Simplicity of Complexity

De door TNO, Oxrider en Aardbron georganiseerde samenscholing op 1 februari 2008 over Simplicity of Complexity in het wondermooie, volgens Feng Shui gebouwde, Bomencentrum in Baarn was een prachtig succes.

De heldere uiteenzetting van Francis Heijligers en de prachtige natuurfotografie waren een lust voor zowel "mind" als "eye".

Bij deze mijn ruwe aantekeningen. Zaken die ik belangrijk vond en flarden van gedachten die door mijn hoofd schoten tijdens de heldere college van Francis Heylighen. Het geheel aangevuld met eigen gedachten en verwijzingen naar andere plekken.

Oh ja, ik gebruik veel verwijzingen naar Aardnoot. Dat is een speciale Wiki waar ik allerhande informatie verzamel over mensen, methoden, onderzoeken, visies, inzichten, plaatsen en evenementen die te maken hebben met de aanstaande orde.

Ik moet zeggen dat het een prettige verversing is van zaken waar ik me al jaren mee bezig houdt. Al jaren ben ik groot fan van Stuart Kauffman en zijn At Home In The Universe is nog steeds een "evergreen" en standaardwerk voor me. Ook de andere bronnen die ik aan het eind noem zijn prachtige en begrijpbare kunststukjes over simplexiteit.

I Am a Strange Loop van Douglas Hofstadter ga ik dit jaar kopen en lezen. Mijn zoon Martijn wil'm ook lezen. Hij studeert Software Technologie aan de UU. Ik kan me herinneren dat ik destijds ook Gödel, Escher, Bach van Douglas Hofstadter las. I Am a Strange Loop gaat onder andere over tangled hierarchies, iets waar Amit Goswami veel over schrijft. Maar dit terzijde.

Alle deelnemers kregen trouwens een voorlopige versie van Heylighen's aanstaande boek Complexiteit en Evolutie mee. Veel dank daarvoor! Prachtig Nederlandstalig verhaal over simplexity.

Voor de koffie

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Mooie quote van de gastheer Jan van der Greef:

You can do whatever you like within certain limits.

• complexus (Gr.) betekent: "intertwined, embracing"
• distinct parts connected so that they are different to separate
• distinctions + connections
• Karl Simms (artist) creates wonderful computer generated imagery on evolution en self-*
• order: regular, predictable
• chaos: gas, quantum, vacuum, everything is different, nothing the same, equivalent with emptiness, The Void (one of the Fifteen Fundamental Properties of nature, according to Christopher Alexander in his magnum opus The Nature of Order.
• order: crystal (ref. crystallize), homegeneous, void, vacuum, nothingness, everything the same; humans only notice changes (when they happen)
  

  

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• meaningfullness is in the realm of chaordic
• emptiness == meaningless
• living systems are open systems
• environment is everything but the system, implies the existence of a border (yet another one of the Fifteen Fundamental Properties)
• the weight of a car is a result of the sum of the weight of its parts
• the maximum speed of a car is an emergent property:
  • it emerges from the composition of the whole;
  • emergent properties are the most interesting properties; give meaningl
• a particular arrangement of parts leads to emergent properties:
  • an engine, a wheel, a dashboard, etc. in itself does not allow you to drive; it's the particular arrangement of all the parts that creates the whole and becomes valuable and meaningful
• particular arrangement and connection of parts leads to emergent properties
• the way (sequence, recipe) of putting things together is important to create live, emergent properties.
• coupling types (binding, linking):
  • sequential, serial;
  • parallel
  • circular (most interesting: create feedback loops)
    

    

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• isomorph systems: same behaviour, different implementations
• hierarchy‚ levels of scale‚ zoom in and out‚ microscope/macroscope; interestingly, levels of scale (fractal) is also one of the Fifteen Fundamental Properties
• strange loops? tangled hierarchies? got no satisfactory answer on this; seems like Francis is "stuck" on hierarchies only
• feedback loops:
  • video camera capturing it's own image on TV: loops recursively, and with and interesting delay
  • strengthening loops:
    • more infections → more viruses; more viruses → more infections
    • Mexican hound: microphone in front of loudspeaker recording its own sound
  • weakening loops ('more is less; less is more'):
    • rabbits eat grass: more rabbits → less grass; more grass → more rabbits
• non-linearity: effect is much largeer or much smaller than its cause
• usually caused by feedback
• non-linearity is a somewhat awkward term; to explain non-linearity, prefer to use another term; Martien: try the term naturality
  

  

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• unstable equilibrium: e.g. marble on top of hill only requires very little disturb in order to roll down: small cause → big effect; low noise, high impact (just like a whisper)
• stable equilibrium: large cause → small effect
• intrinsic unpredictability

