Values as emergent dynamics of complex systems

Freedom, Democracy, Justice: Isolated Nouns or Interwoven Verbs? (Part #9)

The implicit locus in geometrical terms can be related to the development of insights into complex system dynamics "governed" by strange attractors. This suggests that the subtlety of what is strangely "attractive" about values might be fruitfully explored in this light, as noted above (Human Values as Strange Attractors: Coevolution of classes of governance principles, 1993). Again this stresses that values are systemically defined -- dynamically.

Hector Sabelli (Non-linear dynamics as a dialectic logic. Proc. International Systems Society, 1995) notes that:

Standard logic neglects actions by reducing all verbs to the copula "to be", and further, interpreting "to be" in a static sense, although it is obviously possible to model mathematically other verbs via logical relations; action verbs may also be modeled by different types of catastrophes.

From a system dynamics perspective, an attractor is a set towards which a dynamical system evolves over time. This could be understood as offering the kind of description of the progressive convergence of any psychosocial system -- or civilization -- whose dynamics are effectively "guided" by an elusive value (complex), perhaps only to be recognized through hindsight (possibly in centuries to come). This language is especially appropriate given that a major achievement of chaos theory has been the recognition of strange attractors. Few would dispute that the evident chaos of social organization acquires a surprising degree of coherence (of a higher order) primarily through the role of human values -- hence appropriately explored as strange attractors.

Further to the point made above that a sense of "value" is implicit in any capacity to perceive a "problem", especially relevant is how a psychosocial crisis is to be understood. The cognitive confusion associated with a crisis, or any emergent "crisis of crises", suggests a curious complementarity with subtler and more integrative values understood as strange attractors. The use of "hurricane" (with its metaphorical "eye") in descriptions of the recent financial crisis is appropriate recognition of the dynamic nature of the crisis. Are such "wicked problems" to be better understood as strange repulsors? Is it specifically the cyclic dynamic of such problems that is so challenging -- especially when the remedy is framed as reverting to the previous state (Dysfunctional Cycles and Spirals: web resources on "breaking the cycle", 2002)?

The point to be stressed is that comprehension of such strange attractors is readily distorted and oversimplified to a problematic degree by conventional use of nouns like "democracy" or "freedom". These do not honour the subtle dynamic with which value apprehension resonates and by which it is attracted. Appropriately the attractiveness is better represented visually or through patterns of sound. Visual renderings of attractors raise the question as to whether conventional values should not be represented in this way rather than through text (Experimental Visualization of Networks: world problems, international organizations, global strategies and human values, 2007).

Many images of strange attractors are offered by Chris Lucas (Strange Attractors and Society, 2005; Attractors Everywhere: order from chaos, 2004) who develops arguments of relevance to that made here. A set of images of strange attractors is also offered on the Wolfram MathWorld site with indication of parameters by which they were generated..

Selection of visual renderings of strange attractors

A particular merit of this approach is that it highlights the need to relate a value to the system dynamics through which it might be implemented in practice or from which it might emerge -- if only progressively. Rather than endeavouring to encompass a value by quantitative indicators (and standard graphs), the question is whether indication of values could be rendered more appropriately and meaningfully by elegant patterns more consistent with their implications -- an analogue model rather than a digital representation in computer simulation terms. As attractive symbols these could prove to be more widely comprehensible across cultures -- inviting consensus where misunderstanding could otherwise prevail.

Patterns of this form are standard fare in the testing of electrical and electronic equipment -- through the use of oscilloscopes.

Examples of characteristic oscilloscope patterns (reproduced from Wikipedia entry)
Heterodyne	AC hum on sound	Sum of a low-frequency and a high-frequency signal	Bad filter on sine	Dual trace, different time bases on each trace

Characteristic patterns are used to recognize problems in electrical circuits. It might be asked, if values are to be more appropriately understood in cyclical terms, whether characteristic value problems could be detected from such visual renderings -- problems otherwise obscured by standard statistical graphs. Of particular interest is whether subtler forms of violence -- as "anti-values" -- could be detectable in this way. Those associated with structural violence, cultural violence or symbolic violence might lend themselves to such renderings.

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Values as emergent dynamics of complex systems