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Complexity in Cellular Automata
Hudcová, Barbora ; Mikolov, Tomáš (advisor)
In order to identify complex systems capable of modeling artificial life, we study the notion of complexity within a class of dynamical systems called cellu- lar automata. We present a novel classification of cellular automata dynamics, which helps us identify interesting behavior in large automaton spaces. We give a detailed comparison of our results to previous methods of dynamics classification. In the second part of the thesis, we study the backward dynamics of cellular au- tomata. We present a novel representation of one-dimensional cellular automata, which can be used to charcterize all their garden of eden configurations. We demonstrate the usefulness of this method on examples. 1
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Signal complexity evaluation in the processing of functional magnetic resonance imaging
Vyhnánek, Jan ; Boldyš, Jiří (advisor) ; Dvořák, Jiří (referee)
Functional magnetic resonance imaging has been recently the most common tool for examining the neural activity in human and animals. The goal of a typical data-mining challenge is the localisation of brain areas activated during a cognitive task which is usually performed using a linear model or correlation methods. For this purpose several authors have proposed the use of methods evaluating signal complexity which could possibly overcome some of the shortcomings of the standards methods due to their independence on a priori knowledge of data characteristics. This work explains possibilities of using such methods including aspects of their configuration and it proposes an evaluation of performance of the methods applied on simulated data following expected biological characteristics. The results of the evaluation of performance showed little advantage of these methods over the standard ones in cases when the standard methods were possible to apply. However, some of the methods evaluating signal complexity were found useful for determining the regularity of signals which is a feature that cannot be assessed by the standard methods. Optimal parameters of the methods evaluating signal regularity were determined on simulated data and finally the methods were applied on the data examining emotional processing of...
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Macroevolutionary and ecological implications of the theory of frozen plasticity
Toman, Jan ; Flegr, Jaroslav (advisor) ; Fatka, Oldřich (referee) ; Mikuláš, Radek (referee)
The frozen plasticity theory is a punctuationalist theory of adaptive evolution. It states that long periods of stasis, during which populations respond to selection pressures only by elastic change in the frequency of already present alleles, alternate in the evolution of sexual species with short periods of plastic evolution, during which alleles can get fixed or eliminated by directed selection. Asexual species are not expected to maintain such high genetic polymorphism in the long term. They should, however, be able to plastically respond to selection pressures throughout their whole existence. This difference between the evolutionary dynamics of sexual and asexual clades has a number of ecological and macroevolutionary implications. Concerning ecology, we could expect different environmental preferences of sexual and asexual species. Accordingly, in our first work that was based on a comparative study, we statistically significantly supported the hypothesis that (ancient) asexual groups of (eukaryotes) inhabit more stable and homogeneous habitats than their related sexual controls. Focusing on actually experienced, i.e. subjective, heterogeneity of the environment turned out to be the crucial factor of this type of research. From the viewpoint of macroevolutionary implications of the frozen...
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Evolution as a Way to God in the Work of Teilhard de Chardin
Jirousová, Františka ; Karfíková, Lenka (advisor) ; Sokol, Jan (referee) ; Macek, Petr (referee)
This dissertation deals with the notion of centration in the work of Teilhard de Chardin, the notion being examined with regard to two related aims: 1) to illustrate the logical structure of Teilhard's Christian theory of evolution, and 2) to explain the relation between centration carried out by created beings and centration assigned to God as the focal point of evolution. In other words: to explore the connection between fundamental freedom attributed by Teilhard to created beings and culminating in human beings according to him, and God's freedom demonstrating itself in controlling the universe and directing it to a goal being the fullness of being (pleroma). The first part presents Teilhard's life and the contexts of his work. The second part explains the main notions of Teilhard's theory and metaphysics, such as "consciousness", "spirit", "energy", "centro-complexity", and "matter", and relates them to the notion of centration. Centration is presented here as an activity of the consciousness consisting in the unifying formation of multitude by its interconnection with different types of relations around one centre. In such unification, the main law of evolution manifests itself - the Law of Differentiating Unity. This means that parts unified in such way start differentiating again. What is...
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The Theory of Communication as an Explanatory Principle for the Natural Multilevel Text Segmentation
Milička, Jiří ; Zemánek, Petr (advisor) ; Cvrček, Václav (referee) ; Altmann, Gabriel (referee)
1. Phonemes, words, clauses and sentences are not a logical necessity of language, unlike distinctive features and morphemes. 2. Despite this, such nested segmentation is very firmly present in languages and in our concepts of language description, 3. because nested segmentation and inserting redundancy on multiple levels is an efficient way to get the language signal through the burst-noise channel. 4. There are various strategies how redundancy can be added and what kind of redundancy can be added. 5. The segment delimiter is expressed by some additional information and the amount of delimiting information is independent from the length of the seg- ment it delimits. This principle can serve as a basis for a successful model for the Menzerath's relation.
