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Jochen Fromm-3

FRIAM book

The recent discussion about the advances in the field
of complexity science and Owen's question about a
sound basis for discussions about complex systems
caused me to think about the current state of the
field and its literature. Perhaps a definite book
is missing. Won't it be an interesting endeavour
to write one ? Perhaps with Stephen as an editor ?
A FRIAM book about Agent-Based Modeling, Complex Systems,
Artificial Life, Evolutionary Computation and Swarm
Intelligence ? It could cover for instance complex
networks, complex adaptive systems, basic agent-based
models, edge of chaos, frozen accidents, path dependence,
self-organization, types and forms of emergence, swarm
intelligence,..

-J.

Cook, Ian-3

FRIAM book

Can I pre-order it on Amazon yet, or should I just send some cash along
to someone?

Seriously, this would fill a much-needed gap. A small group of
colleagues are struggling to make sense of many of the things touched on
continuously by this list and in the message below. Having that kind of
resource would be/have been a tremendous help. Any chance early versions
of the articles could hit a website/wiki somewhere?

Not always known for my patience,

-Ian

-----Original Message-----
From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On
Behalf Of Jochen Fromm
Sent: Friday, July 28, 2006 4:21 AM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'
Subject: [FRIAM] FRIAM book

The recent discussion about the advances in the field
of complexity science and Owen's question about a
sound basis for discussions about complex systems
caused me to think about the current state of the
field and its literature. Perhaps a definite book
is missing. Won't it be an interesting endeavour
to write one ? Perhaps with Stephen as an editor ?
A FRIAM book about Agent-Based Modeling, Complex Systems,
Artificial Life, Evolutionary Computation and Swarm
Intelligence ? It could cover for instance complex
networks, complex adaptive systems, basic agent-based
models, edge of chaos, frozen accidents, path dependence,
self-organization, types and forms of emergence, swarm
intelligence,..

-J.

============================================================
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

Belinda Wong-Swanson

FRIAM book

In reply to this post by Jochen Fromm-3

Jochen,

Wonderful idea.

Where can I send a down payment to reserve a copy?

Belinda

On Jul 28, 2006, at 2:21 AM, Jochen Fromm wrote:

>
> The recent discussion about the advances in the field
> of complexity science and Owen's question about a
> sound basis for discussions about complex systems
> caused me to think about the current state of the
> field and its literature. Perhaps a definite book
> is missing. Won't it be an interesting endeavour
> to write one ? Perhaps with Stephen as an editor ?
> A FRIAM book about Agent-Based Modeling, Complex Systems,
> Artificial Life, Evolutionary Computation and Swarm
> Intelligence ? It could cover for instance complex
> networks, complex adaptive systems, basic agent-based
> models, edge of chaos, frozen accidents, path dependence,
> self-organization, types and forms of emergence, swarm
> intelligence,..
>
> -J.
>
>
> ============================================================
> 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

Phil Henshaw-2

FRIAM book

In reply to this post by Jochen Fromm-3

It's always a great idea for someone to synthesize the diverse
directions of an expanding fringe of research. It's curious, though,
that the book idea was immediately preceded by a cautionary note on the
contagious invasion of buzzwords. The surest way to force buzzwords to
mean something useful is to connect them with the observed phenomena of
the physical world, but I find the whole complexity community quite
resistant to doing that. As a community we'd clearly prefer to think of
complexity as theory.

No doubt it cuts both ways, that looking at physical phenomena is
pointless unless you can connect them to the 'buzz' of images that
people are interested in talking about. Still, I wonder that no one
seems to be concerned that the branches of complexity science (in which
I include much of physics along with the modeling approaches of Alife,
etc.) have not yet tried to explain or document the most widespread
complex process in nature, namely growth. Is it, a) comes in too many
forms and is too complicated anyway, b) hidden in sight, c) a bad match
for our preferred techniques? Wazzzza problem? I think there's any
number of places to start.

Considering that mankind has mortgaged its future to the success of a
plan for perpetual business growth, isn't it sort of our job to peek
under the blanket and see what kind of surprises might be in store?

