Complexes

Self-organization can be broadly defined as the ability of a system to display ordered spatiotemporal patterns solely as the result of the interactions among the system components. Processes of this kind characterize both living and artificial systems, making self-organization a concept that is at the basis of several disciplines, from physics to biology and engineering. Placed at the frontiers between disciplines, artificial life (ALife) has heavily borrowed concepts and tools from the study of self-organization, providing mechanistic interpretations of lifelike phenomena as well as useful constructivist approaches to artificial system design. Despite its broad usage within ALife, the concept of self-organization has been often excessively stretched or misinterpreted, calling for a clarification that could help with tracing the borders between what can and cannot be considered self-organization. In this review, we discuss the fundamental aspects of self-organization and list the main ...

A month late, but I share a draft where we propose a simple measure of antifragility and apply it to random and biological Boolean networks. Spoiler: biological networks are antifragile. Abstract: Antifragility is a property that enhances the capability of a system in response to external perturbations. Although the concept has been applied in many areas, a practical measure of antifragility has not been developed yet. Here we propose a simply calculable measure of antifragility, based on the change of "satisfaction" before and after adding perturbations, and apply it to random Boolean networks (RBNs). Using the measure, we found that ordered RBNs are the most antifragile. Also, we demonstrate that seven biological systems are antifragile. Our measure and results can be used in various applications of Boolean networks (BNs) including creating antifragile engineering systems, identifying the genetic mechanism of antifragile biological systems, and developing new treatment st...

The equal headway instability—the fact that a configuration with regular time intervals between vehicles tends to be volatile—is a common regulation problem in public transportation systems. An unsatisfactory regulation results in low efficiency and possible collapses of the service. Computational simulations have shown that self-organizing methods can regulate the headway adaptively beyond the theoretical optimum. In this work, we develop a computer simulation for metro systems fed with real data from the Mexico City Metro to test the current regulatory method with a novel self-organizing approach. The current model considers overall system’s data such as minimum and maximum waiting times at stations, while the self-organizing method regulates the headway in a decentralized manner using local information such as the passenger’s inflow and the positions of neighboring trains. The simulation shows that the self-organizing method improves the performance over the current one as it adapts...

Traffic signals are ubiquitous devices that first appeared in 1868. Recent advances in information and communications technology (ICT) have led to unprecedented improvements in such areas as mobile handheld devices (i.e., smartphones), the electric power industry (i.e., smart grids), transportation infrastructure, and vehicle area networks. Given the trend towards interconnectivity, it is only a matter of time before vehicles communicate with one another and with infrastructure. In fact, several pilots of such vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure (e.g. traffic lights and parking spaces) communication systems are already operational. This survey of autonomous and self-organized traffic signaling control has been undertaken with these potential developments in mind. Our research results indicate that, while many sophisticated techniques have attempted to improve the scheduling of traffic signal control, either real-time sensing of traffic patterns or a priori knowledge of tra...

Self-organizing traffic lights have shown considerable improvements compared to traditional methods in computer simulations. Self-organizing methods, however, use sophisticated sensors, increasing their cost and limiting their deployment. We propose a novel approach using simple sensors to achieve self-organizing traffic light coordination. The proposed approach involves placing a computer and a presence sensor at the beginning of each block; each such sensor detects a single vehicle. Each computer builds a virtual environment simulating vehicle movement to predict arrivals and departures at the downstream intersection. At each intersection, a computer receives information across a data network from the computers of the neighboring blocks and runs a self-organizing method to control traffic lights. Our simulations showed a superior performance for our approach compared with a traditional method (a green wave) and a similar performance (close to optimal) compared with a self-organizing ...

Cities are changing constantly. All urban systems face different conditions from day to day. Even when averaged regularities can be found, urban systems will be more efficient if they can adapt to changes at the same speeds at which these occur. Technology can assist humans in achieving this adaptation. Inspired by cybernetics, we propose a description of cities as adaptive systems. We identify three main components: information, algorithms, and agents, which we illustrate with current and future examples. The implications of adaptive cities are manifold, with direct impacts on mobility, sustainability, resilience, governance, and society. Still, the potential of adaptive cities will not depend so much on technology as on how we use it. Adaptive Cities: A Cybernetic Perspective on Urban Systems Carlos Gershenson, Paolo Santi, Carlo Ratti http://arxiv.org/abs/1609.02000

Urban mobility systems are composed multiple elements with strong interactions, i.e. their future is co-determined by the state of other elements. Thus, studying components in isolation, i.e. using a reductionist approach, is inappropriate. I propose five recommendations to improve urban mobility based on insights from the scientific study of complex systems: use adaptation over prediction, regulate interactions to avoid friction, use sensors to recover real time information, develop adaptive algorithms to exploit that information, and deploy agents to act on the urban environment. Improving Urban Mobility by Understanding its Complexity Carlos Gershenson http://arxiv.org/abs/1603.04267

