Autocreative Hierarchy I: Structure Ecosystemic Dependence and Autonomy Ron Cottam, Willy Ranson and Roger Vounckx The Evolutionary Processing Group IMEC Brussels, ETRO Brussels Free University (VUB) Pleinlaan 2, 1050 Brussels, Belgium evol@etro.vub.ac.be Abstract The natural sciences experience great difficulty in addressing the nature of life. Most particularly, self-consistent theories of observable scalar differences across biological systems are lacking. We have developed a rational scheme for modeling the natural emergence of multi- level hierarchies, and for the characterization of hierarchical entities and systems. This paper describes the resultant birational structure which may be attributed to a real hierarchy. The emergence of new levels is related to the cross-scale transport of both order and novelty, and hierarchical development is attributed to inter-level negotiation of dependence and autonomy. Hyperscalar precursors of understanding and learning, and of complementary logical and emotional operations appear naturally in hierarchies as a consequence of their global stabilization. Introduction It is difficult to see how any large unified system could exist or operate successfully without recourse to hierarchy. But this conclusion is very much a case of putting the cart before the horse, as its validity rests on an extensive set of presuppositions and conditional judgments. We will attempt in this paper to sketch out the network of ideas supportive of the proposition, without falling foul of the many and varied philosophical and other pitfalls with which the landscape is littered. We will mainly restrict ourselves in the present instance to the examination of structural aspects of Hierarchy, Ecosystemic Dependence and Autonomy, and leave most of the discussion of contributive and consequent dynamical aspects to a further paper (“Autocreative Hierarchy II: Dynamics – Self-organization, Emergence and Level-changing”). A necessary starting point is the definition of our subject matter: what do we mean by a large unified system? Unfortunately, this expression does not readily lend itself to reductive linguistic processing, as the elements of the complete expression are inter-dependent: we cannot establish definitions of the words large, unified and system in isolation and then extract the complete expression’s meaning by simply combining them. However, this apparent failure is precisely the definition we require for the expression; or rather it provides a simplified representation of it. Two aspects are important here. The first is that a large unified system can only exist as a partial negation of, or ambiguity in, its own state; the second is that we must in some way match this partiality with the descriptive forms we adopt. An example of the (ontological) former is that a localized entity in a global environment must not only be isolated from it but must also communicate with it (Cottam, Ranson and Vounckx 1999a); an example of the (epistemological)