[FRIAM] "self-organization"

[Nick Thompson]

Hi, everybody, 

 

The term "self-organizing" has always seemed a mis-nomer, almost an
oxymoron.  In that connection, I took an interest in the following quote
from Mary Jane West-Eberhardt's enormous, DEVELOPMENTAL PLASTICITY AND
EVOLUTION. (p. 59, bottom of column one)

 

Extreme modular flexibility is found in the mechanisms sometimes called
self-organizing (refs to Kauffman, Gerhart and Kirschner)  In seolf
organization, the phenotype does not really organize itself.  Rather,
organization is highly flexible and locally responsive because a large
number of modular subunits respond individually to local conditions
according to simple, shared decision rules.  

 

I wonder what you complexity folks think about this as a general and
comprehensive characterization of the phenomena you have called
"self-organizing"?

 

Nick 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

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