To improve the efficiency of peer-to-peer (P2P) systems while adapting to changing environmental conditions, static peer-to-peer protocols can be replaced by adaptive plans. The resulting systems are inherently complex, which makes their development and characterization a challenge for traditional methods. Here we propose the design and analysis of adaptive P2P systems using measures of complexity, emergence, self-organization, and homeostasis based on information theory. These measures allow the evaluation of adaptive P2P systems and thus can be used to guide their design. We evaluate the proposal with a P2P computing system provided with adaptation mechanisms. We show the evolution of the system with static and also changing workload, using different fitness functions. When the adaptive plan forces the system to converge to a predefined performance level, the nodes may result in highly unstable configurations, which correspond to a high variance in time of the measured complexity. Co...

Teotihuacan was the first urban civilization of Mesoamerica and one of the largest of the ancient world. Following a tradition in archaeology to equate social complexity with centralized hierarchy, it is widely believed that the city’s origin and growth was controlled by a lineage of powerful individuals. However, much data is indicative of a government of co-rulers, and artistic traditions expressed an egalitarian ideology. Yet this alternative keeps being marginalized because the problems of collective action make it difficult to conceive how such a coalition could have functioned in principle. We therefore devised a mathematical model of the city’s hypothetical network of representatives as a formal proof of concept that widespread cooperation was realizable in a fully distributed manner. In the model, decisions become self-organized into globally optimal configurations even though local representatives behave and modify their relations in a rational and selfish manner. This self-op...

Ashby's law of requisite variety states that a controller must have at least as much variety (complexity) as the controlled. Maturana and Varela proposed autopoiesis (self-production) to define living systems. Living systems also require to fulfill the law of requisite variety. A measure of autopoiesis has been proposed as the ratio between the complexity of a system and the complexity of its environment. Self-organization can be used as a concept to guide the design of systems towards higher values of autopoiesis, with the potential of making technology more "living", i.e. adaptive and robust. Requisite Variety, Autopoiesis, and Self-organization Carlos Gershenson Invited keynote at WOSC 2014 http://arxiv.org/abs/1409.7475

This article presents an overview of current and potential applications of living technology to some urban problems. Living technology can be described as technology that exhibits the core features of living systems. These features can be useful to solve dynamic problems. In particular, urban problems concerning mobility, logistics, telecommunications, governance, safety, sustainability, and society and culture are presented, and solutions involving living technology are reviewed. A methodology for developing living technology is mentioned, and supraoptimal public transportation systems are used as a case study to illustrate the benefits of urban living technology. Finally, the usefulness of describing cities as living systems is discussed. Gershenson, C. (2013). Living in living cities. Artificial Life , 19  (3 & 4): 401–420. http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/ARTL_a_00112   Free Access Related to this  TED@SãoPaulo talk . Check the rest of the...

Gershenson, C. (2013). Facing complexity: Predition vs. adaptation . In A. Massip and A. Bastardas (eds),  Complexity Perspectives on Language, Communication and Society . One of the presuppositions of science since the times of Galileo, Newton, Laplace, and Descartes has been the predictability of the world. This idea has strongly influenced scientific and technological models. However, in recent decades, chaos and complexity have shown that not every phenomenon is predictable, even if it is deterministic. If a problem space is predictable, in theory we can find a solution via optimization. Nevertheless, if a problem space is not predictable, or it changes too fast, very probably optimization will offer obsolete solutions. This occurs often when the immediate solution affects the problem itself. An alternative is found in adaptation. An adaptive system will be able to find by itself new solutions for unforeseen situations.

In evolutionary biology, attention to the relationship between stochastic organisms and their stochastic environments has leaned towards the adaptability and learning capabilities of the organisms rather than toward the properties of the environment. This article is devoted to the algorithmic aspects of the environment and its interaction with living organisms. We ask whether one may use the fact of the existence of life to establish how far nature is removed from algorithmic randomness. The paper uses a novel approach to behavioral evolutionary questions, using tools drawn from information theory, algorithmic complexity and the thermodynamics of computation to support an intuitive assumption about the near optimal structure of a physical environment that would prove conducive to the evolution and survival of organisms, and sketches the potential of these tools, at present alien to biology, that could be used in the future to address different and deeper questions. We contribute to the...

Earlier this month I gave a seminar back at the VUB, one of my alma maters. Here is a video recording, more details here  or below. Application of living technology to urban problems   Carlos Gershenson  (Universidad Nacional  Autónoma de México)  Abstract: I will present an overview of current and potential applications of living technology to urban problems. Living technology can be described as technology that exhibits the core features of living systems. These features can be useful to solve dynamic problems. In particular, urban problems concerning mobility, logistics, telecommunications, governance, safety, sustainability, and society and culture are presented, while solutions involving living technology are reviewed. A methodology for developing living technology is mentioned, while supraoptimal public transportation systems are used as a case study to illustrate the benefits of urban living technology. Finally, the usefulness of de...

