[FRIAM] Ants and Bees, Oh My.
phil henshaw
sy at synapse9.com
Sun Jul 8 21:31:35 EDT 2007
Good observation, about using young mend when they are most maleable for
making platoons and follow commands. It's the opportunity for
emergent structure, as well as in this case, people who wish to exploite
it, that makes the difference. I don't generally buy the evolutionary
value laden self interest of genes idea for what makes systems powerful,
but how the confluence of diverse factors and a catalyst actually engage
a developmental process. And it's often contradictions like the fact
that these are not the men most fit for the job, but the ones dumb
enough for the job, that raises the questions that reveal what's
actually going on. Older men would think more. Bad for armies!
Does that mean that military 'intelligence' is aware of complex systems
and how to use them. Not as I see it. I think it shows military
intelligence behaveing more like ants forming a trail, drawn itself by
the attraction of the pheramones of the young men. If military people
(or politicians) had anything like actual complex systems knowledge the
very first thing they'd notice about Iraq is that our military
organization is not fighting another military organization, but fighting
a local culture with all the properties and emergent behaviors that a
local culture would be expected to have, and none of the behaviors or
organizations that a military organization is designed to have or those
it is designed to fight.
Where we went wrong in systems terms, allowing gthat the invasion could
have been as some sort of panic response to 9/11, was when we began a
'cleaning up' after the defeated army that involved seeking out and
assaulting renegade defenders of a radical faigh and indigenous culture
we had no understanding of at all, and took pains to deny and dismiss
it's evident swelling power in direct response. That was all clearly
evident in how the reaction to our attempt to supress those dissenting
to our presence, and it whipped up a firestorm. The rigorous evidence
is in the form of the growth process, and the form of the networks that
developed. The fact that probably most of the 'insurgents' in Iraq are
living in the bossom of their families and eat at the family table, and
the incidental fact that after 4 years we have not only not found the
weapons of mass destruction, we have also yet to find the enemy barracks
are abslutely damning of our paper thing intent. We've made a mistake.
We're at war with a people. The scientific evidence is concrete and
real and really matters. We're committing crimes as a nation worse
than murder on a daily basis and occupying ourselves with excuses. We
should reverse course entirely and find some reason to honor the
sacrifice that others have been imposed on to endure in our name.
Phil Henshaw ¸¸¸¸.·´ ¯ `·.¸¸¸¸
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
680 Ft. Washington Ave
NY NY 10040
tel: 212-795-4844
e-mail: pfh at synapse9.com
explorations: www.synapse9.com <http://www.synapse9.com/>
-----Original Message-----
From: friam-bounces at redfish.com [mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] On
Behalf Of Pamela McCorduck
Sent: Sunday, July 08, 2007 1:11 PM
To: nickthompson at earthlink.net; The Friday Morning Applied Complexity
Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Ants and Bees, Oh My.
Thanks, Nick. In one of his books about warcraft (I forget which) Paul
Fussell begins by saying we train young men to be warriors not because
that's when they're at their physical peak, but that's when they're most
easily molded into groups. It won't work later. (When he was writing
we were only training young men to be warriors.)
On Jul 7, 2007, at 10:24 PM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:
Dear Robert,
Pulling my self up to my full height as an evolutionary psychologist, I
assert that:
1. Things arent so clear about the bees and ants. In the first place
female bees can mate with more than one male; if they mate with more
that
two, then the workers in a hive are LESS closely related than mammalian
siblings.
2. Things arent so clear about the principles underlying group action
and
self sacrifice. Relatedness is one of THREE accepted principles, one
other
being reciprocal altruism, the other being group selection. Much of
human
behavior seems group seleected and the historical circumstances of human
evolution -- extreme unpredictibility in the environment -- would pull
for
group selection.
3. What appears to be true is that human beings are constantly balanced
on
the tipping point from individual directed to group directed action.
For
this reason, it is imperative that we think carefully about the
conditions
we put people under. Environmental conditions can trigger adolescents
into
group directed behavior (gang formation, etc.) and indiviidual directed
behavior (preparing for medical school). What cues we give our kids
about
the nature of the world they are entering and its contingencies may be
crucial.
Now I will deflate myself.
thank you for your patience.
Nick
1. Re: Swarm Intelligence in National Geographic (Robert Howard)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Message: 1
Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 10:16:42 -0700
From: "Robert Howard" <rob at symmetricobjects.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Swarm Intelligence in National Geographic
To: "'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'"
<friam at redfish.com>
Message-ID: <001301c7bff1$6c3f2690$7401a8c0 at Core2Duo>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
I'm suspicious of the ant and bee analogy for humans. It should (and
does)
work for routing trucks and autonomous supply chain; but humans?
Here's my hypothesis. With ants and bees, we expect a random individual
to
be a female. In fact, only the queen and a few male drones reproduce.
The
rest exists to propagate the genes of these few elite siblings.
