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TERMS: COMPLEXITY, COMPLEX SYSTEMS, COMPLEX ADAPTIVE SYSTEMS It may well be that the most problematic aspect of moving ideas from the scientific to the business communities relates to these terms: complexity, complex systems, and complex adaptive systems. Most people probably think of "complex" things as being "complicated" things. However, there is an important distinction. Watches or space shuttles are "complicated." That is, they each have a number of interacting parts that interact in a mechanistic or linear manner. However, in the sense of the new sciences, complex systems are characterized by the interaction of numerous individual parts or agents whose collective behavior exhibits emergent characteristics at a higher system level. Ants finding food, birds flocking, or the stock market are all complex systems by this definition. Looking at an individual ant, bird, or stock trader would do little to help you understand what an ant colony, bird flock, or vacillating stock market are. But with "complicated" systems, one could probably look at all of the parts and get a sense of the function of the overall mechanistic system (Think of a watch or a space shuttle.) One can distinguish between complex nonadaptive systems (such as atoms and galaxies) that do not form internal models that evolve over time and complex adaptive systems (such as biological organisms), which do form internal models that selectively change and evolve over time. This might seem like a small point, but as far as modern science has been able to determine, all of the "agents" of nonliving phenomena--quarks, all electrons, all helium atoms, and all water molecules--are functionally identical. The interactions of nonliving agents lead to a variety of patterns and emergent characteristics that are self- organizing. However, as anyone who has been a parent knows, anyone who has been in business and worked with customers knows, or as any biologist knows, all kids, customers, and organisms—that is, all living "agents"—have some traits in common, and some traits that are different (i.e., the agents are not all identical). With living agents (in complex adaptive systems), one sees both the processes of self-organization (as with flocks of birds forming) and of evolution by natural selection (as with the evolution of cheetahs or antibiotic resistant bacteria). Unfortunately, as you read in this area, you may find that the terms "complexity," "complex systems," and "complex adaptive systems" (CAS) are sometimes used as synonyms. Hopefully the distinctions and characteristics of the different types of complex systems discussed here will help you keep track of the "players" in this new world of terms and ideas. Previous | Overview | Concepts | Terms | Next |
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