- Topics: [[Perspective]], [[Problem-solving]] - Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vr_4VHQFbr0 --- ## Summary - Self organization is a process occurs when a system grows. It doesn't just get bigger, but also more complex. - Complexity comes from the parts within the system becoming more specialized and tightly integrated together. - All systems strive to maximize on their form of currency. In the natural world, it would be energy. In the business world, it would be money. - Parts of the system serve critical roles. Ideally, many parts would serve the same critical role. - The diversity of parts allows the system to be more resilient and adapt to change. - Concentration of parts leads to greater risk. If the singular part is taken out, then the entire system that depends on it will collapse. ## Notes ### Self organization - Self organization is a process occurs when a system grows. It doesn't just get bigger, but also more complex. - Complexity comes from the parts within the system becoming more specialized and tightly integrated together. - Each part has conditions to sustain itself, which creates conditions that sustain the whole. - The result is that these self organizing systems grow increasingly resilient, stable, and efficient. - Our bodies are examples self organized systems. One cell becomes 30 trillion cells. We have many types of cells. But these cells have many specialization. ### Natural selection - In the natural world, the bottom line currency is energy. - Natural selection pushes species to be more energy efficient. - If organisms move towards energy inefficiencies, natural selection takes them out of the picture. - Young ecological interactions are very energy inefficient and cause problems with organisms involved. - Species can have mutual relationships without either species explicitly knowing on their adaptions for one another. ### Niche separation - Competition harms both species because energy is expended in their competitive struggle. - A species' niche is it's total ecological role (e.g. foraging niche). - An example of niche separation is the co-existence of owls in the evening and hawks during the day. These 2 species serve the same role. However, they don't conflict because they operate at different times of the day. Operations at different times could be classified as specialization. - Species of similar niches can live together due to their specializations. Almost like agreements of what/when/where they will do things as to avoid competition from other species. ### Repetition in function - As species specialize, the size of their niches shrink. Overtime, ecosystems can support more species. This boosts the repetition of function of critical roles. - Repetition of function is key to the resiliency of these natural systems. - With many species serving a critical role, such as pollination, if a single species goes extinct, that pollination system is just fine. This is because there are so many others doing the same natural role. - Self organization is pushing systems to decentralize critical roles. - Whenever we move towards concentration of critical roles, we move away from resiliency and stability. ### Risk - The more participants you have serving critical roles in your system, the more stable your system will become as it can more easily adapt to change. Resiliency is defined by it's ability to adapt to change. - Concentrations of roles can be expressed as single points of fail. With that comes risk. If that concentration falters, the entire system collapses.