Life excels at honing abilities and then complimenting those abilities by adding additional competencies that extend its reach. The paper on Exaptation discusses the strategy that Life has used to evolve in some detail. This process of complimenting existing faculties results in a layered aspect to organisms, with more complex structures and functions extending underlying “primitive” systems. This characteristic of complex Living Systems is particularly apparent in our systems for sensing and processing sensory information. To this writer’s knowledge, this insight was first enumerated in the 1960s by the American neuroscientist Paul Maclean in his theory of the Triune Brain. The papers in this section discuss the layered structure of both our senses and our cognitive processes (our ability to make information out of sensory data) using the Exaptation model.
Data and information are very different. Our senses bring data into our system from our boundary and beyond. Information is the useable attribute of “raw” data. By processing sensory data, information can be created that initiate beneficial actions. As Living Things embodied increasingly complex sensing and motor functions, they also acquired more sophisticated means to distill and implement information. The evolution of these layers of information processing complexity is recognizable in our core structures:
- In the Metabolic Core and primitive Locomotive Core, signals reach a firing threshold and are then passed along. These responses are described as “Reflexes”. There is no concurrent “timing” component or “carrier-wave” as found in the Central Nervous System’s brain waves. This form of information processing can only respond in genetically encoded, “pre-wired” patterns, immediately responding to what is sensed now, in basic Stimulus/Response patterns – “If X threshold firing = true, do Y”.
- In the evolutionarily more advanced Locomotive and Manipulation Cores, signals are embedded in carrier waves (brain waves) which allow for synchronization of signal convergence. This enables contextual content to be embedded within the signal information. “Tuning” the frequencies of signal transfer is a form of learning similar to acquiring a skill. Synchronization of data convergence facilitates the expression of complex behaviors that can be far removed from the immediacy of Stimulus/Response patterns. These cognitive frameworks are observed in our Drives, Instincts, Emotions, and conscious minds.
THE SENSES
The sensory component of our sensory processing is discussed in the sequence of their evolutionary emergence here:
THE SENSES
COGNITION AND THE EVOLVING BRAIN
The processing attributes of our sensory processing is discussed in the context of their evolutionary emergence here:
COGNITION AND THE EVOLVING BRAIN
SENSORY HYPERACUITY
Sensory processing issues are often identified as linked to low tolerance for sensory inputs. This paper covers some context for these types of issues:
SENSORY HYPERACUITY
META READING
A discussion on our core structural attributes:
THE FOUR CORES
A discussion on the models for our species presented on this website
EVOLUTIONARY PARADIGMS