Life and Mathematical Sciences
Graduate School of Engineering, Kyoto University Department of Micro Engineering
LIFE AND MATHEMATICAL SCIENCES / KYOTO UNIVERSITY (SINCE OCT. 2021)
From matter to cognition and society — a mathematics that runs through all of life.
Understanding Things As They Are, and Making New Life #
What does it mean to understand the laws of this world? When we extract a part of interest from the whole world, how can we say what it is the same as, what it contains, and how? To date, we have sought to grasp nature “as it is” by recasting it in mathematical and physical models — from molecular dynamics, through the mechanics of cells and tissues, to the development of organs. Now, we are extending this reach one step further. A form arising from a physical substrate acquires intrinsic information processing — cognition — enters into relationships with other individuals, and gives rise to a collective order: something we might call society, or culture. Our aim is to thread every layer of this process with a single language of mathematics and computation. To understand life and to make life are not two acts but one. We are building a new mathematical science that describes the world, and extending it toward engineering — and toward the forms of new life that may arise upon a digital substrate.
