论文标题
宏观代理及其动作
A macro agent and its actions
论文作者
论文摘要
在科学中,宏观级别描述复杂的动力学系统中的因果相互作用通常被认为是方便的,但最终可降低到基本微成分的完整因果关系中。然而,这种还原主义的观点很难与与自治和代理有关的几个问题保持一致:(1)代理需要(因果)边界将它们与环境区分开来,(2)至少在生物学背景下,代理与宏观系统有关,并且(3)代理应该对环境采取行动。综合信息理论(IIT)(Oizumi等,2014)基于一组因果原理(包括因果特异性,组成和不可还原性)的因果关系进行定量说明,以多种方式挑战了还原论的观点。首先,IIT形式主义提供了系统的因果结构的完整说明,其中包括由多个系统元素构成的不可还原的高阶机制。其次,系统的集成信息量($φ$)测量了因果限制系统在自身上施加的限制,并且可以在宏观描述水平上达到峰值(Hoel等,2016; Marshall等,2018)。最后,也可以利用IIT的因果原理来识别和量化事件的实际原因(“什么原因导致了什么”),例如代理的行为(Albantakis等,2019)。在这里,我们以模拟代理的示例演示了该框架,该框架配备了一个小神经网络,该框架在宏观尺度上最多形成$φ$。
In science, macro level descriptions of the causal interactions within complex, dynamical systems are typically deemed convenient, but ultimately reducible to a complete causal account of the underlying micro constituents. Yet, such a reductionist perspective is hard to square with several issues related to autonomy and agency: (1) agents require (causal) borders that separate them from the environment, (2) at least in a biological context, agents are associated with macroscopic systems, and (3) agents are supposed to act upon their environment. Integrated information theory (IIT) (Oizumi et al., 2014) offers a quantitative account of causation based on a set of causal principles, including notions such as causal specificity, composition, and irreducibility, that challenges the reductionist perspective in multiple ways. First, the IIT formalism provides a complete account of a system's causal structure, including irreducible higher-order mechanisms constituted of multiple system elements. Second, a system's amount of integrated information ($Φ$) measures the causal constraints a system exerts onto itself and can peak at a macro level of description (Hoel et al., 2016; Marshall et al., 2018). Finally, the causal principles of IIT can also be employed to identify and quantify the actual causes of events ("what caused what"), such as an agent's actions (Albantakis et al., 2019). Here, we demonstrate this framework by example of a simulated agent, equipped with a small neural network, that forms a maximum of $Φ$ at a macro scale.