7.2 Does complexity increase over evolution?

7.2.3 Inherent Self-organisation

Kauffman [17], suggests that the order manifest in organisms is a result of selection acting upon a system that is basically self-organising and that this self-organisational ability depends critically on the complexity of conflicting constraints or connections at the base level. This complexity (see Section 6.5) is a kind of biological fitness complexity (conflicting constraints between the genes affecting fitness) that causes both the evolutionary analytic complexity and the evolutionary fitness complexity. The evolutionary analytic complexity follows from the constraints on evolution which create structures (attractors etc.) that are difficult to specify. Evolutionary fitness complexity is implied by the difficulty of predicting the behaviour of the structure.

What is Complexity? - The philosophy of complexity per se with application to some examples in evolution - 14 JUN 95

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