Emergence may not be enough

Teleonomic processes that have emerged and evolved in our institutions frequently seem to have worked to the benefit of society, but not always. Can we afford to depend on them continuing to work for our species which is increasingly capable of doing harm to itself and our environment?


Fifty years ago I was working in the early days of computer neural network modeling, using simple methods train model networks to recognize patterns. We used both selection and adaptation in the process, and built a device (the Astropower Decision Filter) that illustrated the potential of the approach. The ADF got a fair amount of publicity.

That work was an early example of what has come to be known as "emergence":

the way complex systems and patterns arise out of a multiplicity of relatively simple interactions.

It has influenced my thinking in many ways over the decades.

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In a recent post, I suggested that one could regard the Civil War as a pattern emerging out of the interplay of millions of peoples behavior in the charged atmosphere of the 1850s and early 1860s, directed through the political institutions of the time and contingent upon "external" events that occurred during that time. I suspect that many wars can be so regarded -- with horrible results predicted by few if any of their proponents. After a losing war, I would bet that most people on the side most responsible for its start would regret their actions, and perhaps even those on the winning side would also wish they had worked harder to find a better solution.

In like manner, I suggest that one can regard economic bubbles and crashes as patterns emerging out of the interplay of millions of people's economic behavior in specific emotional atmospheres, directed thought economic institutions and contingent upon external events. Social crises such as the rise of drug abuse and criminal networks similarly can be regarded as emerging from the actions of people (unaware of the full implications of their behavior) under the influence of social institutions and contingent on events.

The political, economic and social institutions mentioned above themselves emerge from interactions of people within society. They also evolve, once in existence, and evolution is a process of emergence. In these cases, the development of institutions can perhaps best be perceived as the result of both teleologic and teleonomic processes -- of planning and of unplanned processes that produce orderly patterns.

At one point about 1970, in graduate school studying public administration, I got very interested in ideas that decision making in organizations was less than ideally rational. Important decisions in organizations are often made by small groups, based on incomplete information and understanding, and often by processes that are not optimal but rather dependent on the idiosyncrasies of the participants. Indeed, I came to believe that the behavior of large organizations is similarly the result of both teleologic and teleonomic processes. In our modern societies, formal organizations are also important institutions. Indeed, we now hear that some corporations are too large to fail, but very large organizations turn out to be difficult to manage and prone to failure.

As I have suggested in the past, we think with our brains, not with our "rational minds". Our plans and decisions are influenced by our emotions; our decision processes are less than the rationality too often postulated for "economic man". It is also becoming increasingly clear that the way we behave is strongly influenced by our genetic makeup. For example, there is now evidence that gene deletions and duplications on the seventh chromosome can produce changes in social cognition (increasing risk for the failed social instincts typical of autism in the one case, and the extreme social attention typical of Williams syndrome in the other). As Edward Wilson points out, we are a eusocial species, and our genetically determined fascination with groups and social interactions underlies both our institutions and our behavior within those institutions.

Some very good things have emerged from the modern world. Never in human history have so many people been so health, so wealthy, and so informed. Some very bad things also have emerged; wars in the 20th century killed many tens of millions of people. So did diseases, some of which were new such as the Spanish Flu or AIDS. The Great Depression led to the phrase, when the United States sneezes Chile catches pneumonia.

However, the paragraphs above suggest that somewhat rational humans, with genetically determined mental processes evolved by survival in very different environments, interacting in processes mediated by institutions we only partially understand, have made very bad mistakes in the past and have failed to meet very large challenges.

Society is not only getting bigger but is getting more connected. People living today can expect to live in a world with eight to ten billion people by 2050. Globalization is reflected in much closer economic links among nations. Technological and economic growth have resulted in a much greater "footprint" of mankind on the earth; indeed we now seem likely to produce unprecedented global environmental catastrophes. And above all, everything but man himself is changing with increasing rapidity.

While mankind hopes for development to reduce global poverty, reduce the global burden of disease, and decrease losses due to war and conflict, we have to worry about increasing the scale of dysfunctional emergence. Can we really depend on good things to emerge from a world we understand so poorly, or for catastrophic things not to emerge?

I don't have an answer, but it seems to me that it would be a good idea to have a really major global social science research program on how patterns emerge from societies and the dependence of those patterns on political, economic and social institutions, as well as how the institutions themselves emerge and evolve. We should also be risk adverse. Lets not let political processes lead us too close to war, economic processes lead us too close to crashes nor to risks of crashes to big to withstand.

Click on the emergence label to the right for more on this topic.

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