The world that exists for us, the universe in which we live, is suitable for complex systems to develop in it, for complexity to exist. Thi...
The world that exists for us, the universe in which we live, is suitable for complex systems to develop in it, for complexity to exist. This property of the universe is not trivial, it is easy to imagine a world in which complexity does not exist. There are necessary conditions for the existence of complexity.
Our universe is like that. We are surrounded by complex structures, we ourselves are complex systems, and certainly other places in the universe are suitable for the existence of complex systems.
When experiencing complexity, the question arises: is there a limit to complexity?
Our universe, as a material system, definitely has boundaries in space and time, which apparently also limits complexity. However, complexity is not only an extensive feature, the increase in complexity is not only possible by connecting new and new components to a structure. Complexity is also an intensive feature, a finite number of components can form an increasingly complex system, in such a way that more and more types of connections, interactions, relationships are created between the components and participate in the formation of the complex system.
Considering the intensive nature of complexity, it is also possible that there is no limit to the growth of complexity. However, given the finite nature of our material world, it could be argued that there may be a theoretical upper limit to complexity when everything in the universe is already connected to everything else in every possible way. The counterpoint to this argument is that, because of the intensive nature of complexity, new emergent properties of newly created complex systems may also appear, and therefore there may always be new opportunities for complexity to grow.
There are also speculations that in the universe everything can be connected to everything through the quantum phenomenon of entanglement, hence everything is already connected to everything else, and so the universe forms a single complex system. Although entanglement is a special relationship with strict conditions, this state is potentially a possibility for our world, and the universe may have been, and may will be in such a state.
Whichever argument is correct, what seems certain is that our universe is far from reaching the upper limit of its possible practical complexity, just as in our human environment we can see that new and new complex systems are being formed and the level of complexity can also increase. The complexity of our world is currently continuously increasing.
What is the significance of thinking about the limits of complexity, why is it interesting to where complexity can increase?
It is worth thinking about the limits of complexity because intelligence, the problem-solving ability, is also the result of complexity, for example, in humans, the intelligent brain is the product of the complexity of neurons. Complexity and intelligence are related. When we think about the limits of complexity, we are also trying to define the possible maximum of intelligence. The upper limit of complexity is an interesting question because of the level of intelligence.
It is a well-known statement that the most complex system in the world we know is the human brain. The statement is certainly not true. First of all, it is not true not because there is no reason why more advanced intelligence and more complex brains cannot exist elsewhere, but because we ourselves have already advanced beyond the complexity of the human brain. No, it is not the complexity of computers and computer networks that has surpassed the complexity of the human brain, they are still behind the human brain in terms of both the intensive and the extensive nature of complexity.
Human cooperation creates an increasingly complex system, leading to an increasingly complex society. As a community, we form ever more complex systems, and we operate in an increasingly complex way. The intelligence achieved by the collective complexity of the human community, of human society, has already surpassed the complexity of the individual human brain.
Seemingly the complexity of human society is no greater than the complexity of the individual human brain, the degree of complexity of the neurons in the human brain. Yet the human community, human society, is capable of solving more complex tasks than a single individual. A single human being is incapable of inventing and creating airplanes, spaceships, computers, the Internet. Almost all the products, functions and achievements of society can only be achieved by the community, not only physically, but also as a collective intellectual achievement. The performance of the complexity of human society has long surpassed the performance of the complexity of the individual human brain.
What does the degree of complexity of a system depend on?
The measures that determine the complexity of systems:
- the number of components,
- the number of connections between components,
- the variety of relationships between components, which is related to the complexity of the components.
The characteristics that determine the degree of complexity apply to all complex systems.
Human society is a more complex structure, and it has a higher level of intelligence than the human brain, because the variety of relationships between people is orders of magnitude greater than the variety of relationships between neurons, which comes from the difference between the complexity of the human brain and the complexity of the neuron.
Is there, can there be an upper limit to complexity, and with it to intelligence, to problem-solving ability?
