A "Good" Regulator May Provide a World Model for Intelligent Systems

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Alicea, Bradly, Hough, Morgan, Nelson, Amanda, Parent, Jesse
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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author Alicea, Bradly
Hough, Morgan
Nelson, Amanda
Parent, Jesse
author_facet Alicea, Bradly
Hough, Morgan
Nelson, Amanda
Parent, Jesse
contents One classic idea from the cybernetics literature is the Every Good Regulator Theorem (EGRT). The EGRT provides a means to identify good regulation, or the conditions under which an agent (regulator) can match the dynamical behavior of a system. We reevaluate and recast the EGRT in a modern context to provide insight into how intelligent autonomous learning systems might utilize a compressed global representation (world model). One-to-one mappings between a regulator (R) and the corresponding system (S) provide a reduced representation that preserves useful variety to match all possible outcomes of a system. The EGRT also extends to second-order cybernetics, where an internal model (M) observes the behavior of S and supervises a S-R closed loop mapping. Secondarily, we demonstrate how physical phenomena such as temporal criticality, non-normal denoising, and alternating procedural acquisition can recast behavior as statistical mechanics and yield regulatory relationships. These diverse physical systems challenge the notion of tightly-coupled good regulation when applied to non-uniform and out-of-distribution phenomena. Overall, we aim to recast the EGRT as a potential approach for developing world models that adapt and respond to a wide range of task environments.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2506_23032
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle A "Good" Regulator May Provide a World Model for Intelligent Systems
Alicea, Bradly
Hough, Morgan
Nelson, Amanda
Parent, Jesse
Other Computer Science
One classic idea from the cybernetics literature is the Every Good Regulator Theorem (EGRT). The EGRT provides a means to identify good regulation, or the conditions under which an agent (regulator) can match the dynamical behavior of a system. We reevaluate and recast the EGRT in a modern context to provide insight into how intelligent autonomous learning systems might utilize a compressed global representation (world model). One-to-one mappings between a regulator (R) and the corresponding system (S) provide a reduced representation that preserves useful variety to match all possible outcomes of a system. The EGRT also extends to second-order cybernetics, where an internal model (M) observes the behavior of S and supervises a S-R closed loop mapping. Secondarily, we demonstrate how physical phenomena such as temporal criticality, non-normal denoising, and alternating procedural acquisition can recast behavior as statistical mechanics and yield regulatory relationships. These diverse physical systems challenge the notion of tightly-coupled good regulation when applied to non-uniform and out-of-distribution phenomena. Overall, we aim to recast the EGRT as a potential approach for developing world models that adapt and respond to a wide range of task environments.
title A "Good" Regulator May Provide a World Model for Intelligent Systems
topic Other Computer Science
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.23032