Talk:Neural Darwinism

message: It states that replication is a precondition for selection, and that the absence of replication in fact logically falsifies Neural Dariwnism. Although Crick probably (like many others) believes this, it is not at all uncomplicatedly true. I have myself published on this topic and I think it's not just a mistake but a quite serious mistake whose commonness only makes it worse. I will not go into the details here, nor do I think that is necessary in the article - for those interested, the refs are below. It should state something like "Crick argues that this..." or something like that - not state it as an uncontroversial truth. The references are (as I said, not necessarily relevant for the article): 
Andersson, Claes. 2008. “Sophisticated selectionism as a general theory of knowledge.” Biology and Philosophy 23(2):229-242.
Andersson, Claes. 2011. “Splitting the replicator: generalized Darwinism and the place of culture in Nature.” Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.16.11.108 (talk) 09:15, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Replication

message: The article does not mention even in passing the prior work of Changeux, although it definitively should. A previous  formalized theory of a pre-existing neural connections followed by selection by activity was presented in "Changeux JP, Courrege P, Danchin A (1973). Theory of epigenesis of neuronal networks by selective stabilization of synapses. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 70: 2974-2978". The original article is very mathematical, and people generally quote the later review "Changeux JP, Danchin A (1976). Selective stabilization of developing synapses as a mechanism for the specificication of neuronal networks Nature, 264 (1976) 705—712". Edelman's book heavily borrowed from Changeux's ideas, and it is not difficult to see the "neuronal groups" as equivalent to Changeux's "neuronal graphs". Nicolas Le Novere (talk) 22:14, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
replies: text:  Second that. Other significant precursors are Turing's "A-brain and B-brain" paper, which itself took some of its inspiration from Hebb's initial ideas on synapse reinforcement through use.137.205.183.109 (talk) 11:29, 21 March 2016 (UTC)
thread_title: Previous work of Jean-Pierre Changeux

message: I do not dare to edit this entry at that place by myself. I think that I was the one who pointed out the relation between Hayek and Edelman for the first time. This was in:
Carsten Herrmann-Pillath, The Brain, Its Sensory Order and the Evolutionary Concept of Mind, On Hayek's Contribution to Evolutionary Epistemology, in: Journal for Social and Biological Structures 15/2, 1992, 145-187. http://ssrn.com/abstract=950592
A scan of that paper (the journal is now defunct) can be found on the SSRN website as indicated. I will appreciate if somebody can check this and may find it worthwhile to insert this citation.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cahepil (talk • contribs) 08:23, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I personally don't want to add the citation because I haven't read Hayek and don't really want to, but I don't see any reason why you shouldn't add it -- you've certainly been transparent enough about your involvement. Looie496 (talk) 03:19, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I have read both Hayek's book and some of Edleman's writings in this area.  I noticed the connection on my own, being unfamiliar with the Hermann-Pillath paper.  I feel you can legitimately add the citation.StN (talk) 05:27, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Reference to Hayek

message: Virtually all biologists support Neutar Darwinism, so what's the point in listing two names ? --Taw
They are 'leading proponents'. I incline towards the Neural Darwinist theory (or at least my currently dominant neural subsystem does), but I am not a 'leading proponent' of the theory. These guys have written books advocating the theory. -- The Anome
Why no discussion of the criticisms of Neural Darwinism? They do exist, and they're not all Creationists. - Discolando 10:26, 5 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Virtually

message: If the article title is meant to name the theory it should not be capitalized (see MOS:CAPS), but if it is applied to the book, of course it should be capitalized.  What do you think?  --Blainster 11:02, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Capitalization

message: I'm not an expert on Neural Darwinism, so I'll make this comment and let other editors can consider it. Background to comment from material on genetic programming with Wikipedia links added by me: "William James, the father of American psychology, argued in 1874, just 15 years after Darwin published The Origin of Species that mental processes could operate in a Darwinian manner. Evidence in cognitive research shows such competing patterns of thought and consciousness, where we consciously perceive only the tip of the iceberg. A very good overview of these thoughts is provided by Nobel laureate Gerald M. Edelman in his seminal book Neural Darwinism from 1987." It seems the most compelling, simple explanation, is that evolution of thoughts is fundamental to our adaptive nature and is an advanced survival mechanism: allowing destructive thoughts to die instead of the species. Application in technology: I've recently listened to the Singularity Summits (online) in which the transition to smarter than human technology was discussed (and have also been reading, etc.). There is a concensus among AI scientists that most advanced and promising area of evolutionary algorithm (inspired by natural evolution, this area of technology evolves software) is genetic programming (using mechanisms cross-over and mutation). A great first source in this area is "Genetic Programming, An Introduction," by Banzhaf, Nordin, Keller, and Franconé. But there is also already an entry on genetic programming in Wikipedia. GP was started by John Koza, who also has a Wikipedia entry. Development of "a complete cognitive system for robotics" based on GP and the work of Peter Nordin has been announced by irobis . Rogerfgay 09:01, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm having trouble understanding whether that is just a comment or whether you're proposing a change to an article. Looie496 (talk) 22:43, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Uses in technology 

