Meta-Structures: The Search of Coherence in Collective Behaviours (without Physics)

Gianfranco Minati
(Italian Systems Society (AIRS))
Ignazio Licata
(Institute for Scientific Methodology (ISEM))
Eliano Pessa
(University of Pavia)

This contribution shortly outlines and reviews a theoretical and computational approach for a theory of change concerning systems where it is not possible to apply the laws of motion ab initio. The concept of meta-structure relates to the emergence of forms of spatiotemporal coherences in collective behaviours intended as coherent sequences of multiple structures. The essential difference compared with traditional methods is the role of the cognitive design by the observer when identifying multiple mesoscopic variables. The goal is both to study the "change without physics" of the dynamics of change and to design non-catastrophic interventions having the purpose to induce, change, keep or restore collective behaviours by influencing -at the mesoscopic level -and not prescribing explicit rules and changes.

In Alex Graudenzi, Giulio Caravagna, Giancarlo Mauri and Marco Antoniotti: Proceedings Wivace 2013 - Italian Workshop on Artificial Life and Evolutionary Computation (Wivace 2013), Milan, Italy, July 1-2, 2013, Electronic Proceedings in Theoretical Computer Science 130, pp. 35–42.
Published: 30th September 2013.

ArXived at: https://dx.doi.org/10.4204/EPTCS.130.6 bibtex PDF
References in reconstructed bibtex, XML and HTML format (approximated).
Comments and questions to: eptcs@eptcs.org
For website issues: webmaster@eptcs.org