Kia ora e Dave

You say, "True complexity evolves and human cognitive capacity evolves with it. New technologies introduced progressively can be accommodated, humans co-evolve with their tools."

Are you really maintaining that this is so? I would refute this. I believe that complexity does evolve but that it can become too involved for human cognitive capacity to cope with it. This is principally because human cognitive capacity does not evolve that fast - nowhere near that fast.

Neither is it true that technologies introduced progressively can be accommodated through humans co-evolving (with their tools).

In fact, I'd go as far to say that in the past few decades, since before the collapse of the Soviet Union, we have witnessed many symptoms of human behaviour and action that suggests that there is a limit to human cognitive capacity where complexity is concerned. It's likely that this limit has been reached several times in the history of the evolution of civilisations.

Catchya later

Hi Dave

I don't agree with much of your position on this - and I do find that it contradicts some of your earlier blogs - eg. your effusion over Twitter - and then finding your 'new shiny lamp' in Tweetdecks - or whatever they were - in order to manage the complexity of your favourite new tool.

And when you say that "humans are very good in messy situatiuons" - and my immediate thought for some reason turned to the Great War. Hmmm - really? Are we humans so good at messy situations. Methinks not! I suspect your reason for saying this refers to a very limited domain.

PS I was wondering what device this blog entry was written on?

Ken
Obviously there is some limit to what can be absorbed but its a lot higher than most people realise. As we assimilate technology we can take on more, and create social processes around it that again increase our capacity to handle it. I'm not aware of evidence of reaching a limit in the past so you will have to give me some evidence there. For the moment I agree that you disagree but that that you have refuted it.

David
The whole point about enthusiasm for tools (Nambu by the way not Tweekdeck) is that they provide novelty and handle complexity. These are tools that are progressively adopted, changed etc. They form a part of extended sense-making. The language of your first paragraph is your own not mine (as is often the case with your comments). As to your second paragraph, sorry I find the point you are making obscure at best, incomprehensible at worst. As to the devices, it was an apple mac using Ecto, what relevance that has I have no idea, but you asked so you know.

What caught my attention was Dave's refrence to "navigating complexity" - I really think this is exactly what we we do - In an emergent world with a new reality emerging that may be different from thaty expected we need to navigate our way through the unexpected - South Africa is a country where there is constant unexpected and more often than not constantly emerging realities that come into play on all fronts and depending on the impact on the organisation executives need to navigate the organisation through all of this. The political and economic environment in partricular is very fluid and is a changing landscape with often very week soft signals if any.

I'm not sure if it's a language problem, but I'm appalled by the idea to "conquer complexity". Similar to "harness creativity" or "capture knowledge" - either the metaphors are poorly chosen, or, if those who use them really mean it, I find the ideas abusive, inhuman. Fortunately, my company is big enough that, if I meet such people, I can use the law of two feet, and find a better place.

I have recently become more interested in complexity theory because [1] I had the good fortune to hear a one-day presentation by David on a MBA module I took in the summer, and something just clicked and [2] I work in a company where the interim CEO has tried to implement ‘requisite organisation’ (the Elliot Jaques model) and I have had a hard time rebutting something that does not seems worthy of approbation. But as a novice in this area I struggle to understand whether the ‘requisite’ model is an attempt to overcome complexity, or merely navigate it effectively through aligning human cognition to the levels of complexity inherent in a given environment?

As a brief overview of ‘requisite’ Jaques’ work (seems to be) predicated on the idea that human beings possess in-born cognitive functions that allow them to deal with a certain amount of complexity (links in a chain, parallel chains, conflicting paradigms of parallel chains etc.) The ‘level’ of complexity can be measured or observed in the time horizon a human being works to: those capable of fulfilling orders one at a time and possessing a time horizons of a week or so have 0 stratum (the lowest) and those who have a time horizon of 50 years and whose cognitive functions allow them to handle the complexity inherent in such a context (or a series of multiple contexts) would be stratum 9 (the highest). In terms of measurement, an observer can only tell if the results of their work are right or wrong by judging their actions over that time period (e.g. was Ghandi’s or Churchill’s world outlook right 50 years on?)

Generally, a person is able to develop their cognitive abilities during their life to deal with greater complexity (i.e. this opportunity does not peak and decline after a certain age). But one is born with a ‘pre-programmed’ potential that cannot be transcended. Therefore, someone born with ‘stratum’ 1 cognitive predisposition to complexity can only ever develop stratum 1-3 cognitive abilities, whilst someone born at stratum 4 can develop stratums 4-8.

In an organisational context, stratums (according to Jaques and his followers) should inform the hierarchical model (and hierarchy is seen as a naturally occurring structure in nature). A person of high stratum (and assuming s/he possess relevant knowledge, skills, experience and motivations) should be in a ‘higher’ role as s/he has a longer planning horizon, ‘sees’ more complexity than ‘lower stratum’ subordinates and will likely make better decisions. Also ‘lower stratums’ will more readily accept subordinate roles as they will recognise this natural leader who will use their gifts to help the lesser beings handle their own challenges – the result is a more harmonious, happy and successful organisation.

