Vehicles : experiments in synthetic psychology

These imaginative thought experiments are the inventions of one of the world's eminent brain researchers. They are "vehicles," a series of hypothetical, self-operating machines that exhibit increasingly intricate if not always successful or civilized "behavior." Each of the vehicles in the series incorporates the essential features of all the earlier models and along the way they come to embody aggression, love, logic, manifestations of foresight, concept formation, creative thinking, personality, and free will. In a section of extensive biological notes, Braitenberg locates many elements of his fantasy in current brain research.Valentino Braitenberg is a director of the Max Planck Institute of Biological Cybernetics and Honorary Professor of Information Science at the University of TÃ1⁄4bingen, West Germany. A Bradford Book. This volume describes Braitenberg vehicles. Braitenberg vehicles are conceived in a thought experiment by the author of this book to illustrate in an evolutive way the abilities of simple agents. The vehicles represent the simplest form of behavior based artificial intelligence or embodied cognition, (i.e. intelligent behavior) that emerges from sensorimotor interaction between the agent and its environment, without any need for an internal memory, representation of the environment, or inference. There are 14 vehicles in all -- a series of hypothetical, self-operating mobile machines that exhibit increasingly sophisticated behavior similar to that in the real biological or neuroscientific world. One might assemble Braitenberg's vehicles like cunning table-top toys that might look like the fantastic Albrecht drawings. Whatever their guise, they behave like living creatures, ranging from simple light-seeking automata to vehicles that an observing psychologist or philosopher might conclude were operated by concealed human beings. Each of the vehicles in the series incorporates the essential features of all the earlier models but represents an evolutionary advance to a higher plateau of complexity. Along the way, they come to embody the instincts of fight or flight, the characteristic behaviors impelled by love and by logic, manifestations of foresight, concept formation, creative thinking, personality, and free will. The author shows that these attributes and patterns of behavior can be internalized into machines using the simplest parts -- a collection of environmental sensors, some wheel-driving motors, various threshold devices, a few fictional (but logically and technologically plausible) components with special properties. The author locates many elements of his fantasy in current brain research in a concluding section of extensive biological notes The Study Group on a European Civil Code has taken upon itself the task of drafting common European principles for the most important aspects of the law of obligations and for certain parts of the law of property in movables which are especially relevant for the functioning of the common market. Like the Commission on European Contract Law's Principles of European Contract Law, the results of the research conducted by the Study Group on a European Civil Code seek to advance the process of Europeanisation of private law. Among other topics the series tackles sales and service contracts, distribution contracts and security rights, renting contracts and loan agreements, negotiorum gestio, delicts and unjustified enrichment law, transfer of property, and trust law. The principles furnish each of the national jurisdictions a grid reference.They can be agreed upon by the parties within the framework of the rules of private international law. They may provide a stimulus to both the national and European legislator for moulding private law. Beyond this, they aim to further discussion about the creation of a European Civil Code, or a Common Frame of Reference in the area of patrimonial law, by submitting a concrete model. The Principles of European Law are published in co-operation with Bruylant (Belgium), Sellier (Germany) and Staempfli Publishers Ltd. (Switzerland) These imaginative thought experiments are the inventions of one of the world's eminent brain researchers. These imaginative thought experiments are the inventions of one of the world's eminent brain researchers. They are "vehicles," a series of hypothetical, self-operating machines that exhibit increasingly intricate if not always successful or civilized "behavior." Each of the vehicles in the series incorporates the essential features of all the earlier models and along the way they come to embody aggression, love, logic, manifestations of foresight, concept formation, creative thinking, personality, and free will. In a section of extensive biological notes, Braitenberg locates many elements of his fantasy in current brain research.

The "vehicles" described in this light-hearted yet wonderfully skillful exercise in fictional science are the inventions of one of the world's eminent brain researchers.