I see no evolutionary benefit for any ordinary female to "defect" from
the
collective.
An ordinary ant has everything to gain from laying down its life for the
queen.
This is not the case with humans, which is why we observe
non-ant-and-bee
things like revolts, revolutions, and certain extreme command-structured
governments respond by punishing the children of their subjects for
actions
of dissent.
With humans (and caribou), we expect a random individual to participate
in
natural selection for the genes that each carry individually.
When individuals propagate their own genes, predator/prey dynamics
evolve
within the species; unlike ants and bees.
Robert Howard
Phoenix, Arizona
_____
From: friam-bounces at redfish.com [mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] On
Behalf
Of Joshua Thorp
Sent: Thursday, July 05, 2007 8:53 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: [FRIAM] Swarm Intelligence in National Geographic
Interesting article in National Geographic:
http://www7.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0707/feature5/
>From slashdot with interesting commentary:
http://hardware.slashdot.org/hardware/07/07/05/1244224.shtml
--joshua
---
Joshua Thorp
Redfish Group
624 Agua Fria, Santa Fe, NM
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Message: 2
Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 11:30:38 -0600
From: "Bruce Abell" <bruceabe at gmail.com>
Subject: [FRIAM] Anyone want an older OK computer? Free
To: friam at redfish.com
Message-ID:
<e89a6f6e0707061030k3a66ce6ap344d890c8ef51e95 at mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
FRIAMers--
I've kept my older desktop computer for a spare and thought I might use
it
to experiment with a different operating system. But now it has become
a
back-up spare with the acquisition of yet another one, so I've got to
find
it a new home or bury it.
Free. Just pick it up and pretend it will have a good home. It works
fine. I wrote a nice book on it.
HP Pavilion 6630
Celeron 500 MHz
Win 98 SE
192 Meg Ram
10 Gig HD
Ethernet card
Modem
CD R/W drive
Floppy drive
17-inch CRT monitor--a monster, but it still displays pretty well. No
one
can take the computer without taking the monitor!
Manuals, OS, etc.
Send me an e-mail if you're interested.
--Bruce Abell
--
Bruce Abell
7 Morning Glory
Santa Fe, NM 87506
Tel: 505 986 9039
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Message: 3
Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 14:59:31 -0400
From: "Stephen Guerin" <Stephen.Guerin at redfish.com>
Subject: [FRIAM] Whitfield's PLOS article mentioning Eric Smith and
Dewar
To: friam at redfish.com
Message-ID: <E1I6t1f-0000ar-VI at madrid.hostgo.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
Whitfield's PLOS article mentioning Eric Smith and Roderick Dewar's
work.
http://biology.plosjournals.org/perlserv/?request=get-
document&doi=10.1371%2Fjournal.pbio.0050142
I'm now reading Whitfield's book, "In the Beat of a Heart: Life,
Energy, and the Unity of Nature" (www.inthebeatofaheart.com), but it
appears so far to be much more focused on quarter-power scaling than
maximum entropy production...
-S
------------------------------
Message: 4
Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 16:30:13 -0600
From: "Tom Johnson" <tom at jtjohnson.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Anyone want an older OK computer? Free
To: "The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group"
<friam at redfish.com>
Message-ID:
<e04090490707061530i53d6dd5cqcd762c169c5c370c at mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
Bruce:
If you don't get any takers, you might try Craig's List. It has a
"free"
section.
http://santafe.craigslist.org/zip/
-tj
On 7/6/07, Bruce Abell <bruceabe at gmail.com> wrote:
FRIAMers--
I've kept my older desktop computer for a spare and thought I might use
it
to experiment with a different operating system. But now it has become
a
back-up spare with the acquisition of yet another one, so I've got to
find
it a new home or bury it.
Free. Just pick it up and pretend it will have a good home. It works
fine. I wrote a nice book on it.
HP Pavilion 6630
Celeron 500 MHz
Win 98 SE
192 Meg Ram
10 Gig HD
Ethernet card
Modem
CD R/W drive
Floppy drive
17-inch CRT monitor--a monster, but it still displays pretty well. No
one
can take the computer without taking the monitor!
Manuals, OS, etc.
Send me an e-mail if you're interested.
--Bruce Abell
--
Bruce Abell
7 Morning Glory
Santa Fe, NM 87506
Tel: 505 986 9039
============================================================
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
--
==========================================
J. T. Johnson
Institute for Analytic Journalism -- Santa Fe, NM USA
www.analyticjournalism.com
505.577.6482(c) 505.473.9646(h)
http://www.jtjohnson.com tom at jtjohnson.us
"You never change things by fighting the existing reality.
To change something, build a new model that makes the
existing model obsolete."
