Why does any definition of complexity involve either usage of the word complex, or reference mathematical terms that only a PhD would understand?
It seems to me that everybody has a general understanding of complexity without really being able to put it in words. Yet another word that has no accurate definition but is universally understood nonetheless.
I wonder if my own personal chautauqua is the search for an understanding of complexity, because lately it has been drawing me. I believe that understanding complexity is about as close to understanding the underlying nature of the universe as any person can really achieve in a single lifetime. Let’s just hope I don’t go insane on the road.
I once asked all of my friends to supply me with a good definition of complexity without using the word complex. My good friend Sl8r came up with this:
Complexity: an entirely qualitative/relative statement about the level of perception of the speaker’s mind.
I kinda like that.
Yea, I guess complexity is relative to a person’s experience.
something that is complex is something or an idea that is not easily understood.
but easy is a relative term, huh?
Yea, I agree that Sl8r’s definition is close enough.
Or at least it’s a good start.
This begs the question, does complexity exist without an outside observer?
Me again.
A Globe, Clothing Itself with a Brain
Check out this article Chef.
“An obscure Jesuit priest, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin,set down the philosophical framework for planetary, Net-based consciousness 50 years ago.”
“An increase in consciousness was accompanied by an increase in the overall complexity of the organism. Teilhard called this the ‘law of complexity consciousness'”
It’s a boost of confidence to find a theory that so closely matches my own…
I guess my definition would be something that would require more than the usual brain or thought processing…