Re: Managing complexity?

[Joseph Rabie]

I have not been following this thread, so please excuse me if I repeat 
something already said.

Brian, I do not agree with your definition of complexity (as below) as a form 
of disorder coming from malfunctioning entities.

Complexity, in my view, is a natural phenomena caused by the multiple 
interactions that occur between different systems that collide with each other, 
by the fact that they operate autonomously (and not necessarily competitively) 
within the same body: whether it be our own, society, the world...

As an urbanist, this is certainly the case of cities. As a "simple", physical 
example, look at all the utility networks (water, gas, electricity, telephone, 
optic fibre, sewage, drainage...) operating under our pavements. They do not 
compete, but when one sees the same pavement being dug up over and over again, 
one sees the difficulty of organising their coexistence.

Joe.



> Le 30 mars 2019 à 21:19, Brian Holmes  a écrit :
> 
> However, the surging sense of intellectual mastery brought by the phrase, 
> "managing complexity," declines percipitously when you try to define either 
> "management" or "complexity." The latter is vexing because  the disorder 
> comes from so many sources: faulty airplane equipment, disgruntled voters in 
> the north of England, the harvesting of behavioral data by Internet 
> companies, persistent trade imbalances between Germany and Southern Europe, 
> the volatile relations of US and North Korean leaders, etc. When exactly does 
> complexity get bloody complicated, and for whom?
> 

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Re: Managing complexity?

[Örsan Şenalp]

The elegant idea of "current global disorder results from a failure to
manage complexity" is the mirror image of the idea of 'order in chaos',
which ties increasing complexity and the emergence of the disorder
together. Thus it also calls for the manageability of complexity, no matter
how high is its complexity while it means time to time the unmanageability
problem will rise, for those, whoever they are, organizes societies
globally or global societal order. This latter is a 'class point of view',
of the organizer class.

For complexity and chaos theories emergence of the disorder is about
boundary conditions and emergence phenomena. For Gramsci, it is the time of
molecular changes, when old is dying yet the new can't be born. For
Bogdanov it is the type of crisis. Indeed as Joseph, you say it might be
about a complex system and its environment, two complex systems encounter.
Or as a result of the internal activities, differentiation of parts, of one
complex system.

There is an ongoing debate within systems and complexity thinkers'
community today which is about "what went wrong?". Prestigious systems and
complexity thinkers call for going back to the roots and original sources
to discover what went wrong or missed so that the unified science, the most
general general systems theory, promised by Bertalanffy or Boulding's
vision of GST, or Cyberneticıans failed.

As for Castell's suggestion about Russia and lack of PC-industry, it
implies that the Internet (the network) is the emergence phenomena. So it
is the noosphere getting flesh and blood (software and hardware). I think
there is a grain of truth in what Castell suggest. In this article (
http://www.systema-journal.org/article/view/406/357) David Rousseau et. al.
argue why the GST failed and describe what a genuinely universal GST would
look like. Funny enough, he is describing the first chapter of Bogdanov's
Tektology, the Russian version first ever emerged GST. See:
https://snuproject.wordpress.com/2019/02/26/alexander-bogdanov-not-ludwig-von-bertalanffy-is-the-founder-of-the-new-world-outlook-and-it-is-not-systemology-it-is-tektology/


Best,
Orsan



On Sun, 31 Mar 2019 at 13:54, Joseph Rabie  wrote:

> I have not been following this thread, so please excuse me if I repeat
> something already said.
>
> Brian, I do not agree with your definition of complexity (as below) as a
> form of disorder coming from malfunctioning entities.
>
> Complexity, in my view, is a natural phenomena caused by the multiple
> interactions that occur between different systems that collide with each
> other, by the fact that they operate autonomously (and not necessarily
> competitively) within the same body: whether it be our own, society, the
> world...
>
> As an urbanist, this is certainly the case of cities. As a "simple",
> physical example, look at all the utility networks (water, gas,
> electricity, telephone, optic fibre, sewage, drainage...) operating under
> our pavements. They do not compete, but when one sees the same pavement
> being dug up over and over again, one sees the difficulty of organising
> their coexistence.
>
> Joe.
>
>
>
> Le 30 mars 2019 à 21:19, Brian Holmes  a
> écrit :
>
> However, the surging sense of intellectual mastery brought by the phrase,
> "managing complexity," declines percipitously when you try to define either
> "management" or "complexity." The latter is vexing because  the disorder
> comes from so many sources: faulty airplane equipment, disgruntled voters
> in the north of England, the harvesting of behavioral data by Internet
> companies, persistent trade imbalances between Germany and Southern Europe,
> the volatile relations of US and North Korean leaders, etc. When exactly
> does complexity get bloody complicated, and for whom?
>
>
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Re: Managing complexity?

