Re: of(f) course

[horn_jim <jhorn@titan.liunet.edu> (by way of vanessa@media.mit.edu (VanessaStevens Colella))]

The group-piloted airplane appears to only vaguely analogous to what goes
on in social systems that have attained a level of interactions that may
be termed autonomous.  In self-organizing systems, the capacity for
growth is partially determined by diversity of its members that occupy
different niches based on each individual's history of transformations.
In short, not everyone is a pilot.

On Thu, 18 Sep 1997, Bruce Gregory wrote:

>
>
> > No such thing as a silly question.  In fact, one of the things that I think
> > makes learning about  emergent systems challenging is developing an
> > intution for why the "average" is not always the result.
> >
> > -- Vanessa
>
> In the emergent system flying the airplane, one reason control
> is maintained might be that the moment the plane starts to move
> left or right there is a good reason for everyone to support
> rather than to fight that motion. (Otherwise a crash is likely.)
> If, on the other hand, participants could not see the results of
> their collective actions, the "average" might well be the
> result.
>
> Bruce Gregory
>
>
>