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Forum #1 - Thursday, January 18, 2007
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Science, Kind of New
The study of complex systems or complexity theory has explored many aspects of non-linearity in systems we observe daily. The weather is a system which is not random but complex; the underlying processes that define it may provide ways to predict it fairly well when the prediction is not too far in the future. Complex systems are very susceptible to initial conditions and they unfold or develop in unpredictable ways but they are not random. A model that has been used to study complexity is the Cellular Automata. It has been shown that although CAs follow very simple and deterministic rules, they may show complex behavior. Despite the simplicity of the CAs, studying their properties has not always been straightforward. The present study shows some results that seemed unlikely not too long ago. The complexity displayed in the CAs might come from simple and monotone functions and these primitives may provide a possible peek into complexity shown in many complex systems. This work started from ideas presented by Stephen
Wolfram in his book A New Kind of Science and by personal conversations with him.
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