A role for action selection in consciousness: an investigation of a second-order Darwinian mind

Robert H. Wortham; Joanna J Bryson

A role for action selection in consciousness: an investigation of a second-order Darwinian mind

Robert H. Wortham, Joanna J Bryson

Department of Computer Science

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Abstract

We investigate a small footprint cognitive architecture comprised of two reactive planner instances. The first interacts with the world via sensor and behaviour interfaces. The second monitors the first, and dynamically adjusts its plan in accordance with some predefined objective function. We show that this configuration produces a Darwinian mind, yet aware of its own operation and performance, and able to maintain performance as the environment changes. We identify this architecture as a second-order Darwinian mind, and discuss the philosophical implications for the study of consciousness. We use the Instinct Robot World agent based modelling environment, which in turn uses the Instinct Planner for cognition.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	25-30
Number of pages	6
Journal	CEUR Workshop Proceedings
Volume	1855
Publication status	Published - 9 Dec 2016
Event	EUCognition 2016: Cognitive Robot Architectures - TU Wien, Vienna, Austria Duration: 8 Dec 2016 → 9 Dec 2016 http://www.eucognition.org/index.php?page=2016-vienna-general-info

Bibliographical note

Proceedings of the EUCognition Meeting (European Society for Cognitive Systems) "Cognitive Robot Architectures", Vienna, Austria, December 8-9, 2016.

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InstinctRobotWorld
The final publication is available at CEUR-WS.org via http://ceur-ws.org/Vol-1855/EUCognition_2016_Part6.pdf
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http://ceur-ws.org/Vol-1855/EUCognition_2016_Part6.pdf

Cite this

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title = "A role for action selection in consciousness: an investigation of a second-order Darwinian mind",

abstract = "We investigate a small footprint cognitive architecture comprised of two reactive planner instances. The first interacts with the world via sensor and behaviour interfaces. The second monitors the first, and dynamically adjusts its plan in accordance with some predefined objective function. We show that this configuration produces a Darwinian mind, yet aware of its own operation and performance, and able to maintain performance as the environment changes. We identify this architecture as a second-order Darwinian mind, and discuss the philosophical implications for the study of consciousness. We use the Instinct Robot World agent based modelling environment, which in turn uses the Instinct Planner for cognition. ",

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AU - Bryson, Joanna J

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AB - We investigate a small footprint cognitive architecture comprised of two reactive planner instances. The first interacts with the world via sensor and behaviour interfaces. The second monitors the first, and dynamically adjusts its plan in accordance with some predefined objective function. We show that this configuration produces a Darwinian mind, yet aware of its own operation and performance, and able to maintain performance as the environment changes. We identify this architecture as a second-order Darwinian mind, and discuss the philosophical implications for the study of consciousness. We use the Instinct Robot World agent based modelling environment, which in turn uses the Instinct Planner for cognition.

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ER -

A role for action selection in consciousness: an investigation of a second-order Darwinian mind

Abstract

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