Out of Control: The New Biology of Machines, Social Systems and the Economic World

Amazon.com

In many ways, the 20th century has been the Age of Physics. Out of Control is an accessible and entertaining explanation of why the coming years will probably be the Age of Biology -- particularly evolution and ethology -- and what this will mean to most every aspect of our society. Kelly is an enthusiastic and well-informed guide who explains the promises and implications of this rapidly evolving revolution very well.

Customer Reviews:

This Book Is Out of Control.......2007-03-19

I must admit that I'm a little ticked at spending a considerable amount of time reading a 500 page book with too many ideas and lack of focus. The editing left a lot to be desired. Throughout the book, the author asserts that if dumb, simple things (e.g. a swarm of bees) continuously communicate with each other they will eventually become capable of performing highly complex tasks not feasible by the will of intelligent beings. Yet, this point is expressed in such a complex manner that it makes one wonder why the author didn't follow his philosophy by dumbing down his arguments and letting the plentiful explain the more difficult concepts.

The main premise of the book is the idea of intelligent beings, in this case humans, giving up control of their creations, which are machines, and letting them "adapt on their own, evolve in their own direction, and grow without human oversight."

There are some intriguing ideas such as: No sustaining ecosystem is in equilibrium or completely "in control". Some chaotic or "out of control" events are required for complex systems to function. For example, the earth's atmosphere is made up of 20% oxygen. This oxygen content is just enough to maintain viable ecosystems without burning up the earth from fires.

"Out of Control" was written in 1994, and 14 years later global warming is a hot button. What happened to the Kelly's grand ideas of recycling (see example of Danish companies recycling each others' waste somewhere in the book)? How much closer are we to eco-friendly intelligent homes and personal belongings? Instead of moving to cheap renewable energy sources, we are experiencing the use of fossil fuels like never before with the fast growing economies of China and India. Crucial counteracting forces seemed to have been completely ignored by the author in projecting a sea of changes in how humans behave. Solar energy will never succeed as a viable energy source unless Big Oil has a monopoly over the sun. Digital cash has been a failure because its success would've destroyed the profits of Visa/Mastercard.

The author is a proponent of the idea of passing down learned behavior innately to offsprings, i.e. through genes. For example, experiments cited from one scientist proved evolution with learned behavior passed down to offsprings is superior to natural evolution. In this instance the author ignored the prospect of passing down negative and undesirable learned behavior that is criminal in nature for example. It's best that all offsprings are created much like computers, and most behavior is learned much like software. It is precisely individuality that facilitates variability, the hallmark of evolution. The author himself even argues for systems thriving at the edge of chaos; systems flexible enough to adapt to the changing environment, yet not rigid enough to become unadaptable. Passing down learned behavior to offsprings would undoubtedly create a more rigid system. Besides, most people already harbor the ill effects of bad parenting. The last thing they need is to acquire this cr*p at conception.

At the end of the book, Mr. Kelly mentions "The Nine Laws of God". One law in particular stood out: "Grow by chunking" which states "The only way to make a complex system that works is to begin with a simple system that works. Attempts to instantly install highly complex organization-such as intelligence or a market economy-without growing it, inevitably lead to failure..... Time is needed to let each part test itself against all the others...." The failure to observe this law has been aptly demonstrated in the U.S. effort to build democracy in Iraq, and to a lesser degree the pressure exerted on Russia by the west to quickly move to a market economy following the collapse of communism.

Inspite of all the criticism, I'm glad I read this book. The ideas could have been expressed in 200 pages fewer and more coherently. Pick up a copy and fasten your seat belt. You will be riding this one for a while.

Perhaps the most important book of the 90s.......2006-08-24

Why are the three most powerful forces in our world--evolution, democracy and capitalism--so controversial? Hundreds (in the case of democracy, thousands) of years after they were first understood, we still can't quite believe these three phenomena work. Socialist Europe resists capitalism, the religious right in America questions evolution and the Middle East makes a mockery of democracy. When you think about it, it's easy to understand why: all three are radically counterintuitive. "One person, one vote?" What if they vote wrong?

But that's the problem--we're thinking about it. Our brains aren't wired to understand the wisdom of the crowd. Evolution, democracy and capitalism don't work at the anecdotal level of personal experience, the level at which our story-driven synapses are built to engage. Instead, they're statistical, operating in the realm of collective probability. They're not right--they're "righter". They're not predictable and controllable--they're inherently out of control. That's scary and unsettling, but also hugely important to understand in a world of increasing complexity and diminishing institutional power (mainstream media: meet blogs; military: meet insurgency).