Many people seem to have had difficulty with the first class/second class citizen overtones – man is not born equal in this model. But my issues with it (aside from its utopian nature) have been the following:

1. Can one really judge innate cognitive functions geared towards dealing with complexity? We were put through a case study with a list of questions which were then hand-marked and analysed by ‘experts’ who looked for our demonstrable ability to express ourselves and recognise the complexity in the case.
2. Doesn’t context matter more than the Jaques’ theory proposes – e.g. is a pilot of an aircraft automatically a low stratum because serious errors on his/her part would have immediate consequences that would be observed?
3. Would certain ‘transition’ countries (e.g. where I live - Russia) ‘compel’ actors on its stage to have shorter time horizons – not only is there less stability in the political and legislative system compared to ‘established’ economies like the U.K. or the U.S. but the turbulent history of the last 25 years makes people more aware of exogenous risk and their inability to change this and so act less inclined to ‘tempt fate’

If complexity cannot be conquered, only navigated, does anyone accept that the Jaques view - that some people are innately more capable of leading us forward - completely fails to take into consideration the rapid disintermediation going on in modern civilisation, the results or developments of which cannot be seen too far ahead. Therefore, a 'scientific management religion’ based on modern-day complexity ‘supermen’ (and women) not only reeks of man’s arrogance to change things (by masters running hierarchies of sub servants) but also ignores much of what I believe cognitive edge is trying to communicate.

@Marcus - than's a one-dimensional, hierarchical elitist "wise experts in complexity know best" model. And the model assumes that there is a (ontologicaly pre-existing, just yet unknown) way to best design the organization, and that real-word problems are only the effect of ill-fitting structures which can be fixed (by the wise experts). #dontlike.

Tēna koe e Dave

Thanks for your response. There is a wealth of findings arriving that suggest that despite the idea of multi-tasking being a recent development (especially in the younger generations as is claimed by Marc Prensky) it doesn't actually happen. The myth of multi-tasking, and other ideas that suggest human brain evolution over a few decades as a result of the use of new digital technologies, is being exploded by findings that suggest limits to cognitive function rather than its expansion.

The collapse of the Soviet Union is a classic example of a complexity system that met its demise through cognitive failure of one description or another. Perhaps the fall of the Roman Empire is similar. There are many mathematical similarities between these two complexity systems that I won't elaborate on here.

I see America as a society that could go the same way and for the same reasons. Despite modern technological advancement, the human brain and it's cognitive capacity to cope with ever increasing complexity within society has not changed much in the past several thousand years.

That's not to say that I believe it's not fixable. I think a closer study of complexity may well assist humankind to navigate the future successfully.

The evidence on multi-tasking is that it has not greatly increased and that we have similar capacity. However this is an area fraught with issues of definition. If you look at the various tasks involved with driving then they are many and various. Many of them are autonomic. As systems build around us, we create autonomic capability which expands what we can cope with (which is the point I was making). We can easily adapt that to a digital environment, especially as we shift to augmentation. Symbols, visual representations etc. all increase our capability, using cognitive capacity better. I'd argue that we don;t even approach using what were are capable of achieving.

I don;t see why the Soviet Union is an example of a complex system. Its an example of an over-constrained system that suffered catastrophic failure. All Empires reach a point where they can no longer sustain themselves and the US will go the same way. I don;t think that is anything to do with complexity per se.

Agree on the study of complexity

During 12 days in Italy (Rome, Florence, Lucca) in Nov09 I was constantly reminded of the extreme complexity handled easily by those traversing the Swindon Roundabout and further exemplified by the complex driving habits exhibited by Italians. The road is shared by cars, buses, motorcycles, pedestrians, trucks. There are perhaps 90 percent fewer traffic signals that we are used to in the States.

During numerous taxi drives Dave's description of the IBM senior execs who either froze up or drifted around the outsides of the Magic Roundabout in Swindon frequently came to mind. Individuals constantly handled complex decision making in which inches separated vehicles and pedestrians. Crossing a road means you start out in a crosswalk and expect drivers to stop. They will - as long as you stick to your original decision. Indecision is not easily forgiven or absorbed. It truly is a complex system in which the agents and the system constantly interact and evolve during the millions of independent decisions that actually increase the throughput rather than reductionist thinking exhibited in the form of massive traffic signals.

Humans can navigate lots of complexity and it is extremely disconcerting to see the US government reverting to command and control, top down decision making with health care and many other proposals. People are not dumb but can be dumbed down by schools (read John Taylor Gatto) and by a pathetic excuse for news media in the States (cable news and major newspapers) and a government that insists only it can pick winners and losers in every field.