Na de koffie

• self-organization: spontaneous appearance of order or organization or structure with a certain function
• not imposed by outside system or inside its components
• organization distributed over all the components; properties:
  • collective;
  • robust (resilient);
• distribution + collectiveness → robustness and resilience
• Francis does not refer to holarchy or holarganisation at all; strange
  

  

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• a robust system shows graceful degradation—take stuff out of the system and the system still works, although with a lower quality
• magnetization is a nice example of self-organization
• pareltaal is a nice example of unfolding self-organizing whole systems (architecture, organizations, societies)
• how to leverage non-linearity to self-organizing Aardbron, just like the magnetical molecules of a needle?
• Bénard convection is another nice example of self-organization
• align yourself to the movement
• self-organization emerges far from the equilibrium; needs energy to live; therefore a dissipative structure; resonates strongly with Fritjog Capra's De eenheid van leven.
  

  

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• 2^nd law of thermodynamics tends to maximize entropy
• sustain the far from equilibrium
• dissipative structures sit between dead & live systems
• Stuart Kauffman's order for free:
  • self-organization is stimulated by random variation (noise, chaos, shaking things up, rocking the boat)
  • many configurations are explored
  • more stable ones are retained
  • some configurations are amplified by strengthening feedbeck loops
• for example:
  • shake a box with cubes → total volume decreases because of better fitness
  • creates rectangulat arrangement if components are identical because it takes less volume—a form of crystallization
  • intrinsic preference to be as close to the bottom as possible due to force of gravity

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• formation of bonds
• mat develop a stable bond if they fit together
• intrinsically stable configuration
• e.g. shake a box with a bunch of slighlty opened paperclips: they entangle because entanglement is easier than untanglement

Lunch talk

• dialog with a couple of medicin students from Leiden University onhealth vs. harmony

Na de lunch

• Manuel Presti shows 45 minutes of brilliant nature photography
• fast motion
• slow motion
• e motion
• swarms

Na de thee

• bonding: one can only move with the involvement of the other (interdependence)
• must follow some rules that gives the members an identity (so that the identity of the whole can emerge)

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• within boundary, connections are stronger than ouside → coherence → system
• (sand = aggregate) ≠ system
• ((sand + cement) = brick) = system, has boundary
• stronger, more stable links within boundary
• from loose assembly higher up in hierarchy to more coherent system lower in hierarchy
• follow some rules, e.g. football rules: creates differentation between all play with a ball; other rules create basketball, volleyball, etc.
• integration of different differentations into larger whole: e.g. all ball plays integrate into next higher class of sport
• next higher layer, e.g. federation, etc.
• feature of closure (boundary)
• more differentation → more stable; higher bonding forces

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• agent-based simulations
• an agent responses or reacts to meaningful stimuli from the environment (using a specific set of rules)
• stable configuration will emerge
• stable ≠ rigid, fixed or brittle
• stable = continuously evolving, flexible, dynamic, robust, resilient, sustainable
• social simulations
• economical simulations
• Thiema? (Terra?, Tierra?) simulation: compete for CPU time or memory allocation
• co-evolution
• open-ended evolution not yet been achieved → dynamical hierarchies to form a higher order system—compare to Christopher Alexander's levels of scale; fractal, recursive structure
• Karl Sims creates wonderful graphics and visualizations on this topic
• also check out Levitated

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• agent must have one or more goals and rules to behave and find a solution to a challenge or problem or desire or wish
• mutation and recombinations (½ from one, ½ from the other) speeds up evolutionary process
• creates population
• social simulation → artificial society emerges (ideally suited to test principles for Aarde or Aardbron
• selfisch behaviour and competition
• prisoner's dilemma: cooperate (+ for both) or defect (+ for me, - for other);
• best strategy is Tit for Tat
• agents are identified with a label → family → flock together → swarm → tribe
• evolution of culture
  • different agents try to solve a problem
  • they can search individually for solution
  • they can imitate the best solution of their neighbours

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• good ideas spread fastest with a mixture of individual innovation and imitation;
• e.g. 90% imitation, 10% innovation is often most effective
• create offspring to try out new stuff, and then re-member (literally; integrate into your own new whole)
• good ideas should be re-membered!
• a good idea is:
  • useful and meaningful
  • simple and elegant
  • makes sense—does not contradict o is not inconsistent with (current) beliefs
• trust and reputation of agent grows with good ideas
• creates subcultures (ref. Alexander: mosaic of subcultures)
• generates polarization
• differentiated on lower levels, yet integrated on higher levels

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• there seems to be a general disbelieve in morphogenetical theory by Heylighen
• how does one leg of the crystal of a snowflake know how to self-organize similar to the other five? seems that Stuart Kauffman has written a paper on that; Christopher Alexander has his own meaning; and I bet that Rupert Sheldrake has yet another