Roger Frank Malina – Director, Leonardo Observatory for Arts and Technology (OLATS) at Paris, France, Emeritus & Executive Editor of the Leonardo Publications at MIT Press
Today, I want to share a topic we have been researching over the past few months: “emergence phenomena.” Many people define emergence in different ways, but here, our primary focus is on the fact that today, there are so many people on Earth and so many interconnected digital devices, with communication speeds approaching the speed of light—something unprecedented in human history.
- Emergence in Complex Systems
This is an incredibly complex system. We know about termite mounds in South Africa, where thousands of termites interact and cooperate to build different structures to prevent their nests from being destroyed by heavy rain. This behavior sometimes leads to emergence, sometimes growing into a significant emergent phenomenon, and at other times diminishing or suddenly stopping altogether. This suggests that we must rethink how we design the world, how we design products, especially in the context of digitalization and intelligence. I believe this calls for a fundamental reevaluation.
Here, I would like to introduce the research of my colleague at Stanford University, Samantha Bennett, who recently focused on the concept of “meta-risk.” This is essentially an implicit critique: experts often prefer simple causal relationships—A leads to B. If you do one thing, another thing will stop happening. However, in reality, systems are complex and interwoven; sometimes, C may occur before B, D may never happen, and E may arise under specific conditions. Localized effects can even lead to unexpected results, where negative impacts sometimes create desired outcomes.
Thus, when trying to solve a problem, we might need to introduce additional problems. This may sound provocative, but consider microplastics polluting the environment. They affect human health and contribute to declining populations and species extinction. Ironically, however, such changes might stabilize the climate. I am not advocating this as a solution, but it highlights how side effects of certain causal relationships can lead to unexpected results.
For the past two or three centuries, discussions have centered around the “complexity of complex systems.” Now, people talk about “algorithms.” We are fascinated by different types of complexity in systems. As early as 1919, research in this field began, and AI has been developing since the 1940s. Here, I want to mention different types of complexity: physical complexity, such as earthquakes; chemical complexity, such as toxins and poisons; biological complexity, such as the human body; psychological complexity, such as social media. These all trigger emergent phenomena, including political complexities. The COVID-19 pandemic, for example, combined all of these complexities. It affected biological health, shook political and social systems on a global scale, and caused unprecedented disturbances. We cannot return to the past. Now, many people discuss these issues, and we hope to focus on specific areas in the coming years.
Figure 1 The Complexities of Complex Systems
Another issue is that humans tend to study phenomena similar in scale to themselves. However, emergence occurs at all scales of the universe, from the macro to the micro. Telescopes and microscopes have only been present in our society for a few hundred years. If you are a student, you are unlikely to study something that takes 600 years to understand fully. Some problems are on timescales incompatible with human institutions. Humanity primarily studies issues that match its own scale, though many others have written about such topics. As an astrophysicist, I am particularly aware that what we study is largely based on structures similar to human existence, even though 80% of the universe is made up of materials completely different from us. During the process of emergence, neutrinos, gravitons, and other substances—though not part of our composition—still influence us, affecting events and even the progression of the entire Earth.
- Cross-Disciplinary Collaboration in the Context of Emergence
All these discussions led us, in recent months, to establish a decentralized emergence research center. It represents complex systems where emergence occurs not at the center or top but at the edges or diagonals. We heavily rely on team science, a concept that emerged about 20 years ago, introduced by the U.S. National Institutes of Health. This approach brings together doctors, managers, civil servants, lawyers, and insurance researchers to collaborate on solving complex issues. Similar groups of people tend to think alike, much like musicians playing in the same band, even if we have not yet devised a significant framework to address these problems.
With this foundation, we aim for our research to be intergenerational and universally applicable. Our research team consists of individuals from diverse cultural backgrounds, spanning continents and oceans. We also involve interdisciplinary professionals, including geologists and computer scientists. I am an astrophysicist, but I am also a publisher, and we plan to collaborate with judges and lawyers.
Figure 2 Decentralized Emergent Research Center
From a collaboration perspective, it is easier to work with people who think similarly to you, but even that does not guarantee solutions. For example, I once spoke with a judge in Texas who pointed out that the legal system is poorly designed to accommodate technological evidence. In other words, judicial decisions are increasingly based on machine-generated evidence rather than human-generated testimony. When presenting evidence in court, relying solely on images, for instance, may no longer be sufficient, as they can be easily manipulated. Many lawyers no longer examine evidence themselves; instead, they rely on AI-generated summaries. Thus, beyond modifying laws, we must redesign the entire judicial system to adapt to new realities. We need to step back and reconsider the original intent of our legal institutions.
We now call this “transformative design.” In other words, we must establish new design paradigms based on contemporary changes. Take a simple example: a bottle. It evolved from glass to plastic, which seemed beneficial at the time, but now we must reconsider its significance. Should it be designed for human hands, or perhaps for robots? This demands a reevaluation of our assumptions. The Texas judge’s insights emphasize the necessity of cross-disciplinary integration. Where should the legal system go next? Perhaps we must use digital-intelligent design to rethink our approaches and expand our perspectives.
- Entering a New Era of Emergence
Next, I want to share a key issue based on an article we published. This is not a groundbreaking idea; it is well known that population demographics shift over time. Many articles discuss demographic changes over the past centuries, but I believe we may be underestimating the transformations we will face in the next 50 years.
For example, in Texas, the average number of children per household is now 1.94, and this number continues to decline, dropping even more sharply during the pandemic. I am not saying COVID-19 directly caused lower birth rates, but it acted as a catalyst. A century ago, having six or seven children in a Texas household was common. Today, over 30% of adults in Texas choose not to have children. However, we must consider this in conjunction with other factors, such as increased life expectancy, especially in places like China and Japan, where the elderly population is growing significantly.
We are now entering an entirely different era. The pandemic has demonstrated how people can work remotely. Even for individuals in their eighties or nineties who cannot travel, they can still collaborate online, co-write papers, and engage in academic activities. This shift is what we call a “new academic republic,” whereas in the past, knowledge was exchanged through paper, horse-drawn carriages, and long periods of waiting. Take the example of the French philosopher Voltaire—his writings throughout his lifetime sparked societal changes, including the founding of universities and transitions from monarchy to democracy.
Thus, my point is that we may be entering a completely new era of emergence. We are not just seeing demographic shifts but also the proliferation of emergent technologies that are becoming accessible to everyone. Various tools now empower individuals to pursue their aspirations. For instance, we are designing the CIBER Village software community, aiming to positively impact groups of about 300 people. However, this is challenging because most current software systems tend to reinforce negative behaviors rather than encourage positive interactions. We hope to drive change in this regard.
Finally, let me introduce the “Heretic Fred” project—a science fiction writer and poet generated by AI. While this might seem unremarkable, the system is built on a database of 60 years of publications by Fred Turner. The AI can mimic his style, but when asked about love and marriage, its answers differ vastly from Turner’s own life experience. Can AI have a personal life? Can AI distinguish reliable data from unreliable data? These questions shape the challenges and opportunities we face in the era of emergent intelligence.
Figure 3 Fred the Heretic
“Heretic Fred” generates science fiction stories and poetry based on our prompts. Interestingly, we discovered that the questions humans ask AI are often more intriguing than the answers AI provides. This made me wonder—why do we ask these questions in the first place? For example, my son works at Disney in Los Angeles, where his job title is **AI Imagineering Engineer**. His role involves creative AI work—feeding existing database information to AI and allowing it to generate content.
This demonstrates that while humans can freely exercise their imagination, AI can only create within the constraints of its database.