Gray:
Primary readings I would recommend on complexity theory:
"Out of Control" by Kevin Kelly
"Complexity: Life at the Edge of Chaos" by Roger Lewin
"Complexity: The Emerging Science at the Edge of Order and Chaos" by M.
Mitchell Waldrop
"Artificial Life" by Steven Levy
These will give an excellent overview of the area. There will be some
overlap, but I think it is well worth working your way through all of
these books.
Once you've got these under your belt, this is the next set of readings:
"The Collapse of Chaos" by Jack Cohen and Ian Stewart
"Order Out of Chaos" by Ilya Prigogine
"Complexification: Explaining a Paradoxical World Through the Science of
Surprise" by John L. Casti
"Chaos: Making a New Science" by James Gleick
"Turtles, Termites and Traffic Jams: Explorations in Massively Parallel
Microworlds" by Mitchel Resnick
"The Origins of Order" by Stuart A. Kauffman (NOTE: Kauffman has just had a
new book published that might serve as a more accessible work. I don't have
the name of it readily at hand.)
"Leadership and the New Science" by Margaret J. Wheatley (NOTE: A light read
that hits on a few of the highlights. However, this was a highly popular book
in management circles about a year ago.)
You should also search the WWW under the keywords "chaos", "artificial
life", and "complexity". The Santa Fe Institute in Santa Fe, New Mexico
has a web site.
My own web site at
http://www.neosoft.com/~appfutr/
has pointers to the Santa Fe Institute and other sources of information on
complexity and related topics. My site will give you a point of entry to
the web sites that deal with complexity. As well, my web site contains
information that links chaos and complexity theory to organzational change
and futures studies.
Hope this is of help.
Regards,
Peter von Stackelberg
Applied Futures, Inc.
-- e-mail: appfutr@neosoft.com WWW: http//www.neosoft.com/~appfutr/Sent from PeterVS1@aol.com