Random choice in amorphous processes

摘要

I prove that the natural multicellular environment requires random scheduling of cell activity in order to successfully execute arbitrary amorphous programs. This proof uses an unusual new method of constructing amorphous programs. Amorphous processes model natural multicellular information processing and so it is finite in most respects. Thus it is surprising that a non-computable operation (random choice for cell activity) is an essential part of the formalism's interpretation. The necessary randomness could originate in thermodynamic events. To the extent that amorphous processes successfully model multicellular biological information processing, this result suggests that there is something essential to the processes of life and evolution that lies just beyond Turing computability.