Fortunately, this book that makes sense of all of this. Out of Control was first published in 1994, well before its time, but it's one of those rare books that sells better each year it gets older. That's because Kelly recognized that the messy markets of natural selection, enlightened self-interest and invisible hands all anticipated the Internet and the delights of watching peer-to-peer cacophony create the greatest oracle the world has ever seen. Some of the examples may be a bit dated a dozen years later, but the message has only become more true: "There is no central keeper of knowledge in a network, only curators of particular views," he writes. The emergent mob wisdom of the blogosphere and Wikipedia were unimaginable then, but somehow Kelly imagined them all the same. This may be the smartest book of the past decade.

Cyberpunk Fact.......2006-08-05

The first half of the book is simply as good as it gets. Each Kelly pronouncement reads like a mantra from on high. The second half of the book is merely brilliant, but Mr. Kelly gives you a pretty good run for your money at 500 pages. There's only a couple of people even close to Kevin Kelly in the futuristic field, Ray Kurzweil, Howard Bloom, and Thomas L. Friedman. Alvin Toffler may have pioneered in a field that H.G. Wells started, but the new mavens like Robert D. Kaplan, Mike Davis, and Kevin Kelly, achieve levels of literacy as beautiful as a Dali. There are about ten must-read human futures, "Out of Control" is one of them.

Review for Out of Control.......2006-05-23

Kevin Kelly was the executive editor at Wired, and his own magazine had a negative review. It describes distributed computing systems and concommitant communication problems in a new light, vastly expanding the scope of otherwise mundane academic articles on the topic. Kelly defines the rules of complex system behavior that simultaneously apply to traditional distributed computing, to markets, to a flock of birds or a bee hive. This book is tedious but worth a read.

Original thinking the value of which I really do not have the tools to judge .......2006-05-14

This is Kevin Kelly's own summary of his bottom- line conclusions.

" As we make our machines and institutions more complex, we have to make them more biological in order to manage them.
The most potent force in technology will be artificial evolution. We are already evolving software and drugs instead of engineering them.
Organic life is the ultimate technology, and all technology will improve towards biology.
The main thing computers are good for is creating little worlds so that we can try out the Great Questions. Online communities let us ask the question "what is a democracy; what do you need for it?" by trying to wire a democracy up, and re-wire it if it doesn't work. Virtual reality lets us ask "what is reality?" by trying to synthesize it. And computers give us room to ask "what is life?" by providing a universe in which to create computer viruses and artificial creatures of increasing complexity. Philosophers sitting in academies used to ask the Great Questions; now they are asked by experimentalists creating worlds.
As we shape technology, it shapes us. We are connecting everything to everything, and so our entire culture is migrating to a "network culture" and a new network economics.
In order to harvest the power of organic machines, we have to instill in them guidelines and self-governance, and relinquish some of our total control."

This is the kind of book I find extremely difficult to know how to read. I just do not have the proper scientific- technical background to evaluate the kinds of claims which are being made here. And this when I am naturally skeptical about books which claim to have a sure general understanding of the shape of the human future.
My skepticism also relates to the meaning of this kind of 'evolution' for the lives of individual human beings, and for society as a whole. Is the suggestion that we are on the verge of some vast transcending or de- humanizing of humanity, some creation of an 'organic collective mechanical consciousness' which will somehow 'direct' or guides society as a whole.?
If so , once again, what does this say about our own individual freedom and identity?

Industrializing Organisms: Introducing Evolutionary History (Hagley Center Studies in the History of Business and Technology)

Average customer rating:

Industrializing Organisms: Introducing Evolutionary History (Hagley Center Studies in the History of Business and Technology)

Manufacturer: Routledge
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Industrial | Management & Leadership | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Social Sciences | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

Genetics | Evolution | Science | Subjects | Books

General | Evolution | Science | Subjects | Books

General | Science | Subjects | Books

All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books

Business & Investing | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books

Nonfiction | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books

Professional | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books

Science | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books
Similar Items:

The Green Revolution: The American Environmental Movement, 1962-1992 (A Critical Issue)
Experimenting with Humans and Animals: From Galen to Animal Rights (Johns Hopkins Introductory Studies in the History of Science)
The Organic Machine: The Remaking of the Columbia River (Critical Issue Book)
Hunters, Herders, and Hamburgers: The Past and Future of Human-Animal Relationships
Savages and Beasts: The Birth of the Modern Zoo (Animals, History, Culture)

ASIN: 0415945488

Book Description

Scientists have developed a featherless chicken designed to make industrial chicken production more efficient, while specially trained Pacific bottlenose dolphins are being deployed in the Persian Gulf to disarm mines and protect our Navy. Everyone knows Darwin's theory of natural selection, but what about his idea of artificial selection--how humans, not nature, rework natural organisms to meet our needs? Industrializing Organisms brings us to the threshold of the new field of evolutionary history--from the mobilization of war horses in the 19th century to today's engineered plants and manipulated animals.

