Human society is a network of interconnections between a diverse variety of different people, in which people act in an interdependent way ...
Human society is a network of interconnections between a diverse variety of different people, in which people act in an interdependent way to adapt to changes, and thereby forms a robust structure. Human society is a complex system.
The ability to know and make use of the ever-changing environment in which the system operates is a requirement for complex systems to function. Exploring and exploiting the environment are necessary mechanisms of complex systems.
Human society, as a complex system, can only function effectively if the processes for the functions of exploring and exploiting the environment are effective in society. What could be the fundamental mechanisms for the exploration and exploitation of the environment in the complex system of human society?
Seemingly, scientific and economic activities serve the mechanisms being sought. However, the behavior of complex systems is the emergent manifestation of the interconnected, still individually functioning components. If we consider human society as a complex system, then we have to analyze the functioning of society as emergent behaviors, and the processes of exploration and exploitation of the environment must also be expressed through emergent mechanisms. However, the activities of the theoretical and applied sciences are definitely functions guided mostly by human volition and consciousness.
Human society is a very specific complex system, because it is a community of intelligent people with their own will to act. Hence, human society can also behave in non-emergent ways. Human society can be directed by its members’ intelligence, consciously, by individual or collective will. However, human society ceases to behave as a complex system when operated by intentional will, and becomes, even if a complicated, still a non-complex structure, typical of, and like as mechanical machines. When society behaves in non-emergent ways while reacting to the changes of the environment, it loses the robust stability characteristic of complex systems.
The sciences practiced by mankind are a typical example of the risks of non-emergent functioning. The practice of exploratory and applied sciences does not necessarily increase the robustness of society as a system, but it raises the potential ability of society. Science can both benefit and harm humanity.
Human society can function in a robust way only if its dominant functions are manifested in emergent ways characteristic of complex systems. What are the mechanisms that allow the environment to be explored and exploited in emergent ways in human society?
As a complex system explores the environment by interacting with it, the system constantly seeks and tries new ways of operation. In the case of human society, the function of exploration of the environment can appear as an emergent consequence of the freedom of opinion. Freedom of opinion allows the spread of new ideas in society. Through the validation of new ideas by utilizing memes, society can constantly try out new mechanisms of operation. Freedom of opinion creates the function of exploration of the external and internal environment in an emergent way, characteristic of the functioning of complex systems. Human society is able to explore its environment emergently if freedom of opinion can be properly exercised in society.
A complex system exploits its environment using the tried and tested methods that worked when the environment was explored. In the case of human society, the function of exploiting the environment is the emergent consequence of the behavior of the members of the society complying with the actual laws. Law-abidingness allows the mechanisms of operation that have already been developed by society, i.e., that are actually accepted as they function effectively in society. Human society is able to exploit its environment in an emergent way if the mechanisms of law compliance can be upheld in society. The requirement to exploit the external and internal environment in an emergent way, as it is characteristic to complex systems, appears in law-abidingness.
The operating conditions of a revolution-free society was discussed in an earlier thought. If we consider the functioning of human society as a complex system, the mechanisms for exploring and exploiting the environment that are necessary for complex systems to function properly require exactly those operating functions that are the proposed conditions of a revolution-free society. The conditions for a stable, i.e. revolution-free society can be deducted theoretically from the laws of operation of complex systems.
In a changing environment, a complex system can function effectively if its operating mechanisms can work together in a balanced and mutually supportive way. How can the mechanisms of free opinion and law observance in human society function in a cooperative and balanced way? Whatever a member of society thinks is part of freedom of opinion. Everything a member of society actually does must comply with the prevailing laws.
The connection between the two is the act of expression, like for example speech. No golden rule exists which works in all societies for freedom of expression. Every society needs to develop the balance and update the balance time-to-time by laws, how the freedom of expression is governed.
How can an opinion become a law or a law become an opinion in a system of human society behaving by emergent operation?
In an effectively functioning society, ideas can spread freely between people. As long as an idea that appears in action does not contradict the existing laws, the given idea can exist in society. If an idea expressed in action becomes a meme, it is able to spread, and might be accepted by the majority of society. In this case, the meme should become a law. The mechanisms of society must have processes to allow memes of majority to become the law of society, which, at the same time, restricts the actions of all members in society.
As the environment changes, a law might lose its useful function. Freedom of opinion ensures the spread of new ideas in society, which, if it becomes a meme of majority, it must be able to involve modification of influenced existing laws in society, if the society is allowed to function as a complex system.
In order for human society to be able to explore and exploit its environment in an emergent way, which is the characteristic of complex systems, fundamental mechanisms of freedom of opinion and observance of law are necessary, and adequately sufficient functions in society.
Considering human society as a complex system, the rules necessary for the emergent functioning of society can be objectively defined. The proposal for the operation of human society without direct intention, as a non-mechanical system, without the control of the elite, through emergent processes of freedom of opinion and law-abidingness, examined in an earlier thought.
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