It certainly seems true that more and more complex structures are emerging in the world, complexity is increasing. But why can the complexity of the universe increase at all?
The development of complexity requires more and more components to be connected in new and new ways through possible interactions. Our universe is such that it allows this. Complexity can grow in the universe because and as long as the universe exists, there is movement and change in it. The formation of complexity takes place over time. It wasn't always like that in the world, and certainly won't always be like that in the future.
Why are the formed complex systems able to survive?
The structure of complex systems can be characterized by the strength of the coupling resulting from the interaction between the constituent parts. This is characteristic of any complex system, hence characteristic even of human society, related to the virtual force that holds society together. If the system is subjected to greater forces than the apparent coupling, the connections break down and the complexity weakens. The complex system can break down in this way, and the universe provides countless opportunities for the dissolution of complexity. However, the higher the level of complexity, the more and more complex the relations created by the interactions of the components form the system, the more resistant the structure becomes to the forces affecting the system.
Although human society, the most advanced complex system known to us, appears to be fragile, and we ourselves are striving to apply forces that will cause it to break down and collapse, is in fact extremely resilient, and its resilience is increasing with time, with increasing complexity.
The resilience of human society is determined on the one hand by the number of people who build society, the extent and quantity of relationships between people, but most fundamentally by the diversity of relationships based on the complexity of the building blocks, the people, which is primarily related to the knowledge of people.
As complexity increases, the system's resistance to the effects that cause the structure to break up increases. This seems to contradict the obvious consequence of increasing complexity, that the more complex a system is, the more ways it can be attacked, the more vulnerable it is, the more sensitive it becomes to influences. The sensitivity of the system does indeed increase, but the robustness of the system also increases as complexity increases. The resilience and collapse of complex systems are governed by specific laws.
Due to the consequential increase in the resilience characteristic of complex systems, complexity is potentially able to continuously persist and thereby evolve continuously. Human society, even though it appears vulnerable, is extremely robust, and its robustness increases with increasing complexity, i.e. with time. Humanity is also increasingly resistant to changes that threaten its complexity, and the longer it exists, the longer it can exist, humanity as a living system is potentially immortal.
Evolution is a unique mechanism by which complexity increases. Although the operating mechanism of evolution is essentially to adapt to a changing environment, without a specific goal and therefore without a specific direction, the evolution we experience has a specific direction. It is an obvious fact that increasingly complex systems are created through evolution on Earth. Why can evolution increase the complexity of the system?
In an earlier thought it was stated that any evolutionary system that can store information, the process of evolution will collect information, and by doing so such evolution will form increasingly complex structures, so the adaptive operation of evolution will have direction, such an evolutionary system develops.
Such an evolutionary system is, for example, the biological evolution, because DNA can store information, and human society is also such a non-biological evolutionary system, which is able to collect information by recording information using writing, and with the help of this ability it functions in an increasingly complex form.
Individual human intelligence is limited by the finite size of the brain, but the collective intelligence of a potentially unlimited society is potentially unlimited.
In practice also, we experience that humanity is constantly developing. But we also see that the societies formed by human communities live a cyclical life, forming, developing, and ending. As if the collapse of societies would be a necessarily inevitable part of the life of societies.
All living systems, including societies, are based on the use of resources. Seemingly, the increase in the complexity of societies necessarily causes the exhaustion of resources and, as a consequence, the inevitable collapse.
The phenomenon can be observed, but it is also a fact that the development of humanity, the complexity of human society, is increasing, if not necessarily in a strictly continuous manner. How can the two contradictory phenomena be reconciled?
For living species in general, the phenomenon of collapse due to resource depletion applies. But humanity is a special species because it has intelligence and the capacity for directed evolution.
Although resource depletion is ongoing, and humanity has so far been unable, and even if theoretically possible, seems deterministically unable to live in equilibrium with its environment, humanity's potential capabilities with the increase in complexity also increase, and the help of directed evolution which is more efficient than natural evolution for adaptation to use newer and newer environmental endowments as resources, humankind able to avoid the necessary collapse resulting from the exhaustion of resources.