My Business Life Cycle: How Innovation, Evolution, and Determination Made Paul Harris Great

Average customer rating:

"My Business Life Cycle" is very highly recommended and informative reading

My Business Life Cycle: How Innovation, Evolution, and Determination Made Paul Harris Great
Gerald Paul , and Victoria Barrett
Manufacturer: Purdue University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

Business | Professionals & Academics | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Retailing | Industries & Professions | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Look Inside Biographies | Trip | Specialty Stores | Books
ASIN: 1557534268

Book Description

Paul Harris Stores did exactly what it was supposed to. It brought fashion, comfort, style, and functionality to millions of women in the Midwest. Paul Harris' run of 50 years is remarkable because so few retail stores make it that long and so few make it so big. His life and experiences tell readers much about U.S. culture, retail history, and a brand of entrepreneurship that appears to be making a comeback.

Customer Reviews:

"My Business Life Cycle" is very highly recommended and informative reading .......2007-06-09

Gerald Paul is a German immigrant who came over to the United States in 1938 and founded Paul Harris Stores in 1954 which eventually grew into a chain of 303 stores. Written with the assistance of Victoria Barrett, "My Business Life Cycle: How Innovation, Evolution, And Determination Made Paul Harris Great" is the life story of Gerald Paul and his achievements, setbacks, and eventual success as an entrepreneur and businessman who, in 1994, was selected as CEO of the year by 'Indiana Business Magazine' and is now retired from Paul Harris Stores. "My Business Life Cycle" provides readers with an insider's perspective on the inner workings of specialty retail stores in a complex and ever evolving marketplace. It is also a kind of modern Horatio Alger story of a success that arose, flourished, declined, and ultimately ended. "My Business Life Cycle" is very highly recommended and informative reading for anyone striving for success in the business community. It is also an enduringly important and scholastically impressive addition to community and academic library 20th Century American Business reference collections.

Average customer rating:

The Evolution of New Markets
P. A. Geroski
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Strategy & Competition | Management & Leadership | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Industrial | Management & Leadership | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Popular Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

New Business Enterprises | Small Business & Entrepreneurship | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books
Similar Items:

Juice: The Creative Fuel That Drives World-Class Inventors
Medici Effect: What Elephants and Epidemics Can Teach Us About Innovation
Six Degrees: The Science of a Connected Age (Open Market Edition)
The Wisdom of Crowds
Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis (2nd Edition)

ASIN: 0199248893

Book Description

How do markets evolve? Why are some innovations picked up straightaway whilst others take years to be commercialized? Are there first-mover advantages? Why do we behave with 'irrational exuberance' in the early evolution of markets as was the case with the dot.com boom? Paul Geroski is a leading economist who has taught economics to business school students, managers, and executives at the London Business School. In this book he explains in a refreshingly clear style how markets develop. In particular he stresses how the early evolution of markets can significantly shape their later development and structure. His purpose is to show how a good grasp of economics can improve managers' business and investment decisions. Whilst using the development of the Internet as a case in point, Geroski also refers to other sectors and products, for example cars, television, mobile phones, and personal computers. This short book is an ideal introduction for managers, MBA students, and the general reader wanting to understand how markets evolve.

Out of Control: The Rise of Neo-Biological Civilization

Average customer rating:

Decade Ahead of His Time--Absolutely Brilliant

Out of Control: The Rise of Neo-Biological Civilization
Kevin Kelly
Manufacturer: Addison Wesley Publishing Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Popular Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Production & Operations | Management & Leadership | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Industries & Professions | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Systems Analysis & Design | Computer Science | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

General | Evolution | Science | Subjects | Books

General | Science | Subjects | Books

Out of Control: The New Biology of Machines, Social Systems and the Economic World
The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology

ASIN: 0201577933

Customer Reviews:

Decade Ahead of His Time--Absolutely Brilliant.......2000-04-08

Kevin, a WIRED Magazine editor who spoke, with Stewart Brand, at OSS '94, has produced what I regard as one of the top five books of this decade. A very tough read but worth the effort. I had not understood the entire theory of co-evolution developed by Stewart Brand and represented in the Co-Evolution Quarterly and The Whole Earth until I read this book. Kevin introduces the concept of the "hive mind", addresses how biological systems handle complexity, moves over into industrial ecology and network economics, and concludes with many inspiring reflections on the convergence of biological and technical systems. He was easily a decade if not two ahead of his time.

