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RELATIVE PERFECTION. "In searching for the gradations through which an organ in any species has been perfected, we ought to look exclusively to its lineal progenitors. But the state of the same organ in distinct classes may incidentally throw light on the steps by which it has been perfected." (Darwin). https://lnkd.in/d97MFVz View in LinkedIn

SELF-SELECTING ERRORS. "During the formation of a crystal, certain kinds of lattice imperfections usually replicate as a necessary part of the crystallization process. In so far as those imperfections that replicate are thus self-selecting, any crystallization process is likely to involve a rudimentary biological evolution. Under simple laboratory conditions, such evolution would be limited by the absence of any selection pressure for the elaboration of very complex imperfection patterns." https://lnkd.in/dDfWeDF View in LinkedIn

DARWIN'S RELATIVE PERFECTION. "Certainly he does not believe that any current species is perfect, but he frequently cites a kind of relativistic perfection. “How have all those exquisite adaptations of one part of the organisation to another part, and to the conditions of life, and of one distinct organic being to another being, been perfected?” https://lnkd.in/dWKSysJ View in LinkedIn

"EMERGENCE can be defined as the formation of order from disorder based on self-organisation." https://lnkd.in/duyAimW View in LinkedIn

EMERGENCE may be the fly in the ointment that results in totally unexpected interactions between informational computer codes an viruses, giving us the inability to predict, nor control outcomes. The dramatic increase in computer code complexity in the short time it has been on the planet shows no sign of abating. Complex autonomous agents are the engine of emergent phenomena. View in LinkedIn

OUR ABILITY TO PREDICT how any complex system reacts as it gains greater complexity is confounded in all systems by the phenomenon of emergence, or the development of unanticipated traits and phenomena. This is now well recognized in biological systems. Is it equally recognized in increasingly complex computing systems? View in LinkedIn

INTELLIGENT GROUPS. "Flocks of birds flying in lockstep formation and schools of fish swimming in coherent array abruptly turn together with no leader guiding the group. Ants form complex societies whose survival derives from specialized laborers, unguided by a central director." An intelligence that exceeds that of the simple unitary players. https://lnkd.in/duzJtba View in LinkedIn

SUBSYSTEM LINKS. "Some of the most engaging and perplexing natural phenomena are those in which highly-structured collective behavior emerges over time from the interaction of simple subsystems." https://lnkd.in/duzJtba View in LinkedIn

UNEXPECTED COMBINATIONS. "A single-celled bacterium is alive, but if you separate the macromolecules that combined to create the bacterium, these units are not alive. Based on our knowledge of macromolecules, we would not have been able to predict that they could combine to form a living organism, nor could we have predicted all of the characteristics of the resulting bacterium." http://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/biological-complexity-and-integrative-levels-of-organization-468 View in LinkedIn