Science, Strategy and War The Strategic Theory of ... - Boekje Pienter

of energy on the other. In certain chemical reactions he noted that as the system movedfarther away from equilibrium (that is from a state with uniform temperature throughout theliquid), it reaches a critical point of instability, at which certain ordered patterns in the fluidemerged such as hexagonal patterns. This was a spectacular example of spontaneous selforganization.He had found that when systems are driven far-from-equilibrium entirely newthings can happen.This non-equilibrium is maintained by the continual flow of heat through thesystem. These dissipative structures not only maintain themselves in a stable state far- fromequilibrium,but may even evolve. When the flow of energy and matter through themincreases, they may go through new instabilities and transform themselves into newstructures of increased complexity. He discovered that while dissipative structures receivetheir energy outside, the instabilities and jumps to new forms of organization are the result offluctuations amplified by positive feedback loops. Thus amplifying “runaway” feedback,which had always been regarded as destructive in cybernetics, appears as a source of neworder and complexity in the theory of dissipative structures. As Prigogine noted in 1984,‘nonequilibrium is the source of order, nonequilibrium brings order out of chaos’ 8 . Thisconcept goes much further than that of an open system (as developed by Bertalanffy) as italso includes the idea of points of instability at which new structures and forms of orderemerge. Prigogine’s theory implied a radical re-conceptualization of many fundamental ideasassociated with structure - a shift of perception from stability to instability, from order todisorder, from equilibrium to non-equilibrium, from begin to becoming 9 .Although Prigogine himself warns against direct application of the model ofdissipative structures in fields and phenomena beyond chemical nonequilibrium reactions, heasserted already in 1984 these insights would have implications far beyond chemistry. Indeed,he repeated in 1996,it brings in a unified element. It brings in the element of bifurcation, it brings in the historicaldimension, it brings in the idea of evolutionary patterns which indeed you find on all levels.And in this sense it is a unifying element of our view of the future 10 .Interestingly in his presentation Strategic Game Boyd included a telling section out ofPrigogine’s book Order out of Chaos in which Prigogine marks the inadequacy of equilibriumthermodynamics to explain nature and in which he makes the cautious jump to socialsystems 11 :Equilibrium thermodynamics provides a satisfactory explanation for a vast number ofphysicochemical phenomena. Yet it may be asked whether the concept of equilibriumstructures encompassing the different structures we encounter in nature. Obviously theanswer is no.Equilibrium structures can be seen as the result of statistical compensation for the activity ofmicroscopic elements (molecules, atoms). By definition they are inert at the globallevel…Once they have been formed they may be isolated and maintained indefinitelywithout further interaction with their environment. When we examine a biological cell or acity, however, the situation is quite different: not only are these systems open, but also they8 Prigogine and Stengers (1984), p.287.9 Capra (1996), p.180.10 Horgan, pp.218-19.11 Boyd, Strategic Game, p.18. On page 19 Boyd included a section from Looking Glass Universe by JohnBriggs and David Peat which once more desribes Prigogine's concept of dissipative structures.125