{"id":1319,"date":"2010-12-24T00:00:31","date_gmt":"2010-12-24T05:00:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.synapse9.com\/signals\/?p=1319"},"modified":"2014-08-29T17:08:59","modified_gmt":"2014-08-29T22:08:59","slug":"complexity-too-great-to-follow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/synapse9.com\/signals\/complexity-too-great-to-follow\/","title":{"rendered":"Complexity too great to follow what\u2019s happening\u2026 ??"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’ve been discussing since the 70’d how and why growth creates growing complexity and so growing difficulty of problem solving, as a natural physical limit of growth for systems with physical working parts <\/em>of any kind<\/em>. \u00a0A a discussion of the signs to look) \u00a0It’s both a real concern as a threat to the health of an economic growth system, and good proof\u00a0that the natural world functions very differently than a conceptual model. \u00a0It led to my proposing a whole new set of\u00a0scientific\u00a0methods for how science can study natural systems in their own form, as forms of natural organization not concepts.<\/em><\/p>\n

1970 marked the sudden end of steadily growing \u00a0US wages, and the start of ever growing wealth inequity. “Information overload” as a threat to societal resilience was becoming a key topic of discussion as computers emerged as our premiere business tools<\/em><\/p>\n

Was that how the economy changed behavior, as humans began to be replaced\u00a0by technology as things got too complex?<\/em><\/h4>\n

Below this discussion of the general problem is the\u00a0blog comment from 9\/3\/2012 observing the strangely logical connection of the emergence of\u00a0computers as a (false) solution for the ever more numbing complexity of our lives. <\/em><\/em><\/em><\/em><\/p>\n

A follow-up Sept 7 2012 post <\/em><\/em><\/em>Computers taking over our jobs and our pay?<\/a><\/span> explores a fairly reasonable cause for the systemic decline in demand for the products people produce, that the computers making them don’t buy them…<\/em><\/p>\n

__________<\/em><\/em><\/em><\/em><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a graph of the use of the word “complex<\/strong><\/em>“, as found in books scanned by Google. It seems to show a distinct end to the long historic growth of interest in complexity, apparently in pace with the increasing complexity of the economy. \u00a0\u00a0The complexity of all our life issues, as well as demands of education, etc. have similarly increased with the growth of the economy, but only up to ~1963.<\/p>\n

\"growing<\/p>\n

Google\u2019s Ngram tool<\/a> shows steady exponential growth in the use \u201ccomplex\u201d beginning in ~1840 and continuing to ~1963, where there\u2019s a distinct growth “inflection point” (curvature reversal) in the trend. \u00a0The clear end of increasing use of the word is a little\u00a0mysterious.<\/p>\n

The 1960’s, of course, coincided with the actual time when the complexity of the economy’s environmental conflicts, the emergence of computer use, and the rise of true globalization were noticeably exploding the complexity of things\u2026 \u00a0That is also directly implied by the continuing explosive growth in real GDP, as shown in the combined graph below.<\/p>\n

That divergence between the two trends would seem to imply that a very large gap, between the real complexity of our experience and our cultural awareness of it, began for some reason to grow faster and faster at that time. \u00a0It seems to have starting in the early 1960\u2019s and to continue!<\/p>\n

Is that really “the mark” of information overload?<\/h4>\n

The combined data implies a subculture developed\u00a0increasingly\u00a0intense awareness of what was going on, as the rest of the culture stopped being able to focus on it.<\/h4>\n
\n

Or is that a \u201ccoincidence\u201d? \u00a0I think it\u2019s clearly at least a natural phenomenon, that seems clearly to be going quite unnoticed.<\/p>\n

What it looks like to me is clean evidence of what many of us have been groping for good words to describe, having to do with complexity becoming overwhelming. \u00a0Did our culture actually lose interest in complex issues, just as complexity science was emerging too, making the subject “boring”?<\/p>\n

Or\u2026 was it \u201cthe point at which \u201cThe System\u201d blew our minds??<\/em><\/h4>\n

What occurs to me is that growing up in a world that was supposed to make sense, but finding a society that had lost track of what was happening, was the heart of the 60\u2019s generation\u2019s complaint, and its demand for action!<\/p>\n

