Nicholas Thompson wrote at 02/08/2013 11:44 AM: > I have have two quite contradictory definitions floating around in my > head: (1) the number of bits and pieces x the number of kinds of bits > and pieces or (2)the number of organizational levels in the system. > The two definitions work at cross purposes in my head because I think > of heaps of stuff as being unstable and hierarchical systems as > (usually) stable.
I tend to shy away from any construct requiring the concept of "levels", because it carries all sorts of hidden assumptions that severely bias the conversation. A more general concept is that of aspects, scopes, facets, foci, perspectives, etc. Instead of the simple ordering relation of > or <, we can use inside, outside, sibling, overlap/closure, and distance in all those relations. > Glen now introduces (with respect to programming languages) a new > dimension, expressivity vs generality. I know j.s. about computer > languages, but the metaphor of expressivity is intriguing to me, > particularly when opposed to generality. Is the genetic code expressive > or general? And how do they related to complexity. And what is YOUR > working definition of complexity. The thing about a gene is that it's a placeholder, a name, for the multifarious mechanisms that constitute the world around us. Then we come along with our dynamic but singular, focused attention and slice out a part of the observable muck around us. The artificial discreteness between any one gene and any other gene is imposed by that aspect, scope, or focus of attention. The extent to which there is a natural discreteness between the ambient muck (observABLE phenomena), a natural discreteness in the machine(s) that generate that ambient muck, is questionable. Moreover, the extent to which the discreteness of the muck maps to the discreteness of the machine(s) is questionable. FWIW, when I talk about complexity, I'm talking about these discretizations, of the generator, then generated, and the maps between the two. Expressivity applies to the generating machine(s). E.g. What's the smallest machine we can imagine that is capable of generating any given slice of ambient muck? Or, given any machine, how large is its generated phenotype? This is where I think complexity is useful. Complexity is the word we use to describe interesting maps between generators and the generated. -- glen e. p. ropella, 971-255-2847, http://tempusdictum.com ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
