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Introduction a La Pensee Complexe by Edgar Morin, ESF editeur (Paris)*,
pp 158, 135 francs

Simplification is the enemy of understanding. In politics, an outrageous
simpli fication is always followed by a lethal prescription; at worst ‘It’s
all the fault of the Jews’ or ‘Saddam Hussein is another Hitler’. But simplification
is necessary to practical, predictive science and engineering. If you want
to design an efficient power station, start by assuming that steam is a
gas that can be statistically analysed, otherwise you will become lost in
complexity.

It seems to some, though, that at the cutting edges of science simplicity
recedes from our grasp. Compare the counter inituitive results of quantum
mechanics with the sparse beauty of classical mechanics; or marvel at the
tangled webs of immunological reasoning.

Edgar Morin proposes that we need a new mode of thought – complex thought,
or la pensee complexe – of the world and our relation to it. He begins by
comparing present ways of scientific reasoning with that of the ‘closed
system’ of thermodynamic theory suggesting that ‘open systems’ of thought
are required. He extends the analogy with an allusion to Godel’s theorem,
which states that any logical system that is complete must contain contradictions
and is therefore inconsistent.

Many readers will already have detected a certain wool liness; the extension
of Godel’s result beyond the realm of formal logical systems is a happy
hunting ground for playful speculation. This book could have been designed
specifically to annoy Anglo-Saxon scientists. It follows a style, common
in France, that is more akin to a philoso phical manifesto than to the dry
reporting of formal research. When Morin illustrates his idea that concepts
should be defined by their cores, not their boundaries, he uses the example
of love and friendship (amour et amitie).

Halfway through the book, I felt that the introduction had gone on long
enough; surely Morin would soon produce a clear definition of what he means
by complex thought. Instead, he disavows any such intention. ‘One can be
a John the Baptist to the paradigm of complexity and announce its arrival,
without being its Messiah,’ he reveals.

What, then, is he on about? He does produce three principles. First,
what he calls ‘dialogic’; systems have features that are apparently both
complementary and contradictory. He cites the creation of biological order
through the increase of entropy or disorder in the environment. Secondly,
he outlines recursive organisation: the output of system can be the input
determining its future evolution, as in sexual reproduction of a species.
Thirdly, he adds ‘the hologrammatic principle’ – ‘the part is in the whole
and the whole is in the part’ – by analogy to the presence of a complete
image in a small fragment of its holographic image.

Morin also clearly dissociates himself from ‘the cult of information’,
the idea that information has physical reality. Surprisingly, he makes no
reference to work on normal measures of complexity. I would have welcomed
a reference to the idea that the complexity of a system is measurable, by
the length of an idealised computer algorithm to generate it (the ‘Turing
machine programme length’, after the hypothetical universal computer described
by British mathematician Alan Turing).

In the end, Morin seems simply to propose an openness to contingency,
incompleteness and the role of chance, suggesting that in every field (as
in quantum mechanics) we must be aware that the observer and the system
are inseparable. He would probably dismiss my dissatisfaction with his work
as a result of a fixation with ‘old’, determinist logic. He does devote
a chapter to verbatim responses to critics at a conference – most of whom
seem to have attacked him for being too determinist, though their comments
are not reproduced. He also refers most questions back to his earlier writing.

His book is entertaining and, if you can follow a French newspaper,
you will find it an easy read.

*ESF editeur, 17 rue Vierte, 75017 Paris.

Mike Holderness is a writer and consultant on information science.