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Many faces of Chernobyl: temporality, toxicity, complexity in the lives of environmental migrants
Podlesná, Valentina ; Kuřík, Bohuslav (advisor) ; Michal, Šipoš (referee)
The diploma thesis focuses on the topic of environmental migration because of the Chernobyl nuclear accident in 1986. The main questions of the thesis are whether the Chernobyl accident is associated at any social level with environmental migration to the Czech Republic? To what time is the event socially framed? In what areas and how does the accident currently affect the lives of the environmental migrants? The diploma thesis has two research parts. The first part is a media analysis, which shows that the Chernobyl accident is mostly socially perceived as a matter of the past and is not associated with environmental migration to the Czech Republic. The second research part is based on anthropological research of semi- structured interviews with respondents. The result of this research is the division of radiation toxicity into five dimensions (political, biological, potential, reproductive, migration), in which the consequences of the Chernobyl accident continue to manifest themselves in the lives of environmental migrants. The dimensions of toxicity take place in different time frames, so the work also focuses on the temporality of modern accidents. The social perception of the Chernobyl accident as a finished event does not mean that it is no longer present in human lives. The aim of the...
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Complexity in Cellular Automata
Hudcová, Barbora ; Mikolov, Tomáš (advisor) ; Kupsa, Michal (referee)
In order to identify complex systems capable of modeling artificial life, we study the notion of complexity within a class of dynamical systems called cellu- lar automata. We present a novel classification of cellular automata dynamics, which helps us identify interesting behavior in large automaton spaces. We give a detailed comparison of our results to previous methods of dynamics classification. In the second part of the thesis, we study the backward dynamics of cellular au- tomata. We present a novel representation of one-dimensional cellular automata, which can be used to charcterize all their garden of eden configurations. We demonstrate the usefulness of this method on examples. 1
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Macroevolutionary and ecological implications of the theory of frozen plasticity
Toman, Jan ; Flegr, Jaroslav (advisor) ; Fatka, Oldřich (referee) ; Mikuláš, Radek (referee)
The frozen plasticity theory is a punctuationalist theory of adaptive evolution. It states that long periods of stasis, during which populations respond to selection pressures only by elastic change in the frequency of already present alleles, alternate in the evolution of sexual species with short periods of plastic evolution, during which alleles can get fixed or eliminated by directed selection. Asexual species are not expected to maintain such high genetic polymorphism in the long term. They should, however, be able to plastically respond to selection pressures throughout their whole existence. This difference between the evolutionary dynamics of sexual and asexual clades has a number of ecological and macroevolutionary implications. Concerning ecology, we could expect different environmental preferences of sexual and asexual species. Accordingly, in our first work that was based on a comparative study, we statistically significantly supported the hypothesis that (ancient) asexual groups of (eukaryotes) inhabit more stable and homogeneous habitats than their related sexual controls. Focusing on actually experienced, i.e. subjective, heterogeneity of the environment turned out to be the crucial factor of this type of research. From the viewpoint of macroevolutionary implications of the frozen...
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Simulations of open-ended evolution
Prax, Sebastian ; Toman, Jan (advisor) ; Tureček, Petr (referee)
Evolutionary algorithms are used to solve a number of optimization problems in the computer science. At the same time, they are fundamental pillar for creating evolutionary simulations and testing scientific hypotheses in a various areas of theoretical biology. In the first half of my work, I characterize the concept of "open-ended evolution", focus on its connection with the technical side of simulations and introduce readers to the problematics of system simulation. Further on, I deal with the phenomenon of increasing complexity and the idea of "evolutionary progress". All these topics are confronted with various perspectives of researchers in the field of evolutionary biology. In the second half, I summarize the benefits of existing projects for evolutionary biology and applied informatics, as well as the ways in which the simulations of open-ended evolution can be approached. Basically, these projects can be divided into two categories. They are either projects in which individuals develop towards a predefined goal, which is conditioned by a fitness function, or projects of researchers who seek to achieve an open-ended evolution by employing biologically realistic design of the genetic code and environment in conjunction with the absence of a particular attractor in the evolution of virtual...
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Image, Information, Complexity. The study of visual information incorporating the function of information entropy with a focus on abstract art
Malečková, Dita ; Kera, Denisa (advisor) ; Marcelli, Miroslav (referee) ; Havel, Ivan M. (referee)
This text focuses on the relation of information and image, hence Information Theory and Image Analysis, as well as visualization of information and methods of visual analytics focusing on analysis of art works. It also concentrates on evolution of digital image and related new type of perception and artificial aesthetics. We narrow the broader topic of the image and image information to the abstract art, namely the work of Czech painter Frantisek Kupka, which is used as input in the experiment presenting original method of image analysis using the function of information entropy (Rényi entropy). This approach was used for the first time for analysis of art works with the aim to obtain the comparaison of natural and artificial classification of image information. We chose the work of abstract art not only with regard to given history of grammatics of abstract forms and its relation to the digital image, but also as an emblematic example of effective gaining of information from complex environment. Work thus summarizes historical context of evolution of digital image and theoretical reflection of contemporary image analytics and others techniques relevant to the image information and emphasizes relation of abstract art to the natural and simulated complexity.
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