The edge of chaos, but not quite chaos itself. The most complex system of all is life itself. And indeed, the largests quest of Kauffman and his colleagues is for nothing less than laws of self-organization that account for the origin and evolution of life on earth.
Creation science is no accident in late twentieth-century America.
Its proponents adhere to it in an ardent effort to forestall the feared moral implicications of humans as descendents of a haphazard lineage branching from some last common ancestor more remote in time than the Cambrian explosion some 500 million years ago. Tell him in a few words what aspect you are interested in and he will send you a bibliography of recommended reading. As readers of this newsletter know, I am fond of short pithy quotes. Sometimes these can be useful in a classroom. As I look over my collection I realize that some of the best ones are a little like systems Dr. Kauffman studies.