{"id":232202,"date":"2026-02-27T05:27:54","date_gmt":"2026-02-27T11:27:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/02\/what-does-it-mean-to-compute-framework-maps-hidden-computations-running-inside-natural-dynamic-systems"},"modified":"2026-02-27T05:27:54","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T11:27:54","slug":"what-does-it-mean-to-compute-framework-maps-hidden-computations-running-inside-natural-dynamic-systems","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/02\/what-does-it-mean-to-compute-framework-maps-hidden-computations-running-inside-natural-dynamic-systems","title":{"rendered":"What does it mean to compute? Framework maps hidden computations running inside natural dynamic systems"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/what-does-it-mean-to-compute-framework-maps-hidden-computations-running-inside-natural-dynamic-systems.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Some computers are easy to spot. Artificial, human-built computers like those found in smartphones and laptops are abstract dynamic systems with observable computational elements like input, output, energy cost, and logical processes. Other computers aren\u2019t so readily recognized.<\/p>\n<p>Scientists have argued that many natural dynamic systems\u2014from cells to brains to turbulence in fluids\u2014carry out computations, too. However, it\u2019s not always been clear what these dynamic systems are computing, or how they might be harnessed to solve tasks, says SFI Professor David Wolpert.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Some computers are easy to spot. Artificial, human-built computers like those found in smartphones and laptops are abstract dynamic systems with observable computational elements like input, output, energy cost, and logical processes. Other computers aren\u2019t so readily recognized. Scientists have argued that many natural dynamic systems\u2014from cells to brains to turbulence in fluids\u2014carry out computations, [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1523,1965,1512],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-232202","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-computing","category-mapping","category-mobile-phones"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232202","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=232202"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232202\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=232202"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=232202"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=232202"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}