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The analogies used to understand living systems always track technology. In the 1800’s when ‘fields’ were the new thing, folks assumed cells (or, more generall

The analogies used to understand living systems always track technology. In the 1800’s when ‘fields’ were the new thing, folks assumed cells (or, more generally, tissue) has invisible vital forces that dictated morphongenesis etc. With the development of steam, internal combustion, etc, living systems were viewed in terms of energy and chemical reactions. Then, electronics... with digital, everything — from DNA on down — was viewed as, essentially, a computer program. Now, as we’re getting more comfortable with chaos and complex inscrutable systems (such as neural nets and the like), we view the mess of proteins less like a lock-key and more like a dynamic complex system. Not being critical... but, it’s worth noting the source of these analogies.

TeMPOraL 5y ago
I never liked this hypothesis. The way I see it, we're returning to a "dynamic complex system" view from a brief infatuation with computing, and I'm not even really convinced the naive computing analogies were present anywhere else than in popular science and K-12 education. I'm having trouble imagining serious scientists believing there's a discrete, digital logic present in what's clearly an analog system built out of feedback loops - a conceptual framework that dates to the beginning of the 20th century if not earlier.
- XorNot 5y ago
  HackerNews comments tend to build a contrarian narrative where the "young dynamic outsiders" are right and the "establishment" is crusty and old will be quickly superceded. This dominates in fields where the specialists tend not to post here (molecular biology) and gets shot down rapidly in areas where there's more people with domain expertise present (semiconductor manufacturing). It's a tech startup forum: the whole concept is based on this theory and the appeal depends heavily on ignoring the exceptionally high failure rate of start ups.
  - LargoLasskhyfv 5y ago
    OTOH citing Max Planck from there: [1] https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Max_Planck https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Max_Planck A new scientific truth does not generally triumph by persuading its opponents and getting them to admit their errors, but rather by its opponents gradually dying out and giving way to a new generation that is raised on it. … An important scientific innovation rarely makes its way by gradually winning over and converting its opponents: it rarely happens that Saul becomes Paul. What does happen is that its opponents gradually die out, and that the growing generation is familiarized with the ideas from the beginning: another instance of the fact that the future lies with the youth.
    - ncmncm 5y ago
      Originators of new ideas are finally vindicated, and win awards, only after almost all of their opponents have died. The satisfaction is muted.
- lurquer 5y ago
  > I never liked this hypothesis. The way I see it, we're returning to a "dynamic complex system" view from a brief infatuation with computing, I don’t know if there was much of the “dynamic complex system” stuff in the 1800s. (What a terrible way to describe it... but, I think you know what I was saying.) The theme seemed to be striving towards simplification. That is, as Newton transformed the convoluted epicycles and platonic spheres and all the other bizarro theories explaining astronomical movements down to F=MA with a nice simple inverse-squared law tossed in, I think scientists writ large believes a similar simplification would occur in other fields. This was justified to some degree; chemistry was beautifully simplified in a short time. As was, to some degree, medicine with the advent of germ theory. But, biology seems immune. I really don’t think many biologists were thinking in terms of complex dynamic systems. (Ironically, Turing — a computer guy — was with his paper on reaction/diffusion equations.)

TeMPOraL 5y ago

I never liked this hypothesis. The way I see it, we're returning to a "dynamic complex system" view from a brief infatuation with computing, and I'm not even really convinced the naive computing analogies were present anywhere else than in popular science and K-12 education. I'm having trouble imagining serious scientists believing there's a discrete, digital logic present in what's clearly an analog system built out of feedback loops - a conceptual framework that dates to the beginning of the 20th century if not earlier.

XorNot 5y ago
HackerNews comments tend to build a contrarian narrative where the "young dynamic outsiders" are right and the "establishment" is crusty and old will be quickly superceded. This dominates in fields where the specialists tend not to post here (molecular biology) and gets shot down rapidly in areas where there's more people with domain expertise present (semiconductor manufacturing). It's a tech startup forum: the whole concept is based on this theory and the appeal depends heavily on ignoring the exceptionally high failure rate of start ups.
- LargoLasskhyfv 5y ago
  OTOH citing Max Planck from there: [1] https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Max_Planck https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Max_Planck A new scientific truth does not generally triumph by persuading its opponents and getting them to admit their errors, but rather by its opponents gradually dying out and giving way to a new generation that is raised on it. … An important scientific innovation rarely makes its way by gradually winning over and converting its opponents: it rarely happens that Saul becomes Paul. What does happen is that its opponents gradually die out, and that the growing generation is familiarized with the ideas from the beginning: another instance of the fact that the future lies with the youth.
  - ncmncm 5y ago
    Originators of new ideas are finally vindicated, and win awards, only after almost all of their opponents have died. The satisfaction is muted.
lurquer 5y ago
> I never liked this hypothesis. The way I see it, we're returning to a "dynamic complex system" view from a brief infatuation with computing, I don’t know if there was much of the “dynamic complex system” stuff in the 1800s. (What a terrible way to describe it... but, I think you know what I was saying.) The theme seemed to be striving towards simplification. That is, as Newton transformed the convoluted epicycles and platonic spheres and all the other bizarro theories explaining astronomical movements down to F=MA with a nice simple inverse-squared law tossed in, I think scientists writ large believes a similar simplification would occur in other fields. This was justified to some degree; chemistry was beautifully simplified in a short time. As was, to some degree, medicine with the advent of germ theory. But, biology seems immune. I really don’t think many biologists were thinking in terms of complex dynamic systems. (Ironically, Turing — a computer guy — was with his paper on reaction/diffusion equations.)