-- Buckminster Fuller
==========================================
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Message: 5
Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 16:02:50 -0700
From: "Stephen Guerin" <stephen.guerin at redfish.com>
Subject: [FRIAM] local boy makes good
To: <friam at redfish.com>
Cc: 'Dan Kunkle' <dan at redfish.com>
Message-ID: <016f01c7c021$c97e7470$6501a8c0 at hongyu>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
Just happened across this news tidbit:
http://tinyurl.com/2b7ywl (Boston Globe)
http://www.physorg.com/news99843195.html
http://plus.maths.org/latestnews/may-aug07/rubik/index.html
Cool work, Dan!!
-S
------------------------------
Message: 6
Date: Fri, 06 Jul 2007 19:59:30 -0400
From: "Phil Henshaw" <sy at synapse9.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] JASSS (and despair)
To: "'Robert Holmes'" <robert at holmesacosta.com>, "'The Friday Morning
Applied Complexity Coffee Group'" <friam at redfish.com>
Message-ID: <002c01c7c029$b22bb730$6402a8c0 at SavyII>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
I somehow didn't send this to the forum before - and it needed an edit
anyway
---------
The ambiguity about whether computer models are thought to be exploring
actual social systems or not is definitely all over the place in the
journal, and not discussed. That's what I usually take as a sign of
confusion, so I'd have to tentatively conclude that the journal isn't
concerned with the difference and assumes that their theories are the
structures of human societies. To check exactly what they say, in the
banner of the journal for example, top of the front page, it says
"JASSS....an inter-disciplinary journal for the exploration and
understanding of social processes by means of computer simulation."
That specifically says the exploring of the social system is done by
computer, but maybe the mean that they'd study models of how they think
real systems work to help them study what makes actual systems
different. That's my method, and could be what they mean to say.
That view is also hinted at in the article on model realism, "How
Realistic Should Knowledge Diffusion Models Be?" with the following
abstract:
Knowledge diffusion models typically involve two main features: an
underlying social network topology on one side, and a particular design
of interaction rules driving knowledge transmission on the other side.
Acknowledging the need for realistic topologies and adoption behaviors
backed by empirical measurements, it becomes unclear how accurately
existing models render real-world phenomena: if indeed both topology and
transmission mechanisms have a key impact on these phenomena, to which
extent does the use of more or less stylized assumptions affect modeling
results? In order to evaluate various classical topologies and
mechanisms, we push the comparison to more empirical benchmarks:
real-world network structures and empirically measured mechanisms.
Special attention is paid to appraising the discrepancy between
diffusion phenomena (i) on some real network topologies vs. various
kinds of scale-free networks, and (ii) using an empirically-measured
transmission mechanism, compared with canonical appropriate models such
as threshold models. We find very sensible differences between the more
realistic settings and their traditional stylized counterparts. On the
whole, our point is thus also epistemological by insisting that models
should be tested against simulation-based empirical benchmarks.
Here again I find confusion, though, in terms of clear ambiguities not
discussed. It appears that the 'real world phenomena' are equated
with general statistical measures in terms of 'benchmarks' rather than
behaviors, and these may be "simulation-based empirical benchmarks".
It's like the analysis of that plankton evolution data I studied, where
the complex eruptions of developmental processes in the evolutionary
succession I uncovered were for many years firmly defended as definite
random walks because the statistical benchmark for their range of
fluctuation was within the range reasonably likely for random walks.
Benchmarks, are sometimes very useful for actual diffusion processes,
of course, and much has been learned with them. What they are most
definitely misleading for is as indicators of complex system design
(lacking the 'requisite variety' I guess you'd say), and for any
behavior that is pathway dependent. The whole field of systems and
complexity is really supposed to be about building knowledge of the
pathway dependent properties of nature. These authors clearly are not
asking about that, so I guess I'd have to agree with you that the
journal is unaware of the difference.
Is knowledge 'diffusion' pathway dependent? You bet. So I guess the
subject it not a 'diffusion' process at all, but a development process,
and nearly any kind of 'benchmarks' will be reliably misleading.
Phil Henshaw ????.?? ? `?.????
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
680 Ft. Washington Ave
NY NY 10040
tel: 212-795-4844
e-mail: pfh at synapse9.com
explorations: www.synapse9.com <http://www.synapse9.com/>
-----Original Message-----
From: rholmes62 at gmail.com [mailto:rholmes62 at gmail.com] On Behalf Of
Robert Holmes
Sent: Tuesday, July 03, 2007 8:06 AM
To: sy at synapse9.com; The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] JASSS (and despair)
Read the articles and tell me what you think. But I believe the answer
to your last question is "No".
Robert
On 7/3/07, Phil Henshaw < sy at synapse9.com> wrote:
The task of associating abstract and real things is rather complicated,
and often made more so by using the same names for them, so it appears
that when you're referring to a physical system you're discussing
entirely some network of abstract rules, for example. Even though you
say the article refers to physical systems, is it possible they just
switch back and forth between ways of referring to things, while being
consistent with an 'information world' model they assume everyone
understands to be the baseline of abstract discussion?
Phil Henshaw ????.?? ? `?.????
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