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Ann - I started to write one of my arbitrarily long and excruciatingly detailed responses to this and to your Seminar invitation. In fact, I did write it and then decided to try to write a concise summary instead. We'll see how that turns out (the first missive, just deleted, was about 5 screens worth, just for comparison). You have most of us at a disadvantage. While no two of us on this list are likely to agree on the details of much of anything, I think we all have differing levels of understanding and agreement on what we mean by Complex Systems (capitalization is mine). Despite these differences, most of us are roughly talking about the same concept, albeit in widely varying domains and with varying preferred formalisms and tools for simulating, generating, and studying them. I'm not sure we know what your ideas on the topic are, or if we are talking about the same thing. I think you may mean something different than I do when you say "complex system". It is evidenced both in your specific phrasing of "systems (complex)" and in the way I've heard you use the term. In particular, I don't think the phrase "creating a Complex System" is even a sensible phrase. In my use of the term, a Complex System is a system whose qualitative complexity arises or emerges, often out of a relatively simple (quantitatively not-complex) system. Created systems may be quantitatively simple or complex (by many measures) but the very definition of a Complex System in the sense that I use the term is that its qualitative complexity could not be designed, created, or even predicted in any detail. So I would never say that science nor art creates a Complex System though I would have to agree that many systems used by science (not created by science per se, but rather created by scientists in pursuit of understanding) are quantitatively complex, and that many types of artistic endeavors as I know them may create or generate quite quantitatively complex systems. I suppose, one could view what I call Complex Systems as having artistic value or interest, but I would have a hard time saying that the artist created these systems, and more to the point, certainly not saying that the artist created the exhibited Complexity in them. In the spirit of our former, former President, perhaps this depends on what create means. From some of the discussions I have observed you having during sfX presentations, I think you may mean something different by create, than I do. If I were to be pressed on the topic, I suppose I would often use the term discover when you would use create. This is germane to the question you pose about "how people should be rewarded for what they know". Since I don't think knowledge can be created, only discovered, it is hard for me to think of there being any absolute or intrinsic value to what I (or anyone else) might know at a given time. In a relative, context, I might know something that you do not, that you find useful and we might agree to exchange some other form of value for that knowledge, but I would not begrudge you the possibility of arriving at that knowing some other way (like discovering it yourself or having someone else share their own discovery with you). I might hold all kinds of knowledge which I might never be rewarded for. I might choose to share as freely as possible all knowledge I hold. So the notion that knowledge itself could have intrinsic value and the holder of the knowledge can have any specific expectation of reward is a little foreign to me. I know that in the pragmatic world, that secrets can be valuable, and their value can be realized both by holding them close and by sharing them selectively or broadly. I think before most of us would want to have a public discussion/debate/conversation (on air, in a very short time interval) on a topic, we would like to have some idea of the opposing viewpoint we are discussing/debating/conversing-about. You and I have had a number of very pleasant discussions online and in-person, and I've browsed through your World Knowledge Bank, but I do not yet have a sense of what your position (or what you refer to as a "differing opinion") is. Perhaps you have written some kind of position paper that would introduce us to your ideas and how they contrast with those which you believe you have fundamental philosophical differences with? I went to World Knowledge Bank tonight to see what you might have there on the topic, but alas, it seemed to be having technical difficulties. If there is such a description there (or elsewhere) please point me to it. I think something of the same nature (a concise description of the position you hold and how it contrasts with the positions you differ with) would help prepare folks considering your seminar series to decide if it is of interest to us, and to help us come up to speed on your ideas more easily. Anyone who has read this far in my "concise summary" is clearly a patient reader, and would likely find the same patience with reading any new way of thinking about complex systems and how we value knowledge and reward those who hold it, that you might offer. - Steve
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