Using Logic to Evolve More Logic: Composing Logical Operators via Self-Assembly

I consider how complex logical operations might self-assemble in a signalling-game context via composition of simpler underlying dispositions. On the one hand, agents may take advantage of pre-evolved dispositions; on the other hand, they may co-evolve dispositions as they simultaneously learn to combine them to display more complex behaviour. In either case, the evolution of complex logical operations can be more efficient than evolving such capacities from scratch. Showing how complex phenomena like these might evolve provides an additional path to the possibility of evolving more or less rich notions of compositionality. This helps provide another facet of the evolutionary story of how sufficiently rich, human-level cognitive or linguistic capacities may arise from simpler precursors.

Automated summary

In a signalling-game context, complex logical operations can self-assemble through the composition of simpler underlying dispositions. This evolutionary process can be more efficient than starting from scratch and can lead to the emergence of more or less rich notions of compositionality.