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Very simply, by Combinatory System I mean an unorganized system made up of a plurality of similar elements; the macro behaviour of the system, as a unit, derives from the “combination” of the analogous behaviours of its similar elements, according to a feedback relation between micro and macro behaviours. The central idea is that in combinatory systems the collective phenomena are produced from a combination of the micro behaviours of agents but, at the same time, they condition these as the result of a micro-macro feedback relationship that seems to guide the individual behaviours and produces the collective phenomena. Four relevant phenomena are: the accumulation of objects, the spread of features or information, the pursuit or exceeding of a limit, and the attainment and maintenance of an order among the micro behaviours. A very relevant fifth effect, which includes the others, is the interdependent dynamics of individual improvement and collective progress in the overall state of a collectivity (defined in opportune ways). If we accept the traditional definition of self-organization as a macro behaviour in which the micro behaviours appear to be directed, or organized, by an invisible hand in order to produce the emerging phenomenon represented by the formation of ordered structures, of recognizable patterns, then all the collective phenomena mentioned before can be defined as self-organization. This approach is quite different from that of complex adaptive systems - and in particular from the micro approaches - the operating rules, describing the behaviour of the system, must in some way include not only local rules but also the feedback between the micro and macro behaviours. |
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