21L.448J Darwin and Design
21L.448J Darwin and Design (Fall 2010, MIT OCW). Instructor: Professor James Paradis. In the Origin of Species (1859), Charles Darwin gave us a model for understanding how natural objects and systems can evidence design without positing a designer: how purpose and mechanism can exist without intelligent agency. Texts in this course deal with pre- and post-Darwinian treatment of this topic within literature and speculative thought since the eighteenth century. We will give some attention to the modern study of feedback mechanisms in artificial intelligence. Our reading will be in Hume, Voltaire, Malthus, Darwin, Butler, H. G. Wells, and Turing. (from ocw.mit.edu)
| Lecture 17 - Evolution and Cybernetics |
Topics: Norbert Wiener, the golem, and the problem of control. The key issue of cybernetics. Evolution as Phylogenetic Learning. Biological versus machine reproduction, Sorcery versus science. An increasingly automated world.
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