w. brian arthur - computer action teamweb.cecs.pdx.edu/~mm/scmay2011/arthurslides.pdf · sfi short...

SFI Short Course, May 25, 2011

W. Brian Arthur

External Professor, Santa Fe Institute

and Intelligent Systems Lab, PARC

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Are there principles common to technologies?

What really is technology?

How do invention, and innovation, work?

Is there a theory of evolution for technology?

How does the economy arise out of its technologies?

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Technology = Means to a purpose

Like an organism it has subparts

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Technology = Means to a purpose

Like an organism it has subparts ! ! These too are means to purposes!

! !=> A technology is recursive, fractal-like!

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Technology = Means to a purpose

Like an organism it has subparts ! ! These too are means to purposes!

! !=> A technology is recursive, fractal-like!

It exploits at least one phenomenon

!A technology is an orchestration of phenomena!

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An element consists of other elements (subparts and subassemblies) [complexity]

Elements (techs) can add and lose these ad libitum, recursively

Each new “element” becomes available as a potential part or subpart

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Calls for a theory of evolution for the “mechanical kingdom” that would explain “that part among machines which natural selection has per-formed among the animal and vegetable kingdoms”

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Radically novel technologies arrive abruptly, not as a result of accumulation of incremental changes

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“To produce means to combine materials and forces within our reach. To produce other things means to combine these materials and forces differently.”

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William Fielding OgburnSocial Change, 1922

“It would seem that the larger theequipment of material culture, thegreater the number of inventions.The more there is to invent with,the greater will be th e number of

inventions. When the existingmaterial culture is small,embracing a stone technique and aknowledge of skins and somewoodwork, the number ofinventions is more limited thanwhen the culture consists of aknowledge of a variety of m etalsand chemicals and the use ofsteam, electricity, and variousmechanical principles such as thescrew, the wheel, the lever, thepiston, belts, pulleys, etc. Thestreet car could not h ave beeninvented from the material cultureexisting at the last glacial period.The discovery of the power ofsteam and the mechanicaltechnology existing at the timemade possible a l arge number ofinventions.”

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Novel technologies are constructed from existing technologies

… These offer themselves as components—building blocks for the construction of further technologies

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Novel technologies are constructed from existing technologies and from capturing phenomena

… These offer themselves as components—building blocks for the construction of further technologies

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Technology is autopoietic or self-creating:

–  New elements build from existing ones !

–  Complication builds from simplicity!

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1. Novel element forms as combination from existing elements. Accepted if provides a needed functionality, and is technically and economically viable

2. Novel element replaces techs and components with similar functionality across the collective

3. Adds to the substrate of elements to construct from

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4. Novel element generates new needs - for supporting methods and arrangements !- for methods to overcome limitations !- for techs to broaden functionalities !

5. New element destroys replaced technologies’ niches for their dependent technologies

6. The economy adjusts to these steps

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“In our universe, matter is arranged in a hierarchy of structures by successive integrations. Whether inanimate or living, the objects found on earth are always organizations or systems. Each system at a given level uses as its ingredients some systems from the simpler level. … The great diversity of vertebrates results from differences in the arrangement, in the number and distribution, of these few [building blocks].”

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•  Biological: –  Darwinian variation and selection !–  accumulation of incremental changes!–  But … occasional combinations!

•  Technological: –  Combinatorial evolution!–  Abrupt, self-augmenting !–  With much Darwinian evolution once a technology exists!

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The economy “adopts” new technologies and

becomes more productive

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Textile machinery

Railroads

Electrical

Electronics

Digital, telecommunications

Genetic engineering

Nanotech

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•  Are toolboxes, they arrive, build out

•  Form new industries

•  Profoundly change the economy or better, create it anew!

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Doesn’t adopt the new domain, it encounters it

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Doesn’t adopt the new domain, it encounters it

Functionalities from the economy and from the new domain combine to form new ones ! !- E.g. banking !! !- CGI in movies!

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The economy wells up from its new domains

It thereby forms and re-forms itself

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1.  Putting together new solutions out of existing toolboxes

2.  Industries constantly combining their practices with functionalities drawn from newly arriving toolboxes

! This is much more important, creates new sub-industries!

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Three overall observations!

1.  Technology is vast “chemistry” of functionalities, that in combination give rise to further functionalities

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Three overall observations!

1.  Technology is vast “chemistry” of functionalities, that in combination give rise to further functionalities

2.  Complexity: The system creates itself [new elements] out of itself

! ! ! !(Technology is organic, and “alive”)!

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Three overall observations!

1.  Technology is vast “chemistry” of functionalities, that in combination give rise to further functionalities

2.  Complexity: The system creates itself [new elements] out of itself

! ! ! !(Technology is organic, and “alive”)!

3.  The economy doesn’t adopt new technologies. It re-forms, re-creates, re-makes itself constantly, as it encounters new bodies of technology

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