A revolutionary OS/Programming Idea

[Lynn H. Maxson]

Alaric B Snell writes:
"...And do we actually know if the human brain can be 
described as something not based on an instruction set? ..."

Again I refer you to Ashby's "Design for a Brain" where you 
will find a description of his "homeostat", a non-programmed 
adaptive device.  This does not say that the brain works in 
this manner.  We simply do not know how the brain works its 
magic.  Ashby simply illustrates that adaptive behavior can 
occur or not occur through connection-based conditions.  

In the particular instance of the homeostat, an 
electro-mechanical-chemical device of identical 
interconnected components (neuron analogs), he 
demonstrated a form of homeostasis.  Homeostasis describes 
the process which occurs in living things to keep composite 
"vital signs" within certain value ranges.  Stay inside and you 
live.  Step outside and you die.

Now process engineers attempt to maintain vital signs in 
operating refineries.  They basically program the process, 
centrally monitor it, and more importantly shut it down when 
their programming cannot handle an "out of control" situation.

Refineries are not living organism.  You can kill and 
resuscitate a refinery, but a living organism gets only one 
chance.  If the program fails it dies.  The program can do no 
more than its authors can pre-conceive.  It has no means to 
dynamically adjust (adapt) except in pre-conceived ways.

Such pre-conceptions do not exist--or according to Ashy need 
not exist--for a living organism to demonstrate adaptive 
behavior.  Thus no "deus ex machina", no finger of God, no 
external (pre-conceived) programming required.

You could construct a refinery in this manner, but you would 
not.  At some point measured in a nanosecond or a hundred 
years it would die.  No one would invest money in such a 
venture.  We do our best through programming to minimize 
risks by making systems which we stop (kill), correct 
(reprogram), and restart (give life).  Living organism only get 
a start.

Control systems depend on feedback, positive and negative, 
determined through inter-connections.  You change the 
inter-connections you get a different system.  That's partly 
why we call them "control" systems.  What do you call a 
system unconcerned with the inter-connections to produce 
adaptive behavior of a given type?  Living organisms.<g>

Ashby points out that an control system like an automatic 
pilot will fail if the connections (program) are not made in a 
specific manner.  Yet he illustrates that you can build an 
automatic pilot which attempts the same adaptive behavior 
regardless of the connections.  The keyword here is 
"attempts".  If it doesn't succeed in time, i.e. adapt, you get to 
go down with the plane.

The truth is we want the brain to have an underlying 
instruction set.  We don't want it to exhibit free will.  Our 
whole control system philosophy, including all of cybernetics 
(except for Ashby) is based on pre-determinism.

So if Ashby is on the mark with respect to the brain, you can't 
emulate it with von Neumann architecture.  Why?  Because 
von Neumann architecture depends on the "deus ex machina", 
the human programmer.  That's why the dynamic modification 
of source in LISP is overrated and frequently leads to leaps of 
faith into what is possible with it.  But until you can eliminate 
entirely the "deus ex machina" its dynamic modification will 
always follow pre-conceived paths.

"...Hmmm, neurons do have long term state as well as short 
term state, but even the long term state is mutable so 
perhaps not 'static'. The synaptic weightings change slowly as 
the neuron 'learns', and this influences the chance of the 
neuron firing or not in a given situation ..."

You see that's what happens when you have a word like 
"learns" and apply it inappropriately to a situation.  You have 
no basis other than a human preference that it takes place for 
"learning" in a neuron.  Moreover you have no predictive basis 
for what constitutes "learning" in humans or why all learning 
is not "universal" in them.  That's its not, that it varies by 
individual, should indicate it does not rely on a von Neumann 
architecture.  Humans are not computers.  That's why 
software, in the form of instruction, does not have a 
predictable outcome on an individual basis.

In short intelligence and sentience is not von Neumann based.  
Therefore a von Neumann architecture can never emulate 
"exactly" intelligence and sentience.  It cannot cross the 
"threshold".  It cannot escape its own programming.  It 
therefore cannot evolve on its own.

"...I'm interested in learning about more 'alternative' 
realisations of OO.  Things I have alreaded studied are the 
generic function / multiple dispatch idea, which is very 
interesting since it lets you add methods to existing classes; 
..."

In truth we used alternatives up to the point of getting this 
one.<g>  We can put this one down as a learning experience.   
The plain fact of the matter is that we don't need classes, 
class structures, or class libraries defined in this matter.  We 
don't need this particular form to impose inheritance in order 
to simplify (?) the concept of reuse.

We have logic programming.  We have rules.  We can 
associate the rules with the processing of data and with 
processes (source segments) themselves.  If I want to say that 
only certain procedures can maintain a given set a data, an 
element or aggegate (array or structure), then I only have to 
name them in declariing the data.  I do this in SL/I with a 
"range" option as part of the data declaration, e.g. 'dcl able 
(-47, 50) fixed dec (7,2) range (proc1, proc2, ...procN);'.  That 
tells the software that only those procedures can access this 
data aggregate.  If I wanted it to have the same range as 
another set of data, i.e. exhibit inheritance, I can simply 
include the declared data name within the 'range' option.  I 
could then have a class structure apply to only a range of 
data declarations and procedures within the entire body of 
such.  Thus it doesn't have to be an "all or nothing" affair.