Author: Thomas Lee Abshier
The Wisdom To Choose Action or Inaction
In Dr. Robert Malone’s recent post he made the following observations and proposed the following resolution.
Premises:
- Western society believes problems must always be met with action
- Modern society assumes science and engineering can perfectly predict outcomes
- There’s a fundamental difference between complicated systems (like computers) and complex systems (like biology and society)
- Complex systems are inherently unpredictable due to their chaotic, self-assembling nature
- Modern technocrats mistakenly view human society as a complicated rather than complex system
Arguments:
- Complex systems cannot be controlled with the precision of complicated systems
- Complicated systems (computers) can be fully understood and predicted
- Complex systems (biology, society) have unpredictable emergent properties
- Large-scale social interventions often fail
- Historical examples like the “war on poverty” demonstrate unintended consequences
- The “butterfly effect” makes long-term outcomes impossible to predict
- Current global initiatives reflect dangerous hubris
- UN’s Agenda 2030 assumes predictable outcomes
- Centralized planning ignores the complex nature of human societies
- Decentralization and incremental change are preferable
- Allow societies to evolve naturally
- Test changes on small scales before broader implementation
- Avoid censorship that prevents natural adaptation
Conclusion:
- Wise leadership requires:
- Recognition of the difference between complex and complicated systems
- Humility in approaching interventions in complex systems
- Understanding when not to act is as important as knowing when to act
- Favoring decentralized, incremental changes over large-scale interventions
- Allowing natural adaptation and evolution of societies rather than forcing engineered solutions
The article advocates for a more cautious, humble approach to social change that respects the unpredictable nature of complex human systems.
To understand Dr. Malone’s arguments, we need a deeper understanding of the difference between a complex and complicated system
The terms “complex” and “complicated” are often used interchangeably in everyday language, but in systems theory, they have distinct meanings:
Complicated Systems:
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Structure: These systems have many parts, but the relationships between these parts are generally well-defined and predictable. Think of a Swiss watch or a jet engine.
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Predictability: Given enough information, the behavior of a complicated system can be predicted with a high degree of accuracy. If a part fails or needs adjustment, experts can usually diagnose and fix it because the system’s operation follows known laws or rules.
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Hierarchy: They often have a hierarchical structure where components are arranged in levels, with control flowing from top to bottom.
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Change: Changes in such systems can be managed through detailed planning and engineering because the outcomes of modifications can be calculated in advance.
Complex Systems:
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Structure: Complex systems are characterized by a large number of interacting components where the relationships are not just numerous but can also change and evolve. Examples include ecosystems, human societies, or the economy.
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Emergence: These systems exhibit emergent behavior, meaning the whole is more than the sum of its parts. Properties and behaviors emerge from the interactions among the parts that could not have been predicted just by studying the parts in isolation.
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Adaptation: They often adapt and change in response to external or internal stimuli. The parts of the system can learn, evolve, or adapt, leading to new patterns and behaviors over time.
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Nonlinearity: Small changes in initial conditions can lead to dramatically different outcomes (the butterfly effect).
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Feedback Loops: Feedback – both positive (amplifying) and negative (dampening) – plays a significant role in how the system behaves over time, often leading to unexpected results or self-organization.
Key Differences:
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Control: Complicated systems can often be controlled or managed by understanding and manipulating their components. Complex systems, however, might be influenced but not controlled in the same straightforward manner because of their adaptive nature and emergent properties.
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Understanding: To understand a complicated system, you might need deep knowledge of how each part functions and fits together. To understand a complex system, you need to observe its behavior over time, understand the patterns of interaction, and often, accept that there will always be elements of unpredictability.
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Management: Management of a complicated system can often be reduced to following a set of procedures, whereas managing a complex system requires more nuanced strategies, often involving learning, experimentation, and adaptive management.
