I’m often asked what exactly I’m working on here. Though the “exactly” part makes it hard to answer, I’m getting closer.
It’s an approach based on the assumption that there are deep similarities among complex systems in spite of the superficial differences among them — and, moreover, that we can learn about one system from knowledge about another.
For instance, we find a division of labor in all of: the human body, the brain, corporations, computer hardware, computer software, and the world itself. Do all of these also suffer from bureaucracy? What would bureaucracy in the human body look like?
There are democratic governments and dictatorial governments. Are there also people whose internal functioning is democratic or dictatorial?
Exercise is good for the body. Could it be good for corporations, too?
It turns out that the current worldwide break caused by social isolation is beneficial in some ways both to the earth (less pollution) and to people (less illness), though it’s extremely detrimental in all sorts of other ways. It is possible that, for similar reasons, animals and people sleep?
Computers have layers upon layers of protocols, many of which come together to form a message. Therefore, to decode a message one has to know the right protocols — from ASCII, for instance, to TCP/IP, and on up to HTTP, and beyond. One has to know, for example, that “port 80” corresponds to HTTP. To someone who doesn’t know the protocols, there’s just an incomprehensible stream of bits. Does the brain have ports? Maybe. Does it have layers upon layers of protocols? I’m convinced that it does.
So that’s the kind of thing I’m doing.
I think.