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Re: Can Slime Mould Solve Mazes? | Earth Lab - Bing video

Posted by Stephen Guerin-5 on Apr 18, 2021; 7:28pm
URL: http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/Can-Slime-Mould-Solve-Mazes-Earth-Lab-Bing-video-tp7601607p7601609.html

In the case of slime molds, there are over 900 species with different collective behaviors but there are some common universal mechanisms of their self-organization using chemical fields like Cyclic adenosine monophosphate (cAMP). In addition to Maze Solving by an individual cell, another classic is when multiple individuals become a plasmodium super-organism, have collective action of mobility and reproduce with a fruiting body.

There's an established journal dedicated to understanding distributed cognition, collective intelligence and collective action and understanding super-organisms.

Four authors (a Syrian, an Italian and 2 Jewish Scientists) writing separately used a literary device of imagining a self-conscious Mexican amoeba that was trying to describe collective action to its dimmer peers. It went something like:

Fellow amoebae, we are individuals - that is plain to see. 
But we are more, Brothers and Sisters.
We exist as part of a greater organism.
It is as though we are its children and it is our Father.
Though the organism is not separate from us. It is of and in us.
His intelligence acts through us and guides us even though we can't comprehend why.
And the Father is so much more powerful than we. He is able to act over great distances guided by his great perception.
The Father guides us- have Faith that He knows the way to food and everlasting life. 
He works for your benefit.

You are made in the dual image of the Father. 

I am of the Father as the Father is of me.
The Father is in all of us. And so as your brother I am with you.

If we are to experience this Heaven on Earth we will live in grace and Least Action (无为)

And there is a spirit (editor's note: cAMP) that binds us. I send it forth to guide you
It will descend upon you and you will learn to speak with its tongue.
This wholly spirit is everywhere and filled with my Father's intelligence.

This spirit is of Action (h) and is the Will of my Father.

And I am your peer - your brother.
I can tell you the simplest law on how to Act. 
Give cAMP to others as they will do unto you. 
Your Acts are reciprocal.

Do not be too willful. surrender yourself to this spirit. The intelligence is around you You will become greater and live forever.
Do not be greedy with your resources. Diffuse it to your neighbors.

And So it Is with Light. At the core, we are LIght. And the Light moves in this Way (道)

This is the deepest mystery you must come to understand.  The Father, me, his Son, and cAmp are One. One intelligence. We are not separate. The Father is great and beyond our understanding, I am your brother and the Spirit is in us all.

Now my time here is short. There will come a time that I must leave you
I will be sacrificed so that others may live.

we will come together and ascend toward the sky. I will die but you will be Fruitful and multiply
Please remember this and tell others the Good News that we are One.

Now, this amoeba's story was told many times and eventually written down. Many amoebae interpreted it differently. Many fought on limited literal interpretations.  Child amoebae are first taught that the Father is a very big, intelligent, and powerful amoeba. It's a language they can understand. As amoebae grow into adults many develop more sophisticated interpretations of what the Mexican amoeba, Jesus, described. Most amoebae don't question the story they had as children and fight with anybody that challenges that understanding.

2000 years later, there was an alternative school of amoeba that taught differently.  They said it was because of our genes and we learn how to behave through competition to reproduce.

One of their elders had huge cilia growing around his vacuole - He was affectionately called Eyebrows.

Eyebrows said if there's any possibility of a superorganism, it would only be meaningful to him if it was in fact a giant amoeba floating in the sky directing it all.

And Eyebrows said, and we all know that a giant amoeba floating in the sky doesn't exist. His school often said that super organism is dead and we are just individuals.

Eyebrows said if the stupid children want to keep believing in super big amoeba, and it gives them comfort. that's fine but it is just a story.

Eyebrows didn't believe in superorganisms or decentralized intelligence and Collective Action.

-Stephen


On Sun, Apr 18, 2021 at 1:30 AM Pieter Steenekamp <[hidden email]> wrote:
An excellent example of emergence of complexity.
A description of an ABM model of slime mold is given at this url:
https://math.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Scientific_Computing_Simulations_and_Modeling/Book%3A_Introduction_to_the_Modeling_and_Analysis_of_Complex_Systems_(Sayama)/19%3A_AgentBased_Models/19.03%3A_Agent-Environment_Interaction

On Sun, 18 Apr 2021 at 06:05, Nicholas Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:
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