Coupling mechanisms between the contralateral legs of a walking insect (Carausius morosus)

Cruse H, Knauth A. Coupling mechanisms between the contralateral legs of a walking insect (Carausius morosus). The journal of experimental biology. 1989;144(1):199-213.Interactions between contralateral legs of stick insects during walking were examined in the absence of mechanical coupling between the legs by studying animals walking on a horizontal plane covered with a thin film of silicone oil. Investigations of undisturbed walks showed that contralateral coupling is weaker han ipsilateral coupling. Two types of influence were found, (i) For each pair of front, middle and rear legs, when one leg started a retraction movement, the probability for the contralateral leg to start a protraction was increased, (ii) For front- and hind-leg pairs, it was found that the probability of starting a protraction in one leg was also increased, the farther the other leg was moved backwards during retraction. Whether such influences exist between middle legs could not be determined. Both ‘excitatory’ mechanisms very much resemble those influences which have been found to exist between ipsilateral legs. However, in contrast to ipsilateral legs, the interaction between two contralateral legs was found to act in both directions

Is the position of the femur tibia joint under feedback control in the walking stick insect?: I. Force measurements

Cruse H. Is the position of the femur tibia joint under feedback control in the walking stick insect?: I. Force measurements. The journal of experimental biology. 1981;92(1):87-95

Peripheral influences on the movement of the legs in a walking insect Carausius morosus

Cruse H, Epstein S. Peripheral influences on the movement of the legs in a walking insect Carausius morosus. The Journal of Experimental Biology. 1982;101(1):161-170

A new method measuring leg position of walking crustaceans shows that motor output during return stroke depends upon load

Cruse H, Müller U. A new method measuring leg position of walking crustaceans shows that motor output during return stroke depends upon load. The journal of experimental biology. 1984;110(1):319-322

Is the position of the femur tibia joint under feedback control in the walking stick insect?: II. Electrophysiological recordings

Cruse H, Pflüger H-J. Is the position of the femur tibia joint under feedback control in the walking stick insect?: II. Electrophysiological recordings. The journal of experimental biology. 1981;92(1):97-107

The control of walking movements in the leg of the rock lobster

Cruse H, Clarac F, Chasserat C. The control of walking movements in the leg of the rock lobster. Biological Cybernetics. 1983;47(2):87-94

The bottom-up approach : benefits and limits ; a reply to Aaron Gutknecht

Aaron Gutknecht supports our bottom-up approach, specifies possible limits and highlights interesting future aspects. His added perspective is valuable and interesting to us. As we fully agree with his view, we only add some complementary remarks

Mental states as emergent properties : from walking to consciousness

In this article we propose a bottom-up approach to higher-level mental states, such as emotions, attention, intention, volition, or consciousness. The idea behind this bottom-up approach is that higher-level properties may arise as emergent properties, i.e., occur without requiring explicit implementation of the phenomenon under examination. Using a neural architecture that shows the abilities of autonomous agents, we want to come up with quantitative hypotheses concerning cognitive mechanisms, i.e., to come up with testable predictions concerning the underlying structure and functioning of an autonomous system that can be tested in a robot-control system. we do not want to build an artificial system that is, for example, conscious in the first place. on the contrary, we want to construct a system able to control behavior. only then will this system be used as a tool to test to what extent descriptions of mental phenomena used in psychology or philosophy of mind may be applied to such an artificial system. originally these phenomena are necessarily defined using verbal formulations that allow for interpreting them differently. a functional definition, in contrast, does not suffer from being ambiguous, because it can be expressed explicitly using mathematical formulations that can be tested, for example, in a quantitative simulation. it is important to note that we are not concerned with the “hard” problem of consciousness, i.e., the subjective aspect of mental phenomena. this approach is possible because, adopting a monist view, we assume that we can circumvent the “hard” problem without losing information concerning the possible function of these phenomena. in other words, we assume that phenomenality is an inherent property of both access consciousness and metacognition (or reflexive consciousness). following these arguments, we claim that our network does not only show emergent properties on the reactive level; it also shows that mental states, such as emotions, attention, intention, volition, or consciousness can be observed, too. concerning consciousness, we argue that properties assumed to partially constitute access consciousness are present in our network, including the property of global availability, which means that elements of the procedural memory can be addressed even if they do not belong to the current context. further expansions are discussed that may allow for the recognition of properties attributed to metacognition or reflexive consciousness