21 May 2011

1 Synopsis

Zoological History:  The accelerative growth in complexity of neural networks started around 550 million years ago and will end around the year 2043

Abstract

The accelerative growth in complexity of neural networks is a roughly 550 million year old trajectory.  This trajectory displays emergence by way of communication revolutions, as points in time, in accordance with a geometric series.  Interspersed between these points is a period during which there is an ecological revolution through a transition in the mode of sustenance.  The next communication revolution is due around the year 2043, but whatever might emerge it will not be sufficient enough for the continued accelerative growth in complexity of neural networks.

Introduction

The Cambrian explosion in animal diversity as witnessed in the fossil record, in retrospect, represents later evidence for the start of a now roughly 550 million year old trajectory.  This trajectory has accelerative growth in complexity and can be continuously traced in relation to neural networks.  A neural network is defined to be any communication network where the foundational level is composed of neurons and therefore includes all human communication networks.  For context, the universe is estimated to be about 13 700 million years old, and life on earth, 3 800 million years old.

Below, listed numerically, it is demonstrated that this trajectory displays emergence by way of communication revolutions, which map onto this course as points in time in accordance with a geometric series.  These points begin to verge around the year 2048 and this date will be referred to as the communication climax (henceforth abbreviated CC).

Below, listed alphabetically, it is demonstrated that interspersed between every pair of these successive points lies a period during which an ecological revolution is completed.  These transitional periods are proportionally of somewhat similar durations.  However, they are placed in essence randomly albeit that a certain proportion of time first has to elapse before they start.  A fundamental transition in the mode of sustenance occurs through a suite of new adaptations thereby potentially providing new pathways that can be further developed upon in the future.

The overarching transitions in anatomical organization (and accordingly in behaviour) and then, after the advent of behaviourally modern humans, in economic organization (and accordingly in human culture) occur within these periods.  Furthermore, the attributes of a mode of sustenance will become functionally more elaborate in all subsequent transitional periods.  A cladistic approach is used to identify the boundaries of these periods by evaluating all branching points: lineages are first traced through genetic ancestry and then, after the advent of behaviourally modern humans, through cultural ancestry.

The change in animals from a diffuse network of neurons towards a concentrated network, made possible by the advent of a body plan based upon bilateral symmetry, led quickly to the emergence of a centralized nervous system.  The accelerative growth in complexity of neural networks now began and an alternating series of communication and ecological revolutions ensued.

Picture

Roughly .55 billion years before CC-  
(0)  Centralized nervous system in the eubilateria.  Originating in a common ancestor of the protostomia (a clade that, for example, includes the insects) and the deuterostomia (a clade that, for example, includes the vertebrates).

(A)  Nurturing of offspring:  Starting with the beginning of protected embryonic development.  Originating in a common ancestor of the amniotes (currently represented by reptiles, birds and mammals).  Ending with the beginning of supplemental nourishing through lactation following a viviparous birth.  Originating in a common ancestor of the therian mammals (currently represented by marsupial mammals and placental mammals).

Roughly 55 million years before CC-  
(1)  INTERPRETATION OF BODY LANGUAGE, aided by increased visual acuity and pattern recognition (for example, to assist in the decoding of facial expressions thereby allowing enhanced social behaviour), in the anthropoids (also referred to as the simiiformes).  Originating in a common ancestor of the platyrrhini (New World monkeys) and the catarrhini (Old World monkeys and apes).

(B)  Manipulation of matter:  Starting with the beginning of fully opposable thumbs.  Originating in a common ancestor of the catarrhines.  Ending with the beginning of manual dexterity (for example, as is necessary in nest building).  Originating in a common ancestor of the great apes.

Roughly 5.5 million years before CC-  
(2)  Transmission of culture, based upon learning by trial-and-error, in the hominini.  Originating in a common ancestor of the chimpanzees (our closest surviving relatives) and ourselves (descended from an ancestry that, early on from the divergence with chimpanzees, became increasingly dependent on bipedal locomotion over time).

(C)  Technology:  Starting with the beginning of the skillful production of tools using naturally occurring materials, as witnessed in the archaeological record of the Oldowan culture, for the creation of crude cutting edges made of stone.  Originating in a common ancestor of all human species.  Ending with the beginning of tools produced according to a model, as witnessed in the archaeological record of the Acheulean culture, for the creation of implements designed for hand use.  Originating in a common ancestor of Homo erectus (sensu lato).

Roughly .55 million years before CC-  
(3)  Language, if not fully developed then at least in a rudimentary form, in Homo sapiens (probably first represented in the fossil record by Homo sapiens heidelbergensis).  Originating in a common ancestor of Homo sapiens neanderthalensis (the only other widespread human species to, at least initially, successfully compete against modern humans) and Homo sapiens sapiens (anatomically modern humans).

(D)  Cooperative society:  Starting with the beginning of intraband cohesion as a consequence of the division of labor according to gender; just like the distribution of roles, witnessed by anthropologists, in hunter-gatherer bands.  The change from a robust to a gracile skeletal frame, as witnessed in the fossil record, being an adaption to the more mobile nature of this way of living.  Originating in a common ancestor of anatomically modern humans.  Note how close in time the start of this period is to the date, estimated by geneticists, for Mitochondrial Eve (the matrilineal most recent common ancestor of all living people).  Ending with the beginning of interband cohesion resulting in mutual benefits like the exchange of information.  Originating in a common ancestor of anatomically modern humans that advertise a common identity.  The earliest important evidence for such behaviour, as witnessed in the archaeological record, being the ceremonial use of red ochre as a pigment.  This custom has been extensively witnessed, by anthropologists, in hunter-gatherer bands across the world.

