I had a couple of takes on it:

http://asecondhandconjecture.com/?p=149

http://asecondhandconjecture.com/?p=153

“At any rate, evolution appears to happen. It is a pity that evolution has been tied up with the question of the original of the human animal (although, if God did grow the human animal in that way, isn’t that just more evidence of his grandeur?). The concept is helpful in many other areas. Art, economy, culture, science, scholarship, and even engineering all are grown, not designed from scratch.

I don’t know the answers here, but I know that evolution is a powerful tool and a powerful explainer. Ignoring evolution means both that we set aside a useful tool, and that we blindfold ourselves to an aspect of the creation we dwell in. While an evolving, growing world seems very weird, it seems to be what we have. Surely God wants us to study his creation that we dwell in. Surely he wants us to learn to thrive in it.”
-http://www.daublin.org/freewill-evolution.html

Many socialists seem to believe, deep in their hearts, that *someone* must be in charge of everything. Things don’t just happen. Smith’s Invisible Hand is as mystical to them as Divine Intervention is to you or me.

If socialists and libertarians ever want to understand each other, the socialists are at least going to have to understand how evolutionary processes at least CAN work. We understand their mystical faith in the government. Now they need to understand our scentific observation about evolving systems.

Great analogy. I know you shut down trackbacks due to spam, but I linked you here… As I pointed out, the right wing at least takes solace in something that can never be disproven. Thus, they never have true evidence to the contrary of their top-down supreme being. The left, of course, despite evidence that socialism has never worked, no matter where it has been tried, seem to persist…

Without the ability to store gas the way we store grain or gold (or crude oil, for that matter), there is no way to smooth out seasonal demand differentials — we refine it when we need it. And we need it in the summer. Fluctuating demand coupled with very-short-term supply constraints results in seasonally volatile prices.

It really is that simple — no conspiracy required.

Although I tend to think the Right would be more apt
to accept CAS as a mechanism because it doesn’t shatter their underlying
believes/philosophy, but merely changes how they view it.
(ie. creation could have been through evolution, 7 days = metaphor)

If you convince the Left that life and it’s processes are not a zero sum game,
then you have basically shattered their whole belief system.
One could almost differentiate Left and Right based on their belief of the zero sum game.

I’m currently studying Complex Adaptive Systems as a modeling tool.
The power lies in the simplicity of the agents (simple properties, simple rules, simple actions).
The simplicity gives ways to emerging properties/behaviors of the system.
Of course self-organization (through simple interactions) plays a huge role.

I’m contemplating trying to find a proof that emergence only exists when there is a non-zero sum game.
Or maybe that emergence cannot exist in a zero sum game.

Another idea is that a zero sum game might only be possible in a closed system.