[Prem Chandavarkar]

Let me throw in my two bits worth:
Complex systems can be of two types: linear and non-linear
In linear systems there is a relationship between input and output - small 
inputs result in small outputs and large inputs result in large outputs.  The 
complexity of the system comes from the number of components in the system.
Non-linear systems often do not have a relationship between input and output.  
A small input can result in a large output, and a large input can result in a 
small output.  
Both linear and non-linear systems can exhibit polycentricity - change cannot 
be confined to a single component of the system.  The best metaphor for this is 
a spider’s web - the attempt to tweak the tension in a single strand results in 
a redistribution of tension across the entire web.  ‘Management’ and 
‘complexity’ do not fit well in a polycentric system, for management is an 
activity where one intervenes in order to control output, and in a polycentric 
system, it is almost impossible to ascertain with precision the impact of any 
intervention.
Similarly it is impossible to ‘manage’ non-linear systems, because one cannot 
have any control over the output.
Non-linearity often results from components of the system being sentient - even 
if they do not rise to the extent of self-conscious intelligence, there is a 
genetically ingrained impulse to recognise patterns in the environment and 
respond accordingly, and this can shift the behaviour of the system as a whole.
In polycentric systems and in non-linear systems, the term ‘managing 
complexity’ is an oxymoron.  I find a similar situation in my discipline of 
architecture where the latest buzz word is ‘designing for sustainability’.  
‘Design' is used here in an interpretation very similar to ‘management’ - the 
desire to control results, failing to recognise that climate and other natural 
systems are inherently non-linear (while it is not essential to this post, if 
you want to read more on what I have written on this subject, see 
https://premckar.wordpress.com/2018/02/21/to-design-so-as-to-sustain/ 
)
To live with complex systems we must allow them to be self-organising.  This is 
the argument used in the argument for free markets, falling back on Adam 
Smith’s metaphor of the ‘invisible hand’.
However, self-organising systems are emergent - they can exhibit fundamental 
properties that did not exist at all in an earlier state of the system.  As 
humans, we cannot be blind to what properties may emerge, unless we say we have 
no ethical concerns at all if the system throws up properties such as unfair 
and degrading exploitation of others or ecological imbalances.
These problems are exacerbated because we make assumptions about the system 
that are not correct.  We believe that the system is ‘natural’ in the sense 
that components in the system are there because they inherently belong in the 
system.  But taking markets as an example, as Karl Polanyi has pointed out, 
many of the components of markets were not meant for that purpose.  To pursue 
the goal of markets we force fundamental distortions and reshape them as 
‘fictitious commodities’.  Lives get reduced to labour, and land is stripped of 
its connection with environment and memory and reduced to being an asset.  
Similarly we believe that the social contract can emerge from rational 
communication, failing to recognise emotion, especially when that emotion is 
exploited in political rhetoric to inflame tribal passions.
It cannot be a totally laissez-faire approach.  To live within complex systems, 
our mindset must change from seeking to manage the system to seeking harmony 
with it.  Harmony is a term that has strong ethical implications that we must 
come to terms with.
For harmony, we have to acquire what the philosopher Morris Berman calls ‘a 
participating consciousness’, whereas we currently pursue individualised 
consciousness that is framed by ego.
A participating consciousness cannot come from a knowledge system.  It has to 
be ingrained through rigorous practices by which one builds harmonious 
awareness of consciousness beyond the self.  Such practices are routinely found 
in performing and creative arts, as well as within certain spiritual traditions.
Without seeking to romanticise the past, one must recognise that the incidence 
of participating consciousness has dropped precipitously in modern times.
AI systems do not sit well with consciousness, for AI makes its decisions on 
the basis of statistical correlations derived from computing power, and not on 
the basis of consciousness.  AI systems run into problems difficult to foresee 
or comprehend once the decision process gets detached from sentient 
consciousness, especially when the AI system encounters non-linear contexts.  
The computer has much to offer us.  But we have moved too fast from 
computer-assisted-design to AI-driven-design, and paid insufficien

Managing complexity

[Allan Siegel]

Hello,
As I recall ‘complexity’ as discussed extensively by Henri Lefebvre is related 
more to urbanism (as Joe mentioned) than management. Complexity is more about 
the politics and social realities relating to the ‘right to the city’ than 
managing systems. Managerial complexity invariably leads towards some 
technocratic abyss as opposed - let’s say - a more ideological based discourse.
Best
Allan
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Re: Managing complexity?

[Joseph Rabie]

I would define complexity as the interaction between autonomous agents. An 
ecosystem is surely the prime example, with the multiple destinies of multiple 
species playing out in a circumscribed milieu, with limited resources, and so 
inevitably one at the expense of the other – or with one being the (unwilling) 
resource of the other. One might say that evolution is the unknowing arbitrator 
of the process as it throws out non-intentional permutations which allow each 
species to gain possible advantages.

Joe.




> Le 31 mars 2019 à 17:14, Allan Siegel  a écrit :
> 
> Hello,
> As I recall ‘complexity’ as discussed extensively by Henri Lefebvre is 
> related more to urbanism (as Joe mentioned) than management. Complexity is 
> more about the politics and social realities relating to the ‘right to the 
> city’ than managing systems. Managerial complexity invariably leads towards 
> some technocratic abyss as opposed - let’s say - a more ideological based 
> discourse.
> Best
> Allan
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Re: rage against the machine

[Morlock Elloi]

Didn't have to wait for long:

"Fake lane attack: ... Misleading the autopilot vehicle to the wrong 
direction ... we pasted some small stickers as interference patches on 
the ground in an intersection ... This kind of attack is simple to 
deploy, and the materials are easy to obtain. "


https://keenlab.tencent.com/en/whitepapers/Experimental_Security_Research_of_Tesla_Autopilot.pdf

Note that this intervention was not on the vehicle, but on the environment.


On 3/17/19, 12:48, Morlock Elloi wrote:

Note that autonomous vehicles are becoming affordable assassination
instruments. It would cost a fortune a decade ago to create robotic


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