DYNAMIC AND LINGUISTIC MODES OF COMPLEX SYSTEMS
Howard Hunt Pattee · International Journal of General Systems · 1977
Complexity is defined in the context of biological systems which contain their own genetic descriptions. This definition is justified on the grounds that without self-description complex organizations tend to deteriorate in function and do not evolve when challenged by environmental interactions. This leads to the problem of what constitutes a description in terms of physical structures, and what are the simplest conditions for writing, reading and executing descriptions. To explain the relation of systems and descriptions of systems, we introduce the distinction between dynamic, or continuous, rate-dependent events and linguistic, or discrete, rate-independent events. The stability and evolutionary potential of self-describing, complex systems depend on the complementary relation between these two modes, and this relation is inextricably dependent on the epistemological problem of measurement,