Merle Lefkoff wrote:
Regardless of whether leaders act because of endogenous traits or a
circumstantial opening, they are indeed emergent throughout the system.
In human systems, however, unlike flocks, over-determined structures
suppress this emergent property of the system. Rather than stepping
aside to allow emerging leaders to bring requisite variety to the
"flock", elite hierarchies/patriarchies suppress distributed leadership
and generally prevail for long periods of time.
Ted Carmichael wrote:
I haven't read the papers all the way through, but on first blush, I
don't see them as contradictory. Either could be correct.
A "leader" - whether bird or person - could act first due to internal
traits (inclination, ability, imagination) or external influence. The
first implies that the leader is different from the others in some
way, while the second implies only a situational difference:
circumstance rather than inherent traits.
Once the leader acts, this creates space for the other birds/people to
act similarly, and follow the leader. The followers must have had the
same inclination towards this action, because they end up doing it,
too ... they just weren't over the tipping point yet. There was
something missing that kept them from acting first. The leader's
action clearly provides the missing element, and so all the followers
perform the same action.
The remarkable thing about the flocking models, such as the one in
JASS, is that they show that leadership doesn't have to be due to an
internal trait. It may simply be a situational difference among very
similar agents. Before these models were put forth, the prevailing
view was that leadership is always endogenous to the leader. Now, at
least, we can consider other possibilities, whether or not they end up
being correct.
-t
On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 8:57 PM, glen e. p. ropella
<[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>
wrote:
sarbajit roy wrote circa 10-04-09 06:34 AM:
> The religious grouping I belong to had cause to study/discuss
this about 150
> years back (concerning flocks of men not birds). The leader of
the faction
> in opposition to mine (which means my faction vehemently
disagrees with his
> view) had this to say
That quote from your opposition seems to fall in line with the nature
article, the idea that particular birds/humans (presumably with
particular traits, inbred or learned) turn out to be leaders. I
take it
from your statement that you agree more with the jasss article, that
leaders with no particularly exceptional traits emerge? Right?
Of course, to even have this discussion, we have to allow
ourselves the
metaphor between human cliques and bird flocks...
--
glen e. p. ropella, 971-222-9095, http://agent-based-modeling.com
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FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
