In 1988, Joseph Tainter published “The Collapse of Complex Societies,” in which he published a prescient and simple argument with far-reaching implications:
1) Social complexity is a problem-solving mechanism.
2) Complexity has costs in terms of energy.
3) Societies tend to add rather than subtract complexity when facing new problems.
4) Complexity often reaches a point of diminishing marginal returns in relation to its energy costs.
5) When societies reach this point of diminishing returns, they are vulnerable to collapse to a simpler level of social organization, which is an economizing reaction to problems that can no longer be solved by adding more complexity.
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Makes sense from a human-ecology point of view (which was trendy in 1980s),
but that thread is rather fatalistic - a more useful question is what can we do about this ?
As a software developer, I’m also aware that there can be diminishing returns to increasing complexity and feedbacks, on the other hand more feedbacks can add extra powers and resilience, how to stabilise with a good balance ?
The difference between the complexity of software inputs versus complexity in problem solving the real world systems is the energy and infrastructure it takes in the real world.
Joseph Tainter had a really interesting paper about how real world costs rise in an extremely non linear way after a certain threshold.
" It is not a question of expending a lot of energy to discover “more efficient” ways to do these things - that process amplifies the decline. "
So you imply there is a balance point, but what’s clear is that complexity in one area actually reduces resources in the other areas and drags lower the external standards to whatever problem you put a focus on.
So backing out and taking another look at this, the solution of adding any complexity in any area actually makes higher problems. More complexity in one area removes the existing complexity in another, complexity is constrained.
Foe example, the more software we make, the less talent, energy, money and resources go into, say, health care or food production…investments are finite.
People discover the big easy things first, then it costs more and more to make smaller and less useful advancements…the figures and graphs in this paper tell an amazing story. Society is paying more and more for all these failing sectors.
…
Yes, indeed there is always going to be a balance point, with most tasks in life. Thinking is hard, more effort devoted to one topic is less for another. But we can also get into a bigger mess by trying to tell people simple answers to complex problems.
Actually to be more specific I’m a climate-system model developer, it’s intrinsically a very complex problem, so I try to develop software to help people learn by experiment, and balance choices. You can see my current efforts here. Maybe it’s already too complex for some, too simple for others, I’m still trying to fill the gaps.
Human ecology is the study of how humans are shaped by their environment. Would you say the premise of the classic 2006 Mike Judge film Idiocracy is an application of human-ecology?
I consider Human Ecology as the concepts of ecology (including energy, system feedbacks etc.) applied to human society and all that depends on - which is broader than your description. I recall the activities of CHE in Edinburgh in the 1990s. However there are diverse interpretations, also the word ecology has different nuance in different languages (e.g. is used more broadly in french).
a more useful question is what can we do about this ?
Why is that more useful ? We (as a species) cant do anything about it, we haven’t evolved enough. If we had we wouldn’t be where we are.
That’s becase societal collpase is a behavioural problem, not an engineering one.
Surley the answer is collapse, like every civilization has collapsed…
We’ve not evolved to live in complex hierarchical societies for long, they always fail. We’ve evokved to live in non hericaheacial tribes. That worked for the first several hundred thosand years before we tried something else… and keep failing at it, over and over. maybe were literally insane ?
I don’t agree with this, the answer is not collapse.
To me complexity is beautiful, creating and maintaining complexity is the essence of what it is to be alive.
Although I’m no fan of hierarchy or big capital, there are better systems for organising, balancing feedbacks, and we need to keep thinking about ways to do this (which is why we’re here on lemmy).
While medieval societies based more on tribal loyalty were more unequal and hierarchical than modern ones, as well as sustaining far fewer people until the next famine or pandemic.
Makes sense from a human-ecology point of view (which was trendy in 1980s),
but that thread is rather fatalistic - a more useful question is what can we do about this ?
As a software developer, I’m also aware that there can be diminishing returns to increasing complexity and feedbacks, on the other hand more feedbacks can add extra powers and resilience, how to stabilise with a good balance ?
The difference between the complexity of software inputs versus complexity in problem solving the real world systems is the energy and infrastructure it takes in the real world.
Joseph Tainter had a really interesting paper about how real world costs rise in an extremely non linear way after a certain threshold.
" It is not a question of expending a lot of energy to discover “more efficient” ways to do these things - that process amplifies the decline. "
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complexity,_Problem_Solving,_and_Sustainable_Societies
So you imply there is a balance point, but what’s clear is that complexity in one area actually reduces resources in the other areas and drags lower the external standards to whatever problem you put a focus on.
So backing out and taking another look at this, the solution of adding any complexity in any area actually makes higher problems. More complexity in one area removes the existing complexity in another, complexity is constrained.
Foe example, the more software we make, the less talent, energy, money and resources go into, say, health care or food production…investments are finite.
This is an interesting paper by Tainter, its about how science and innovation and technology have diminishing returns on investment: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/sres.1057
People discover the big easy things first, then it costs more and more to make smaller and less useful advancements…the figures and graphs in this paper tell an amazing story. Society is paying more and more for all these failing sectors. …
Yes, indeed there is always going to be a balance point, with most tasks in life. Thinking is hard, more effort devoted to one topic is less for another. But we can also get into a bigger mess by trying to tell people simple answers to complex problems.
Actually to be more specific I’m a climate-system model developer, it’s intrinsically a very complex problem, so I try to develop software to help people learn by experiment, and balance choices. You can see my current efforts here. Maybe it’s already too complex for some, too simple for others, I’m still trying to fill the gaps.
Human ecology is the study of how humans are shaped by their environment. Would you say the premise of the classic 2006 Mike Judge film Idiocracy is an application of human-ecology?
I consider Human Ecology as the concepts of ecology (including energy, system feedbacks etc.) applied to human society and all that depends on - which is broader than your description. I recall the activities of CHE in Edinburgh in the 1990s. However there are diverse interpretations, also the word ecology has different nuance in different languages (e.g. is used more broadly in french).
Why is that more useful ? We (as a species) cant do anything about it, we haven’t evolved enough. If we had we wouldn’t be where we are.
That’s becase societal collpase is a behavioural problem, not an engineering one.
Surley the answer is collapse, like every civilization has collapsed…
We’ve not evolved to live in complex hierarchical societies for long, they always fail. We’ve evokved to live in non hericaheacial tribes. That worked for the first several hundred thosand years before we tried something else… and keep failing at it, over and over. maybe were literally insane ?
I don’t agree with this, the answer is not collapse. To me complexity is beautiful, creating and maintaining complexity is the essence of what it is to be alive. Although I’m no fan of hierarchy or big capital, there are better systems for organising, balancing feedbacks, and we need to keep thinking about ways to do this (which is why we’re here on lemmy).
While medieval societies based more on tribal loyalty were more unequal and hierarchical than modern ones, as well as sustaining far fewer people until the next famine or pandemic.