message: Can I propose replacing the present description of neural Darwinism with the clearer, less jargon-laden description at Gerald Edelman? --Anthonyhcole (talk) 15:46, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Replace this description of the concept with the one at Gerald Edelman 

message: This strength of my opinion on this is open to debate, but I believe that Edelman deals with the issue of replication by generalizing the concept as a differential amplification of selected elements within a population of variant elemements.  There are at least two fundamentally different contexts within which this can take place:  1)  within a population made up of individual replicators as Darwin proposed OR 2) within an physical structure comprised of a population of elements that can differentially respond to future events on the basis of past experience, much as Jean-Pierre Changeux proposed in his Theory of Synaptic Stabilization.  Edelman explicitly acknowledges Changeux's contribution and inspiration in the intro to Neural Darwinism.
Replication can be of individuals within a population, but in Changeux and Edelman's telling it can also occur as the enhanced response of adaptive configurations within the nervous system.  It is the (degenerate) replication of a specific response within a system of potential responses the system is capable of.  It is the increased response of one cell assembly or neuronal group relative to other cell assemblies or neuronal groups that evolves over time in response to the hedonic evaluaion of environmental circumstances.  The population is made up of response elements, the selection mechanism is the result of hedonic feedback, and the differential amplification is of changes in the strength of weighted elements of the system.  This process is the basis of adaption, memory, and recognition in structures organized on the basis of the principles of somatic selection.
I would have to review the material related to replication-based critiques of the theory to adequately respond to their criticisms, but I believe the confusion most people have regards the way Changeux and Edelman have extended the type of systems that selection can occur within.  Edelman's concept of selective systems is far-reaching, having implications for biology far beyond just immunology, embryology, and neuroscience.  He has also shown how this concept can be applied to populations of small rRNA complimentary-fragments in the modulation of protein synthesis at the Ribosome - allowing for diffenential amplification or suppression of gene expression beyond that of transcription.  By extending the Selective System framework beyond replication of individual structures to include replication of functional response elements, the concept can be applied to almost the entire range of biological phenomena - metabolic pathways, genes, ribosomes, cell membranes, cells, cell populations, multi-cellular organisms, ecologies and bioshperes when the appropriate elements have been identified.  The term Neural Darwinism really only covers the application of the much broader idea of Somatic Selective Systems to the nervous system.
Jtwsaddress42 (talk) 18:27, 3 April 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Differential Amplification of Selected Variants Within A Population Generalizes the Replication Requirement 

message: you proposed the following reorganization of the article on my talk page:
    Introduction to Neural Darwinism
    Population Thinking - Somatic selective systems
    Topobiology - Genetic and Epigenetic Mechanisms
    Building a theory of global brain function
    TNGS - The theory of neuronal group selection
    Reception
 
: I have a couple of thoughts on this:
:* First, I think we have to get clear on whether this article is about the concept or the book Neural Darwinism. 
:* Second, if this article is about the book, then a restructure like this makes sense, if the article is about the concept, then I would oppose such a restructure. Because the topic Neural Darwinism needs more: it needs an introduction, explanation, situation in the literature(?), it needs a receptions section, and in general the next point: 
:* Third, still on the same, if this article is about the concept ND then I think this article relies to heavily on one source (Edelman). The concept is important enough (I think) that other authors' perspectives need to be included.
:* Fourth, I think you are on good track of making this into a good article the way you are working on this , but I think the issues about (a) scope: book vs concept and (b) depth: relying to heavily on one source would need to be sorted out.
:Proposal: One, perhaps the easiest, way would be to split this article into two: Neural Darwinism and Neural Darwinism (book), that way you could even have productive links between the two and reference the other without confusing the reader... What do you think? As always, feel free to disagree or disregard whatever I said here. :)  
-- Mvbaron (talk) 06:21, 15 April 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposed reorganization of sections 

message: Should I abandon editing and developing this article? Jtwsaddress42 (talk) 21:23, 3 July 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: pinging  and  -- Mvbaron (talk) 14:54, 15 July 2021 (UTC)

text: If we want to follow the WP:BRD cycle, the content was boldly deleted, I contested it by reverting for the following reason: it was properly sourced content and no valid reason was given for the deletion of properly sourced material. So we're at the Discuss stage now. I do also believed the article could do with some tightening and shortening, but that's no reason for a wholesale deletion in my opinion. Best -- Mvbaron (talk) 20:12, 15 July 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Should I abandon this project?