The June 1995 Scientific American includes an article From Complexity to Perplexity by John Horgan. Even at the Sante Fe Institute, some researchers have their doubt'' the article is very critical of artificial life and related disciples. I highly recommend it. Holland, it should be said, is considered to be one of the more modest complexologists.
Some workers now disavow the goal of a unified theory.
It becomes just another place where researchers are using computers and other tools to adress problems in their respective fields. Building computer models of natural systems is in vogue all over science. I don't know. Murray Gell-Mann, a founder of the SFI makes some claims in his book The Quark and the Jaguar . This is one of several swipes at math.