The\u00a0Google Ngram for \u201cinformation overload\u201d<\/a> (brown line) and for “bottom line”<\/a>\u00a0(pink line) show coincident emergence with break in the long\u00a0historical trend of use of the word “complex”<\/a>\u00a0growing in pace with the complexity of our economy. \u00a0 That indicates to me that the discussions reflected by Google’s “survey of books in English” stopped being able to\u00a0keep up with the continuing rapidly growing \u00a0complexity of the world we live in, though why is open to discussion. \u00a0The more consequential concurrent departure from the GDP trend, of course, is the leveling off of constant dollar US median income figures, suggesting\u00a0a connection between the relative\u00a0declining\u00a0interest and ability to cope with complexity caused employment to have relative declining value to the economy. \u00a0(click to link to image)<\/p>\n

\"US<\/a>The whole 60\u2019s movement could be summarized as \u201cHey, pay attention\u201d. It then, of course, promptly failed the test too. I definitely noticed a \u201cbig chill\u201d in curiosity for the complex problems a few of us were making good progress on in the late 70\u2019s. TheGoggle Ngram for \u201cbig chill\u201d<\/a> shows it\u2019s use emerging in ~1980 and still a very live concern.<\/p>\n

No one\u2019s cultural heritage would prepare them for this kind of whole system departure from from reality\u2026 right? I think it\u2019s still very important for people to know that complexity is more than a problem, it\u2019s a \u201cnerve poison\u201d too, as the natural process of multiplying change and increasingly complex and conflicting interactions at the limits, naturally deadens our decision making ability. The same turning point, when increasing attention by bigger steps shifts to increase by smaller steps, turns up in the\u00a0Google Ngram for \u201ccomplex, complexity\u201d<\/a>, but with the latter not completely leveling off yet.<\/p>\n

Any thoughts?<\/p>\n

That, it seems, that the difficulty of managing an ever more complex world economic system, with ever more confused people, didn’t come up in the planning for our modern world, is very curious. It seems managers and thinkers assumed they\u2019d always come up with the formula for how to run things they didn’t have the formulas for, as they had always seemed to before.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s deeply confused thinking, inherently, that taking ever greater risks won\u2019t ever lead to failure because it didn’t before\u2026 At root I think it\u2019s a failure to notice that organization is a byproduct of independent parts finding how to work together, and not a formula or image someone betting on it imposes on the parts from afar. Our thinkers seem to not have been thinking about the world as having parts needing to find their own way of working, but instead thinking about themselves as virtual rulers of it.<\/p>\n

Peter Brown, the Canadian economist and thinker, [see\u00a0The Moral Economy Project<\/a>] also talks about how the complexity of modern life has become numbing, how we\u2019re \u201cdrowning in our worries\u201d and experiencing \u201cidea fatigue\u201d. It\u2019s one of those \u201clittle voices\u201d, a sick feeling in our gut that we might listen closely to and not be confused by.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not entirely different for a whole society experiencing that, dreading the approach of nature\u2019s final exams and feeling at loose ends on the subject matter, and a school child approaching the hour of starting their homework every night\u2026 In each case, it\u2019s worth noticing.<\/p>\n

The physical complexity, corresponding to real GDP, was not leveling off\u2026<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

jlh<\/p>\n

______<\/p>\n

Related comments from 2012 view to\u00a0Business Insider<\/em><\/h4>\n

I submitted the following two comments on a related \u00a0Business Insider article by Charles Smith <\/em>“The Future Of Work In America<\/a>” <\/em>(<\/em>9\/3\/2012)<\/em> suggesting “Technology and the Web are destroying far more jobs than they create.” \u00a0The comment (1) did not appear<\/em><\/p>\n

comment 1.<\/h3>\n

I think the question is quite relevant, and in line with Nobel laureate Wassily Leontief’s 1983 warning that humans will go the way of the horse in the business of providing goods and services. What most people don’t know is that started dramatically in ~1970,<\/p>\n

Was it also the advent of Computers… ???
\n& humans as predicted\u00a0being replaced\u00a0by technology?<\/h3>\n

