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March/April 1999
Screen Version
Complexity and the Networked Society
By Alan McCluskey
alan@connected.org
In his book The New Alliance written with Isabelle Stengers, Ilya
Prigogine writes, "It is no longer stable situations or permanency
that interest us, but rather evolutions, crises and instabilities."
In the book, Prigogine and Stengers depict modern science as being
"against nature because it denies the complexity and the coming-into-being
of the world in the name of a knowable, eternal world that is
dictated by a small number of simple, unchanging laws." It is
true that a great many phenomena can be described in terms of
simple, linear mathematics. Yet, as Prigogine and Stengers point
out, this approach unfortunately led to a mechanical vision of
nature in which science became an instrument of domination and
scientists shut themselves off from nature with the rest of humanity
in the ivory tower of supposed objectiveness.
Prigogine and Stengers plead for a new approach to science, in
which "the experimental dialogue is based on the two essential
elements of the relationship between man and nature: understanding
and modification." They go on to say, "Experimentation demands
an interaction between theory and practice that implies a veritable
strategy." In another book, entitled The End of Certainties, Prigogine
writes, "We are witnessing the emergence of a science that is
no longer limited to simplified, idealized situations but rather
one which confronts the complexity of the world and allows human
creativity to flourish as a singular expression of a fundamental
trait common to all levels of
Nature."
In presenting Ilya Prigogine at IST98 during a session entitled
The Networked Society, Roger Camrass pointed out that the development
of logic had enabled the emergence of modern science, modern economics,
and modern social theory. However, logic alone no longer provides
a suitable framework to carry us forward in today's transition
to the networked age. "We are seeking new tools to replace or
complement those techniques that have enabled our sciences and
our many academic fields to mature, new techniques that will form
a framework for the future," said Camrass. He went on to say,
"One such powerful tool is complexity theory as a possible underpinning
of our new information society."
Prigogine began his talk to a packed hall in Vienna by saying
that no one had planned either a networked society or the information
revolution. He considers this a sign that self-organization was
at work, drawing a parallel to certain phenomena observed in physics
and chemistry. Prigogine went on to talk about the importance
of bifurcation in self-organization. By bifurcation he meant all
of those moments when choice is possible, a choice that can lead
to novelty.
Bifurcation in physics and chemistry requires two conditions,
according to Prigogine. The first is that the system be far from
equilibrium. The open systems Prigogine was interested in differed
from the closed systems hitherto described by physics in that
they managed to maintain a stable state even though-or, rather,
because-there was a continuous flow of energy or matter through
them. The second condition was that the pertinent equations governing
those systems be nonlinear. The difference between a linear and
a nonlinear system is that in the former, the effect of change
on the system is proportional to that change, and so, small changes
have little or no effect. In a nonlinear system, small changes
can have dramatic effects because their impact may be repeatedly
amplified by self-reinforcing feedback. Bifurcation leads to novelties:
new space-time structures. Such bifurcations occur when a system
moves from one stable state to a new one. For given boundary conditions
for a given environment, the system has many possibilities. Prigogine
says, "That is why I spoke about self-organization, because it
is not the boundary conditions which create the self-organization,
but elements of spontaneous development. The human universe is
only one of the possible realizations. The possible is richer
than the actual."
Going on to connect that idea to the information society, Prigogine
raised the issue of the effect of the present bifurcation with
the move to extensive use of information technologies. He argued:
"Because of the scales involved, we expect larger fluctuations
and increased instability. That is why we need more precise methods
to deal with all these things. That is why we need the theory
of complex systems." Apparently, in the previous meeting of Nobel
prize winners there had been a discussion about whether the technical
revolution hailed the arrival of the Apocalypse or the beginning
of a new dignity of man. According to Prigogine, the vote for
the dignity of man won by a very small majority.
Prigogine ended his talk with three questions he felt were more
on the order of guidelines for reflection and action than questions.
"We have to direct the information revolution so that these questions
can be answered in a positive way," he said. Here are Prigogine's
three questions:
A recent poll shows that among the large majority, the hope for
the third millennium lies in greater harmony between people and
nature. What will be the impact of the networked society on that
issue?
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