Phil Henshaw ????.?? ? `?.????
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
680 Ft. Washington Ave
NY NY 10040
tel: 212-795-4844
e-mail: pfh at synapse9.com
explorations: www.synapse9.com

> -----Original Message-----
> From: friam-bounces at redfish.com
> [mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] On Behalf Of Jochen Fromm
> Sent: Friday, July 28, 2006 4:21 AM
> To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'
> Subject: [FRIAM] FRIAM book
>
>
>
> The recent discussion about the advances in the field
> of complexity science and Owen's question about a
> sound basis for discussions about complex systems
> caused me to think about the current state of the
> field and its literature. Perhaps a definite book
> is missing. Won't it be an interesting endeavour
> to write one ? Perhaps with Stephen as an editor ?
> A FRIAM book about Agent-Based Modeling, Complex Systems,
> Artificial Life, Evolutionary Computation and Swarm
> Intelligence ? It could cover for instance complex
> networks, complex adaptive systems, basic agent-based
> models, edge of chaos, frozen accidents, path dependence,
> self-organization, types and forms of emergence, swarm
> intelligence,..
>
> -J.
>
>
> ============================================================
> 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
>
>

Tom Johnson

FRIAM book

The IAJ Press would be pleased and honored to publish such a book.

-Tom Johnson

> -----Original Message-----
> > From: friam-bounces at redfish.com
> > [mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] On Behalf Of Jochen Fromm
> > Sent: Friday, July 28, 2006 4:21 AM
> > To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'
> > Subject: [FRIAM] FRIAM book
> >
> >
> >
> > The recent discussion about the advances in the field
> > of complexity science and Owen's question about a
> > sound basis for discussions about complex systems
> > caused me to think about the current state of the
> > field and its literature. Perhaps a definite book
> > is missing. Won't it be an interesting endeavour
> > to write one ? Perhaps with Stephen as an editor ?
> > A FRIAM book about Agent-Based Modeling, Complex Systems,
> > Artificial Life, Evolutionary Computation and Swarm
> > Intelligence ? It could cover for instance complex
> > networks, complex adaptive systems, basic agent-based
> > models, edge of chaos, frozen accidents, path dependence,
> > self-organization, types and forms of emergence, swarm
> > intelligence,..
> >
> > -J.
> >
> >
>
> ============================================================
> 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.com

"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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Jochen Fromm-3

FRIAM book

In reply to this post by Phil Henshaw-2

Such a book should of course contain a big cautionary note on
the use of buzzwords. Buzzwords are especially frequent in the
area of complex systems, they are helpful to sell something,
but sometimes problematic in order to understand something.
Self-organization, "emergence", and "edge of chaos" are some
of these fascinating and sometimes frustrating concepts.
Yet how far-reaching are they really ? I think it is important
to say clearly once and for all what is possible and what is
not, to distinguish between buzz and facts, although probably
not everybody would like to hear the truth.

For instance self-organizing systems in the strict sense as
organization without organizer are rare (and therefore also
interesting), whereas adaptive systems are common, etc.
You might disagree here, certainly it will be hard to come
to an agreement about every buzzword, but I think it's worth it.

The hallmark of a science is the existence of basic laws,
We discussed recently for example the question of necessity
and chance - if there are laws of history or if the events
are just accidental ("Does it matter that there was a Napoleon,
a Beethoven, a Newton, etc.").

Interesting questions that could be addressed further are:
"Why is growth so fundamental for many organizations and systems?"
"To what extent are there laws of history?"
"Is there a unified theory for complex systems in terms of agents ?"
"What are the basic agent-based models ?"
"How do laws and rules appear in such systems ?"
"Is a theory of everything identical to a theory of nothing?"

We have discussed many of these questions here, and I think
they have to be answered if we want to make a step forward
on the road to a theory of complex systems. Anyone else
interested in contributing to such a book ? What other
questions should be on the agenda (besides the one if
Robert is a deterministic system or not?)

