这是一本新书,由World Scientific出版公司于出版。但是,要说明的是,这本书是该出版公司出版的关于信息研究的丛书的第二部。目前该丛书已经预告到了第三部。具体说来,第一部的书名叫《信息理论——基础性、多样性和统一性》(Thoery of Information: Fundamentality,Deversity and Unification),第二部就是我现在要介绍的《信息与计算——对信息和计算基础理解的科学与哲学文集》(Information and Computation:Essays on Scientific and Philosophical Understanding of Foundation of Information and Computation)而第三部这是《涌现的信息:统一信息论架构大纲》(An Outline Unifified Theory of Information Framework)。
第一、三两部都是单人的专著,均可自成一说,可是信息这个问题是极其复杂的一个概念,如何理解信息可谓见仁见智。而第二部这体现出包容的内容。首先,它是一部文集,其中所选的17篇文章都是编者们(Gordana Dodig-Crnkovic & Mark Burgin )精心挑选的,因而比较有代表性;其次,这些文章的作者也都是相关领域的领军人物,因而可以相对代表各个方面的研究现状。第三,编者本人也是在这个领域中极其活跃的人物。由于信息与计算目前无论是在国际还是在国内都属于“显学”,所以关注这些活跃人物的工作也无疑是重要的。
1 Cybersemiotics and the Question of Knowledge (S Brier) 2 Information Dynamics in a Categorical Setting (M Burgin) 3 Mathematics as Biological Process (G Chaitin) 4 Information, Computation, Measurement and Irreversibility (J Collier) 5 From Descartes to Turing: The Computational Content of Supervenience (B Cooper) 6 On the Algorithmic Nature of the World (J-P Delahaye & H Zenil) 7 A Dialogue Concerning Two Possible World Systems (G Dodig-Crnkovic & V Mueller) 8 Does Computing Embrace Self-Organization? (W Hofkirchner) 9 Analysis of Information and Computation in Physics Explains Cognitive Paradigms: From Full Cognition to Laplace Determinism to Statistical Determinism to Modern Approach (V Kreinovich & R Araiza) 10 Bodies ? Both Informed and Transformed (B J MacLennan) 11 Computation on Information, Meaning and Representations, an Evolutionary Approach (C Menant) 12 Interior Grounding, Reflection, and Self-Consciousness (M Minsky) 13 Insights into the Biological Computing (W Riofrio) 14 Super-Recursive Features of Natural Evolvability Processes and the Models for Computational Evolution (D Roglic) 15 A Sketch of a Modeling View of Computing (O Shagrir) 16 What's Information, for an Organism or Intelligent Machine? How Can a Machine or Organism Mean? (A Sloman) 17 Inconsistent Information as a Natural Phenomenon (C N J de Vey Mestdagh & J H Hoepman)