Butterflies have four wings. Can they fly with only two? This question arose this week. My wife and daughter had picked up a butterfly cocoon to see how the butterfly emerged and later free her. But our naughty/lovely cat bit on the cocoon. So when the butterfly came out, her right wings were damaged. She couldn't fly. Still, to answer the question of this post, if the hind wings are missing, butterflies can fly, their flight is amazingly robust. This is a nice example of how reductionism fails to see the function of systems by ignoring their interactions. You can have two out of four wings, but a butterfly will fly or not, live or die, depending on how the remaining wings interact . Looking only at individual wings will not tell you much about the capabilities of the insect.

Last June I had the privilege to participate in a wonderful evening in São Paulo where local TEDx organizers from all over Brazil gathered to attend TED's worldwide talent search . There were extremely interesting and moving 6 minute talks from a very broad range of themes and topics. I gave a talk on our work on Living Cities and their potential for solving urban problems. There were almost 300 talks in 14 cities worldwide. 20 of those will be selected to present in TED2013. TED@SãoPaulo was the only event held in Latin America, and I am the only Mexican competing for a place in TED2013. Please watch, rate, comment, and share my talk before August 31st, to help the organizers decide: http://talentsearch.ted.com/video/Carlos-Gershenson-Bringing-urba;TEDSao-Paulo You can find related work at http://arxiv.or­g/abs/1111.3659 http://dx.doi.­org/10.1371/jour­nal.pone.0021469 http://dx.plos.­org/10.1371/jour­nal.pone.0007292

Self-organization in the context of computing systems refers to a technological approach to deal with the increasing complexity associated with the deployment, maintenance, and evolution of such systems. The terms self-organizing and autonomous are often used interchangeably in relation to systems that use organic principles (self-configuration, self-healing, and so on) in their design and operation. In the specific case of system on chip (SoC) design, organic principles are clearly in the solution path for some of the most important challenges in areas like logic organization, data movement, circuits, and software. In this article, we start by providing a definition of the concept of self-organization as it applies to SoCs, explaining what it means and how it may be applied. We then provide a survey of the various recent papers, journal articles, and books on the subject and close by pointing out possible future directions, challenges and opportunities for self-organizing SoCs. De ...

Ultra-large scale (ULS) systems are becoming pervasive. They are inherently complex, which makes their design and control a challenge for traditional methods. Here we propose the design and analysis of ULS systems using measures of complexity, emergence, self-organization, and homeostasis based on information theory. We evaluate the proposal with a ULS computing system provided with genetic adaptation mechanisms. We show the evolution of the system with stable and also changing workload, using different fitness functions. When the adaptive plan forces the system to converge to a predefined performance level, the nodes may result in highly unstable configurations, that correspond to a high variance in time of the measured complexity. Conversely, if the adaptive plan is less "aggressive", the system may be more stable, but the optimal performance may not be achieved. Measuring the Complexity of Ultra-Large-Scale Evolutionary Systems, Michele Amoretti, Carlos Gershenson. Subm...

Edmonds, B. & C. Gershenson (2012).  Learning, Social Intelligence and the Turing Test - why an "out-of-the-box" Turing Machine will not pass the Turing Test .  I nvited talk at Turing Centenary Conference CiE 2012 ,  special session on "The Turing Test and Thinking Machines".  CPM Report No.: 12-215 Abstract : The Turing Test (TT) checks for human intelligence, rather than any putative general intelligence. It involves repeated interaction requiring learning in the form of adaption to the human conversation partner. It is a macro-level post-hoc test in contrast to the definition of a Turing Machine (TM), which is a prior micro-level definition. This raises the question of whether learning is just another computational process, i.e. can be implemented as a TM. Here we argue that learning or adaption is fundamentally different from computation, though it does involve processes that can be seen as computations. To illustrate this difference we compare (a) d...

Last November I had the honor of participating in TEDxDF with a talk on self-organizing traffic lights. You can watch the video (in Spanish) at: http://tedxtalks.ted.com/video/TEDxDF-Carlos-Gershenson-Semfor  or  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QohrFmeNnVw Mejorar el transporte público de la Ciudad de México es una idea que a todos se nos ocurre, pero pocos hacemos algo al respecto. Este no es el caso de Carlos, un apasionado del estudio científico de la complejidad: ¿Cómo podemos diseñar componentes de un sistema para que, por medio de sus interacciones, realicen una función deseada a nivel del sistema? Con su ponencia Carlos responderá esta pregunta y expondrá ideas aplicables al DF para mejorar diversos medios de transporte, afectando positivamente la calidad de vida de la población.