-J.

-----Original Message-----
From: Phil Henshaw
Sent: Saturday, July 29, 2006 2:59 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] FRIAM book

It's always a great idea for someone to synthesize the diverse
directions of an expanding fringe of research. It's curious, though,
that the book idea was immediately preceded by a cautionary note on the
contagious invasion of buzzwords. The surest way to force buzzwords to
mean something useful is to connect them with the observed phenomena of
the physical world, but I find the whole complexity community quite
resistant to doing that. As a community we'd clearly prefer to think of
complexity as theory.

Roger Critchlow-2

FRIAM book

Hmm, perhaps we should start with a "Complexity Hackers Dictionary" wiki?

-- rec --

On 7/30/06, Jochen Fromm <fromm at vs.uni-kassel.de> wrote:

>
> Such a book should of course contain a big cautionary note on
> the use of buzzwords. Buzzwords are especially frequent in the
> area of complex systems, they are helpful to sell something,
> but sometimes problematic in order to understand something.
> Self-organization, "emergence", and "edge of chaos" are some
> of these fascinating and sometimes frustrating concepts.
> Yet how far-reaching are they really ? I think it is important
> to say clearly once and for all what is possible and what is
> not, to distinguish between buzz and facts, although probably
> not everybody would like to hear the truth.
>
> For instance self-organizing systems in the strict sense as
> organization without organizer are rare (and therefore also
> interesting), whereas adaptive systems are common, etc.
> You might disagree here, certainly it will be hard to come
> to an agreement about every buzzword, but I think it's worth it.
>
> The hallmark of a science is the existence of basic laws,
> We discussed recently for example the question of necessity
> and chance - if there are laws of history or if the events
> are just accidental ("Does it matter that there was a Napoleon,
> a Beethoven, a Newton, etc.").
>
> Interesting questions that could be addressed further are:
> "Why is growth so fundamental for many organizations and systems?"
> "To what extent are there laws of history?"
> "Is there a unified theory for complex systems in terms of agents ?"
> "What are the basic agent-based models ?"
> "How do laws and rules appear in such systems ?"
> "Is a theory of everything identical to a theory of nothing?"
>
> We have discussed many of these questions here, and I think
> they have to be answered if we want to make a step forward
> on the road to a theory of complex systems. Anyone else
> interested in contributing to such a book ? What other
> questions should be on the agenda (besides the one if
> Robert is a deterministic system or not?)
>
> -J.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Phil Henshaw
> Sent: Saturday, July 29, 2006 2:59 PM
> To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] FRIAM book
>
> It's always a great idea for someone to synthesize the diverse
> directions of an expanding fringe of research. It's curious, though,
> that the book idea was immediately preceded by a cautionary note on the
> contagious invasion of buzzwords. The surest way to force buzzwords to
> mean something useful is to connect them with the observed phenomena of
> the physical world, but I find the whole complexity community quite
> resistant to doing that. As a community we'd clearly prefer to think of
> complexity as theory.
>
>
>
> ============================================================
> 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
>

Jim Rutt

FRIAM book

In reply to this post by Jochen Fromm-3

good idea. I'd be willing to do a chapter ... maybe an introductory
chapter on emergence, or perhaps an applied chapter on agent based models.

=jim rutt

At 04:21 AM 7/28/2006, you wrote:

>The recent discussion about the advances in the field
>of complexity science and Owen's question about a
>sound basis for discussions about complex systems
>caused me to think about the current state of the
>field and its literature. Perhaps a definite book
>is missing. Won't it be an interesting endeavour
>to write one ? Perhaps with Stephen as an editor ?
>A FRIAM book about Agent-Based Modeling, Complex Systems,
>Artificial Life, Evolutionary Computation and Swarm
>Intelligence ? It could cover for instance complex
>networks, complex adaptive systems, basic agent-based
>models, edge of chaos, frozen accidents, path dependence,
>self-organization, types and forms of emergence, swarm
>intelligence,..
>
>-J.
>
>
>============================================================
>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