Carlos Gershenson on Balance, Criticality, Antifragility, and The Philosophy of Complex Systems

How do we get a handle on complex systems thinking? What are the implications of this science for philosophy, and where does philosophical tradition foreshadow findings from the scientific frontier?

Welcome to COMPLEXITY, the official podcast of the Santa Fe Institute. I’m your host, Michael Garfield, and every other week we’ll bring you with us for far-ranging conversations with our worldwide network of rigorous researchers developing new frameworks to explain the deepest mysteries of the universe.

In this episode we speak with Carlos Gershenson (UNAM website, Google Scholar, Wikipedia, Twitter), SFI Sabbatical Visitor and professor of computer science at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, where he leads the Self-organizing Systems Lab, among many other titles you can find in our show notes. For the next hour, we’ll discuss his decades of research and writing on a vast array of core complex systems concepts and their intersections with both Western and Eastern philosophical traditions — a first for this podcast.

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Carlos publishes the Complexity Digest Newsletter.

His SFI Seminars to date:
A Brief History of Balance
Emergence, (Self)Organization, and Complexity
Criticality: A Balance Between Robustness and Adaptability
Festina lente (the slower-is-faster effect)
Antifragility: Dynamical Balance

W. Ross Ashby & The Law of Requisite Variety

Hyperobjects
by Timothy Morton

How can we think the complex?
by Carlos Gershenson and Francis Heylighen

The Implications of Interactions for Science and Philosophy
by Carlos Gershenson

Complexity and Philosophy
by Francis Heylighen, Paul Cilliers, Carlos Gershenson

Heterogeneity extends criticality
by Fernanda Sánchez-Puig, Octavio Zapata, Omar K, Pineda, Gerardo Iñiguez, and Carlos Gershenson

When Can we Call a System Self-organizing?
by Carlos Gershenson and Francis Heylighen

Temporal, Structural, and Functional Heterogeneities Extend Criticality and Antifragility in Random Boolean Networks
by Amahury Jafet López-Díaz, Fernanda Sánchez-Puig, and Carlos Gershenson

When slower is faster
by Carlos Gershenson, Dirk Helbing

Self-organization leads to supraoptimal performance in public transportation systems
by Carlos Gershenson

Dynamics of ranking
by Gerardo Iñiguez, Carlos Pineda, Carlos Gershenson, & Albert-László Barabási

Self-Organizing Traffic Lights
by Carlos Gershenson

Dynamic competition and resource partitioning during the early life of two widespread, abundant and ecologically similar fishes
by A. D. Nunn, L. H. Vickers, K. Mazik, J. D. Bolland, G. Peirson, S. N. Axford, A. Henshaw & I. G. Cowx

Towards a general theory of balance
by Carlos Gershenson

A Calculus for Self-Reference
by Francisco Varela

On Some Mental Effects of The Earthquake
by William James

Self-Organization Leads to Supraoptimal Performance in Public Transportation Systems
by Carlos Gershenson

Alison Gopnik on Child Development, Elderhood, Caregiving, and A.I.
Complexity Ep. 99

Simon DeDeo on Good Explanations & Diseases of Epistemology
Complexity Ep. 72

David Wolpert on The No Free Lunch Theorems and Why They Undermine The Scientific Method
Complexity Ep. 45

The Clock of the Long Now: Time and Responsibility
by Stewart Brand

Michael Lachmann

Stuart Kauffman

Andreas Wagner

Cosma Shalizi

Nassim Taleb

Does Free Will Violate The Laws of Physics?
Big Think interviews Sean Carroll