It’s remarkably clear in the data, quite indelible as a “coincidence” between introducing computers for business use in ~1970 and the “the great divergence” of breaking American society apart with lagging earnings from employment and multiplying earnings from wealth. What was the impetus for it??? Well, of course it was the numbing increase in the complexity of everything.<\/p>\n

\"\"
US GDP 1880 to 2000 & Wage Percentile’s \u00a0 \u00a0Indexed to 1970 GDP<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Computers became the easy way to sidestep the cumbersome nuisance of people needing to think about what they were doing in order to keep multiplying their tasks. That “extension” of our bodies with a new tool had a range of different effects unlike any other ever before.<\/p>\n

That computers and their rules would later also run into EXACTLY the same problem, in our finding it not possible to update computers with new rules as fast as they were changing our world, is also very evident here. That’s a spot on match for what I predicted in 79, actually, as the ultimate certain limit of growth. The ultimate limit of growth is confusion, caused by the parts of the growing system needing to make ever more complex and complexly changing responses, ever faster.<\/p>\n

the 1st essay on it:
\nhttp:\/\/www.synapse9.com\/pub\/UnhidPatt-theInfiniteSoc.pdf<\/a>
\none of current blog posts:
\nhttp:\/\/www.synapse9.com\/signals\/2010\/12\/24\/complexity-too-great-to-follow\/<\/a>
\nlots of theory developed between:
\nhttp:\/\/www.synapse9.com\/signals<\/a> &\u00a0http:\/\/www.synapse9.com\/home.htm#sci<\/a><\/p>\n

Signs of something taking over…<\/h3>\n

Google Ngram for Computer, Software, Code and Technology
\n– the “killer app” words of our time –<\/p>\n

\"\"
Was 1970 the “moment in time” when the power of computers was realized by business<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

jlh<\/p>\n

__________<\/p>\n

Comment 2.<\/h3>\n

Well, debate points aside, there’s more to the macro-economic change than mentioned here. \u00a0 There’s clearly a major technology take-over of production and information services, so the “agents” of the economy with the appetites for consuming said services are increasingly not being paid enough to consume them.<\/p>\n

So… if it’s technology that’s producing the wealth, and not labor, what do you do to keep the economy afloat?? \u00a0 Technology has no need for the products it creates. \u00a0 In a tech dominant world the earnings of the technology go to investors, as profits, not to the technology for consuming the services. \u00a0As an a whole system “the circle won’t be closed” unless investors spend enough of their earnings hiring humans, so they can exercise their appetites in consuming the products. \u00a0 Investors… of course, live by the opposite principle, compound accumulation.<\/p>\n

I think this actually clarifies a heck of a lot, solving the riddle of humans appearing likely to go the way of the horse. \u00a0That’s impossible, as technology has no desire for its own products. \u00a0 \u00a0It also solves the riddle of Chapter 16 in The General Theory, where Keynes points to this same impasse, in another way. \u00a0 That to work as a system requires investors to be the spenders of last resort to relieve flagging demand, to hire people and not just multiply their money when needed.<\/p>\n

If there’s one thing an economy can’t do without
\nit’s the appetites that drive it, and technology doesn’t have any.<\/h3>\n

More data and discussion of the structural problem and natural limits of technology take-over on Signals: Complexity too great to follow what\u2019s happening\u2026??<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve been discussing since the 70’d how and why growth creates growing complexity and so growing difficulty of problem solving, as a natural physical limit of growth for systems with physical working parts of any kind. \u00a0A a discussion of the signs to look) \u00a0It’s both a real concern as a threat to the health … Continue reading Complexity too great to follow what\u2019s happening\u2026 ??<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6,7,8,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1319","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mail","category-econn","category-theory","category-pop"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/synapse9.com\/signals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1319","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/synapse9.com\/signals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/synapse9.com\/signals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/synapse9.com\/signals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/synapse9.com\/signals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1319"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/synapse9.com\/signals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1319\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3052,"href":"https:\/\/synapse9.com\/signals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1319\/revisions\/3052"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/synapse9.com\/signals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1319"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/synapse9.com\/signals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1319"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/synapse9.com\/signals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1319"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}