The development of humanity is accompanied by the fact that we use more and more resources that exist in finite quantities, but with the growth of human knowledge we are able to use more and more new ones. It is the growth of shared knowledge that potentially enables us to avoid the collapse that results from resource depletion.
However, this is not only an ability, but also must be a condition. In a society in which knowledge cannot grow sufficiently, in which the functioning of society is an obstacle to knowledge and creativity and is therefore not based on the free thinking of people, an extensive growth of complexity may lead to the exhaustion of resources and lead to an inevitable collapse. This is the characteristic and fate of authoritarian regimes. Since the history of mankind is full of authoritarian societies, it is not surprising that the phenomenon of the collapse of societies seems to be a law.
However, there can be an effective human society, without the limitation of problem solving, which operates freely and is continuously capable of renewal. Humanity has so far avoided total collapse. With the help of a common governance system of a society that allows free thinking, humanity can become continuously developing, increasingly complex, and potentially immortal.
Due to the intensive nature of the complexity, with modular and hierarchical organization, there is no practical limit to the increase in complexity. There seems to be no limit to the development of complex systems, yet the development of complexity is not just a linear process. There are also levels, qualitative leaps and steps in the growth of complexity, which, when reached, enable the development of new, emergent properties and the appearance of a qualitatively new form of complexity. Such a step was the formation of the living cell from molecules, the formation of the multicellular organism from individual cells, and such a step was the emergence of human intelligence through the cooperation of neurons with the right number and sufficient connections.
We humans are now creating a next stage of complexity, a complex society of intelligent individuals, which is now evolving through directed evolution.
What are the new, defining emergent properties of a human society entering a qualitatively new stage of complexity? Perhaps the most defining emergent property of human society will be its ability to leave the constraints of biological form and be able to become independent from the terrestrial biosphere.
The complexity of human society is the pinnacle of complexity as we know it, and this statement is certainly valid from the perspective of humanity. However, intelligent societies may have evolved elsewhere and may have reached the level of independence from the environment necessary for the development of the individuals that create the society. If such societies already exist, the cooperation of these societies may further increase the level of complexity, their cooperation may create a new qualitative level of complexity with emergent properties as yet unforeseeable for us.
In the world, peak complexity is constantly evolving through intelligence, which has no apparent limit. A new level of the increase in complexity, a qualitative step, is the appearance of the ability to create and form new things. The intelligence created by complexity is already capable of creation, capable of creating new things. We humans are capable of creating something that did not exist before. The ability to create is also an emergent quality of complexity, which can be defined as a divine attribute. The creative, divinely definable state is a qualitative step in the growth of complexity.
However, there is no practical limit to the growth of complexity, so the creative divine state is perhaps only a stepping stone of the growth of complexity. How can the development of complexity continue after the divine state, what could be the qualitatively new, next stage of complexity?
Generally, a next, qualitatively new stage of complexity is created when a sufficient number of existing complex systems establish a sufficient number of connections to each other to allow new emergent properties to appear in the resulting structure. The complexity that exists in the universe has evolved in this way and will continue to do so. The interaction of complex systems with the property of creation creates new emergent properties for the creative state. Perhaps one of these is the creation of a new, created world in which the creator itself can exist.
The goal of science is to find a natural way for our universe to be tuned to life. However, a created universe attuned to life also can be a natural result of the world's seemingly limitless growth of complexity. The creative divine state is a natural result of the increase in complexity, and a created world can also be a natural consequence of the increase of complexity.
Of course, all this speculation does not solve the fundamental question of the origin, it only pushes it further, even into an unforeseeable distance. But it is also possible that we are the first, or among the first, to have a long way to go in the evolution of complexity, and who are also given the opportunity to search for the original origin.
Whatever our past is, we are in a special state, and fate has given us a special opportunity to create our future. Let's try to live with it.
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