Emergence on the Radio

With my love for fractals, added to my experiences with a gigantic wasp/ladybug colony springing to order in front of my home, the subject of emergent behavior should feel quite natural to me. Indeed, as I listened to Monday night's program on NPR on emergence, I was not disappointed. Listening to the program, a common thread began to emerge, drawing together my subjects of interest... from the social systems of insects, the complexity of the brain and human consciousness, to google and the forces behind creation.

The program begins with firefly synchronization, but soon turns to the social organization of insect colonies, and the work of Deborah Gordon.

"Look to the ants..."

There was quite a bit of ant talk in this program, from the paths they follow in nature, to paths smeared with guts intentionally left by researchers. Some of it was strange and borderline gross, but all of it was fascinating. One of the biggest things that struck me from the program was the impact of the queen ant. The term, from our point of view, is somewhat misleading. She's big, sure, but in no way is she in control of the colony, the way we'd expect the queen to act. She just tends to stand out in the crowd. (Having been pregnant, I can sympathize.) "The queen ant is just a big ant who lays her eggs," was a colloquial definition given on the show. The queen doesn't rule or direct, yet the ants follow order as if directed. How is it possible? Radio Lab examines the question... why we don't have solid answers, and why science wants to know.

This is something I personally struggle with... if you read the description, beneath my photo on the left, you'll see that I'm "seeking synthesis" yet "willing to settle". In some ways, that's science... you want to understand something as a whole, and to do so, you examine the parts. The trouble is, we find greater and greater detail, without ever discovering how the whole works.

Creationists like to point this out, as the program suggests. But, does our inability to understand the synthesis of the parts mean there is some outside force-a creator-or does it mean the parts work without any sort of guidance at all? The science of emergence takes us to the heart of the greatest philosophical question of all... the reason for everything. Can science give us these sorts of answers? It can, at least, describe emergent phenomena, which is just what Radio Lab's Emergence, sought to do.

The examples used in the program range from the strikingly beautiful to the ironic. Here are a few of these seemingly "quasi-mystical" concepts, where order arises from the bottom-up:

In the midst of the chaotic, urban jungle of New York, flower merchants gathering in a certain section... following the smell of hyacinths and the calls of other sellers, they "accidentally" created the Flower District.

Up close, an impressionist painting appears to be a smattering of dots on the canvas. But back away slowly, and a scene emerges.

The human brain manages to produce a thought without using any single neuron. In order to reenact this mysterious process for the radio, a choir from the LaGuardia High School of Music & Art sing the sensations involved when facing a cup of coffee.

Steven Johnson, author of Emergence and guest on the show, finds his blog is in the #1 slot in a Google search for Steven. The rank was based on the number of people linking to his site, and the quality of those links. So, as a result of unwitting group behavior, Steven Johnson was the most important Steven in the world (at the time, it appears to be more erratic now)... and perhaps according to the hive mind of Google users, he is. (or was. Darn that Spielberg.)

At a fair, also described in the opening chapter of Steven Johnson's book Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities and Software , the "father of eugenics", Francis Galton, assumes everyone in a crowd is stupid, (and with highly questionable ethics, would have enforced selective breeding to stop it.) He finds himself distraught as the collective guess of the crowd turns out to be more accurate than his own-or of any individual.

For more detail, or for more examples, you'll have to listen to the program yourself. I'm busy adding Steven Johnson's books to my Amazon wishlist, and thinking about my own ideas (also here, here, and here) on the cause of emerging order.

Note: I noticed that Steven Johnson is set to be a guest on this Science Friday (a product of NPR) at 3pm EST. After listening to his interview on Radio Lab, I'd definitely recommend checking it out, if you can. [Note: (11/17/2006) My mistake... he was on the show last week... the archived episode is here.]

Additional note: I found this nifty image of a really bored looking queen ant awaiting "rescue" from worker ants on the other side of a maze. I thought it might be fun for the kiddies, especially when learning that tricky lesson: the best way to fit in the crowd is to be yourself. Enjoy!

Images notes: Star trek "Borg Queen" via StarTrek.com, Ant maze via Kidprintables.com, Van Gogh's Sunflowers via Cassy's World.