December 06, 2007 – December 09, 2007

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Location

Santa Fe, New Mexico

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Organizers

Simon Levin, Princeton

David Pines, UC Davis and LANL

and Carl Simon, Michigan

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Overview

The proposed workshop will focus on exploring the differences and similarities in the emergent behavior of complex adaptive systems, depending on the relevant levels of selection.

A central question for discussion at the workshop is the extent to which the organizing principles useful in understanding emergent phenomena at one level or in on kind of system are also useful in understanding those at another level or in other systems. For example, could lessons learned from research on protected emergent behavior in correlated matter in inanimate materials be useful in understanding how living matter, neural tissue, social systems, economies, societies and individuals behave, and vice versa? Closely related to this, the workshop will seek to identify protected or robust behavior (such as the persistence of scaling phenomena), and develop models that incorporate an understanding of the organizing principles responsible for such behaviors.