Firm Size, Innovation and Market Structure: The Evolution of Industry Concentration and Instability (New Horizons in the Economics of Innovation series)

Average customer rating:

Firm Size, Innovation and Market Structure: The Evolution of Industry Concentration and Instability (New Horizons in the Economics of Innovation series)
Mariana Mazzucato
Manufacturer: Edward Elgar Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Organizational Behavior | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Popular Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Microeconomics | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Theory | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Industrial | Management & Leadership | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

New Business Enterprises | Small Business & Entrepreneurship | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Industries & Professions | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Nanotechnology | Technology | Science | Subjects | Books

Innovations | Technology | Science | Subjects | Books

All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books
ASIN: 1840643463

Book Description

Firm Size, Innovation and Market Structure uses evolutionary dynamic theory, non-linear mathematics and computer simulation techniques to explore the relationship between firm size, innovation and market structure.

The book begins by reviewing the connection between these variables from a theoretical and an empirical point of view, and goes on to illustrate how analytical tools may be used in order to explore Schumpeterian propositions regarding firm size, innovation and the specific role of idiosyncratic events.

In the concluding chapter, Mariana Mazzucato focuses on the US automobile industry from 1900-1997, and uses empirical evidence in order to determine whether or not there is a relationship between market share instability and stock price volatility, and to what degree the relationship is connected to industry specific factors.

Book Description

The study of agriculture is central to all A-level geography syllabuses. Ian Bowler examines a number of important topics related to agricultural change including the characteristics of developed agriculture; changes in crops, livestock and farm enterprises; causal factors in agricultural change; state intervention; agricultural marketing systems; agricultural trade; farm size and changes to the rural environment. Each topic is treated on two levels, with theoretical concepts supported by empirical case studies. Interactive questions are included in each section.

The Anatomy and Evolution of Industries: Technological Change and Industrial Dynamics (New Horizons in the Economics of Innovation series)

Average customer rating:

The Anatomy and Evolution of Industries: Technological Change and Industrial Dynamics (New Horizons in the Economics of Innovation series)
Orietta Marsili
Manufacturer: Edward Elgar Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Popular Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Theory | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Industrial | Management & Leadership | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Industries & Professions | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Science | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 1840645598

Book Description

In this challenging book, Orietta Marsili examines the relationship between industrial dynamics and technological change. By combining formal evolutionary modelling with empirical evidence, she illustrates how the characteristics of innovative processes in different technological regimes influence market structure and dynamics.

The book is divided into three sections: part one provides the analytical background, part two identifies the characteristics of technological regimes and part three develops a formal evolutionary model which links technological regimes to the dynamics of industrial competition and accounts for empirical regularities identified earlier in the book. Significantly, the author introduces a new taxonomy of technical regimes, which groups sets of production activities together - an important and valuable step away from traditional industrial classifications.

The author concludes by stressing the usefulness of industrial regimes, proposing directions for future research and outlining the elements which must be considered if the relationship between industrial dynamics and technological change is to be fully understood.

Book Description

Jati K. Sengupta examines the market dynamics of the evolution of industry and the impact of new technology with Ramp;D and knowledge capital. The book builds the theory of innovations in the contexts of the high-tech industries of today such as computing and telecommunications.

Corporate Technological Competence and the Evolution of Technological Diversification

Average customer rating:

Corporate Technological Competence and the Evolution of Technological Diversification
Felicia M. Fai
Manufacturer: Edward Elgar Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Commercial Policy | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Theory | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Popular Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

New Business Enterprises | Small Business & Entrepreneurship | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Industries & Professions | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General & Reference | Technology | Science | Subjects | Books

General | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 1840643536

Book Description

Drawing upon evolutionary economics and resource-based approaches, the author utilizes US patent data from 1930-1990 to examine the persistence of corporate technological competencies and their gradual erosion through diversifying incremental change. The book explores the changing nature of this diversification with respect to firm size, technological relatedness and technological complexity in 32 firms distributed across four broadly defined industrial sectors.

The findings suggest that industry and corporate technological profiles remain strong but are becoming blurred by the pervasiveness of general-purpose technologies. Although historically diversification is associated with an increase in firm size, the author argues that in recent times it results from technological relatedness and complexity.

This book will appeal to industrial and business economists, historians of business and technology, and students and scholars of technology management.

Books:

Books Index

Books Home

Recommended Books