Roughly 55 thousand years before CC-  
(4)  Conceptual intelligence that thereby facilitates the transmission of abstract ideas.  Originating in behaviourally modern humans.  Associated, in the archaeological record, with the Later Stone Age in Africa and afterwards with the Upper Palaeolithic in Europe.  The accelerative growth in human population now began, but at this same point a fundamental impasse was also reached.  Henceforth, the continued accelerative growth in complexity of neural networks could only happen through larger or better connected human networks.  Note how close in time this point is to the date, estimated by geneticists, for Y-chromosomal Adam (the patrilineal most recent common ancestor of all living people).

(E)  Agriculture:  Starting with the beginning of the control of the natural environment.  Originating in Southwest Asia.  Its earliest embodiment, in the archaeological record, arguably being the cultivation of land by the Late Natufian culture.  Ending with the beginning of a diversified farming economy, with the inadvertent control of the human environment, in a now socially stratified society.  Originating in Southwest Asia.  Its earliest embodiment, in the archaeological record, arguably being the Chalcolithic Ghassulian culture.  Both the Natufian and Ghassulian cultures blossomed within the eastern mediterranean region of Southwest Asia.  This crossroad is a natural, network focal and network diffusion, zone for the accumulation and spread of advances.  It is in close proximity, from a geographical perspective by way of long river valleys, to where urbanization would soon appear afterwards with the rise of the Egyptian and Sumerian civilizations.  Note that there must have been a major population expansion involving speakers of an ancestral Afro-Asiatic language during this period.

Roughly 5.5 thousand years before CC-  
(5)  Writing as an information storage process by means of the visual representation of language onto suitable mediums.  Originating in Egypt (if the most important criterion is future impact).  Note that Egyptian is an Afro-Asiatic language.

(F)  empire:  Starting with the beginning of transcontinental trade.  Transportation across distinct geographical regions made possible by navigating sea routes using galleys.  Originating in Phoenicia.  Taken to commence from the trade pact between Tyre (the dominant Phoenician city state at the time) and Israel.  The Phoenicians and Hebrews are both Caananite populations.  Note that the Phoenician alphabet was designed for common use and descended from a script used by a Caananite population resident in Egypt.  Egypt was the most influential power across the Caananite region preceding this transitional period.  The Phoenician alphabet was spread through commerce to become the direct ancestor of subsequent alphabets, via the Greek and Aramaic alphabets.  Ending with the beginning of transcontinental bureaucracy.  Telecommunication across distinct geographical regions enhanced by a well maintained road network.  Originating in the Roman Empire.  Taken to commence from the establishment of the imperial postal system.

Roughly .55 thousand years before CC-  
(6)  Printing as an information broadcasting device by means of moveable type in combination with a press.  Originating in the Holy Roman Empire.  This state was predominantly German, but Latin was the language of scholarship and a lingua franca (as it was across Western Europe).  The culture that surrounded this language was passed from the Roman Empire via the ideological empire of Western Christianity.

(G)  Industrial Production:  Starting with the beginning of manufacturing, as embodied in the textile industry, by the factory system used for cotton spinning at the Cromford mill in England.  Originating in the British Empire.  Here, only relatively recently had Latin been a language of scholarship; therefore this preceding academic culture had a direct impact on publications subsequently printed in the English language.  Ending with the beginning of mass production, as embodied in the transportation industry, by the use of automated assembly lines for the construction of Model T automobiles.  Originating in the United States of America.  Here, English language publications were, for some while now, a mass media (being produced using power-driven presses).  The consumer orientated ethos would now spread across the world.

Roughly 55 years before CC-  
(7)  World wide web as an information organization system by means of linking documents, spread across computers connected to the internet, via hypertext.  Originating in the economically more developed regions of the global community.  The world wide web became popular after it could be easily accessed through a graphical user interface (GUI).  The GUI was developed to eliminate the need for text based commands thereby making computers more consumer friendly.

Extrapolation

The completion of another ecological revolution before around 2043 will be necessary if there is to be continued accelerative growth in complexity of neural networks up until then.  We can tentatively speculate that this transition in the mode of sustenance will be:

(H)  Ubiquitous Computing:  This transitional period, if it has not already started with the advent of recent smartphones, will probably begin with a major advance in mobile computing.  Interactions between humans and objects will become integrated through pervasive connection to communication networks.  Increased economic efficiency will be achieved by the optimization of information management systems.  This period will probably finally conclude with the accomplishment of a fluid human-computer interface.  This new computing platform, which will constitute a form of augmented intelligence, might involve the use of glasses to project the computer display directly onto the retina combined with control by hand gestures and voice commands.

After this transition is completed there will still be enough desire for affluence, at least in the economically less developed regions of the global community, to maintain continued accelerative growth in complexity of neural networks up until 2043 (despite a quickly plateauing world population).

Roughly 5.5 years before CC- 
(8)  ARTIFICIAL GENERAL INTELLIGENCE?  The world wide web will be far more developed after (H) to have by around 2043 surmounted most communication obstacles.  For any subsequent communication revolution to make a significant impact it will probably have to utilize artificial intelligence especially natural language understanding.  Whatever might emerge it could not possibly at this stage be effectively applied to have an important impact quickly enough for the continued accelerative growth in complexity of neural networks.

Tanwir Wazir-Khaksar
21 May 2011, Glasgow

Blog Archive

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.