将为进化过程如何建立和抽象其算法结构开发一个综合的理论框架。这项研究将有助于解释人类进化复杂文化的独特能力，并有助于我们认识宇宙其他地方的进化过程。学员将获得丰富的跨学科知识和技能，增强批判性思维和知识交流，使他们能够以多样化和创新的方式为加拿大经济做出贡献。

This research will explore how evolutionary processes get established using models that describe the origins of biological and cultural evolution, capturing their abstract structure. Although culture exhibits cumulative, adaptive, open-ended change, i.e., it evolves, there is no accepted theory of how it evolves. My team will mathematically model cognitive transitions underlying the emergence of cultural evolution, adapting a framework that is used to model the origin of life.***When catalytic molecules interact their diversity increases, and so does the probability that some subset reaches a critical point where there is a catalytic pathway to every member. This phase transition is referred to as autocatalytic closure because although no molecule self-catalyzes, they collectively catalyze each other. I posit a similar phase transition, referred to as conceptual closure, can explain emergence of the kind of cognitive structure that enabled complex culture, and that it involved two transitions.***The first was onset of the capacity for recursive restructuring of mental representations of knowledge and experience. This plays the role of catalytic reactions in origin of life models. It resulted in localized clusters of connectivity amongst representations nearby in semantic space.***The second transition was onset of the capacity to spontaneously shift between a convergent mode of thought conducive to rote tasks and a divergent mode conducive to insight. Divergent thought is modelled as increased reactivity amongst representations. It enables associations to form between semantically distant representations. This makes it inevitable that representations diversify and some subset reaches a critical point where there is a catalytic pathway' to every member. These two transitions resulted in the integrated cognitive structure that can evolve culture.***Since representations are compounds of concepts, to model reactions' between representations during recursive restructuring I will use an established theory of concept interactions that captures their contextual nature. It can also describe interference and entanglement, phenomena observed not just in quantum mechanics but in studies of how people use concepts.***My team will explain these transitions in terms of brain activity, drawing on recent findings in neuroscience. We will compare and contrast the origins of biological and cultural evolution. These processes present intriguing parallels and differences. We will develop an integrated theoretical framework for how evolutionary processes get established and abstract its algorithmic structure.***This research will help explain the uniquely human ability to evolve complex culture, and could help us recognize evolutionary processes elsewhere in the universe. Trainees will gain vast interdisciplinary knowledge and skills that enhance critical thinking and knowledge communication, preparing them to contribute in diverse and innovative ways to Canada's economy.