[Fis] Contingency signals: AI Information, Decision and Learning

[JOHN TORDAY]

Any way to test whether the AI 'parts' are representative of a 'whole'? or
just space-filling stuff....

John Torday


On Thu, Nov 20, 2025 at 4:29 AM Mark Johnson <johnsonmwj1 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Dear all,
>
> A group of colleagues and I have been working on diagnostic AI for some
> years  using a comparison technique. A few of us just published this paper
> on the inter-relationship between management decision making, the learning
> of decision-making and technology: Developing judgement for business: an
> AI-based model of independent management learning - ScienceDirect
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0148296325006654__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!WPhKwNIaSyPehSx-1rv1IXkLmAKWvfhjcSoF8ycbMGpQLKjNmUeRHbMR7LBpcGoUSKLBgkQAwLAnZMgvKms0B4w$>
>
> The role of information in this is obviously crucial - as is the criticism
> of AI that it is an unreliable assistant. How might AI tell us when it's
> not sure about things? While Shannon's H is a kind of contingency signal,
> it is curious how with AI this aspect of mathematical information theory is
> easily forgotten! However, there does seem to be an intersection between
> the way information is conceived and effective social decision-making where:
>
> a. information is framed in terms of varying degrees of contingency
> b. good decision concerns the effective allocation of scarce human
> expertise to maximise organisational effectiveness
>
> In essence, the greater the contingency in a judgement, the greater the
> need to allocate human resource to debate choices; the less the
> contingency, the less the need for humans in decision processes.
>
> The fundamental message is a management cybernetic one (i.e. Stafford
> Beer) - it is not what the technology itself does, it is how we organise
> ourselves with it that matters.
>
> The technique in the paper illustrates a way in which degrees of
> contingency in decision-making can be identified by the technology. It is,
> we would suggest, this signal which we need from our technology, not an
> "answer" to questions. So the pursuit of "answer engines" (as Google and
> others are discussing) is barking up the wrong tree.
>
> A deeper question is whether some kind of "contingency signal" lies at the
> heart of biological information itself. This would have resonance with
> deeper cybernetic ideas about contingency (Luhmann, Leydesdorff, Shannon,
> etc) and cellular organisation (Torday and colleagues, Levin, etc) -
> whether a biological "contingency signal" is produced in the gap between
> the internal biological selection process of a cell (referencing its
> evolutionary history acquired through symbiogenesis, for example) and
> external selection pressure.
>
> Any thoughts?
>
> Best wishes,
>
> Mark
> --
> Dr. Mark William Johnson
> Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health
> University of Manchester
>
> Department of Eye and Vision Science (honorary)
> University of Liverpool
> Phone: 07786 064505
> Email: johnsonmwj1 at gmail.com
> Blog: https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://dailyimprovisation.blogspot.com__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!WtKtZf7-avoS_JPEWLrBaq3FM6-QFggTjILjOJOKraoh-3_sj5f7a_wvU-txPbo48Ozjt7l4eElaz-I1BAU$ 
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://dailyimprovisation.blogspot.com__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!WPhKwNIaSyPehSx-1rv1IXkLmAKWvfhjcSoF8ycbMGpQLKjNmUeRHbMR7LBpcGoUSKLBgkQAwLAnZMgv378sKxM$>
> _______________________________________________
> Fis mailing list
> Fis at listas.unizar.es
> http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis 
> ----------
> INFORMACIÓN SOBRE PROTECCIÓN DE DATOS DE CARÁCTER PERSONAL
>
> Ud. recibe este correo por pertenecer a una lista de correo gestionada por
> la Universidad de Zaragoza.
> Puede encontrar toda la información sobre como tratamos sus datos en el
> siguiente enlace:
> https://sicuz.unizar.es/informacion-sobre-proteccion-de-datos-de-caracter-personal-en-listas 
> Recuerde que si está suscrito a una lista voluntaria Ud. puede darse de
> baja desde la propia aplicación en el momento en que lo desee.
> http://listas.unizar.es 
> ----------
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listas.unizar.es/pipermail/fis/attachments/20251120/530fc370/attachment.html>