In essence, while a complicated system might be difficult to understand or build due to its intricate design, a complex system is difficult to predict, control, or manage because of its dynamic and adaptive nature
Commentary by Thomas Lee Abshier, ND
11/10/2024
There is a common/surface distinction between complex and complicated systems. Complex systems typically have a non-linear cause-effect relationship between components of the complex system and the imprecision of measurement of the initial conditions makes accurate/dependable calculation of a future state of the system.
But there is a deeper cause for the imprecision of predicting future states in complex systems. Namely, the state of the universe is impossible to measure in principle. Measurement of the velocity and momentum of a quanta of energy or mass can only be measured to the certainty allowed by the Uncertainty Principle.
Another deep factor, related to the Uncertainty Principle, prevents knowing the exact initial conditions of a system (mass/velocity, time/energy). I postulate that each quantum of mass and energy is composed of smaller, more elemental components I call Conscious Points. Each of the Conscious Points has an actual position and velocity, but those parameters are unknowable, as the human senses and instrumentation can only detect quanta of energy. All of the subquantum components, each of the Conscious points, are enrolled in a Group Entity. The Group Entity is the essence or spirit of the photon or mass.
Each of the Conscious Points operates independently, but when it is part of a group entity, each Conscious Point carries the momentum of the quanta, the forces acting upon it, and the instantaneous changes of state required by interactions associated with entangled photons.
composed of humans with consciousness and free will in a biologically adaptive world is inherently unpredictable because the spiritual vision directing free will cannot be known except by the viewer. Thus, the problem of human unpredictability (which make human systems complex) cannot be reduced to predictability even by knowing the state of mind and intent of all humans at a given point in time.
Humans have free will, meaning that any/every human can choose any choice in every successive Moment. On its surface, the brain appears to be only a complicated system (that is, knowable, linear, binary, and identifiably physical and mechanical). Bur a complex system i. The synapses take milliseconds to integrate and fire for each cycle of sensory/input stimulus and neural response. The brain produces an extremely complicated pattern of neural firings in response to the inputs of other neurons and the afferent sensory signals, but it is not at the level of unknowable complexity.
There is another level of input to the brain’s complicated neuroanatomy/neurophysiology. This input is not physical. Nevertheless, it affects the brain. It is because of this input from the spiritual realm (God, demons, other people…) that the brain’s operation is complex. It is from this realm, and because of our spiritual vision (seeing the forces operating in the spiritual/non-physical realm), that free will arises. We are not constrained by the determinism of physical beings necessitated by the complicated sequences of synaptic firings. Rather, there is another variable/force/factor/input to the neural-synaptic network equation, arising from the spiritual-metaphysical realm. If an unobservable-metaphysical force were to affect the synaptic network and influence it physically, the brain-neural network would fall into the realm of the complex system – the in-principle unpredictable system of output.
The human nervous system is both complicated and complex. God, the divine mind, has free will, as it has no sequence of cause effect which it must follow. Likewise, the human mind can likewise exercise volition/free will.
Natural systems, such as biology, ecology, and weather/climate, modify themselves in complex ways because of non-linear feedback loops between variables. There is nothing fundamentally unknowable about natural systems, it is merely that the computation of the future state of a system requires the knowledge of the system state’s initial conditions at a level of precision which cannot be determined in principle.
In my Theory of Absolutes/Conscious Point Hypothesis, I postulate that the universe is unknowable in its exact condition at any Moment by human consciousness. The unknowability of the motion of each quantum is because the Conscious Points which constitute each quantum’s group entity are possibly/likely entangled with the Conscious Points constituting other previously entangled quanta.
Note, each time a quantum collides and exchanges momentum, all the conscious Points associated with that quantum communicate with every Conscious Point in the colliding system, as well as with Conscious Points in the previously entangled quanta. It is this constellation of interactions that influences the next-Moment trajectory of every Conscious Point.
Thus, it is the interactions with all other Conscious Points in the universe, and the consideration of the which produces a precisely individualized motion for each Conscious Point, while maintaining the identity . Therefore, all the Conscious Points composing , The Conscious Points composing one quanta may be entangled with the Conscious Points in other quanta. It is this blending/bonding of quanta that makes the
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