Below I have summarized the responses I received on my search for a good book on complexity. The reactions I received to Sunny Auyang's "Foundations of Complex-System Theories : In Economics, Evolutionary Biology, and Statistical Physics" were strong and positive. I have attached Steve Upton's review below. At the very bottom of the list you can read the details of Swarm-modelling list member Richard Morris' own book on complexity. Thanks to all for their help and insights: (My next request will be for good complexity webpages). ----------------------------------------------------------- Complex-System Theories : In Economics, Evolutionary Biology, and Statistical Physics by Sunny A. Auyang Steve Railsback: John Holland's _Emergence_ and Hidden Order Robert Bell Dept. of Geography University of California, Los Angeles: Individual-based models and approaches in ecology Donald L. DeAngelis, Louis j. Gross, Editors Matthew M Murphy: Epstein and Axtell's "Growing Artificial Societies" Richard Morris Artificial Worlds: Computers, Complexity, and the Riddle of Life. By Richard Morris. Pietro Terna: Complexity. (You can find news about it at ). [I also have looked through Complexity International at http://www.csu.edu.au/ci/ (D.S.)] EPSTEIN J.M. e AXTELL R. (1996), Growing Artificial Societies - Social Science from the Bottom Up, Cambridge MA, MIT Press. Gary Polhill: Byrne, D. (1998) COMPLEXITY THEORY AND THE SOCIAL SCIENCES: AN INTRODUCTION Routledge Julie Dugdale: Complexity and Postmodernism Paul Cilliers pub: Routledge 1998 Stephen C. Upton: Bar-Yam's "Dynamics of Complex Systems" Gell-Mann's "The Quark and the Jaguar" Epstein and Axtel's "Growing Artificial Societies" I have read a number of complexity books, and so far (I've just begin reading selected portions of this book), I think the book will be a *MUST* read. Auyang takes the philosophical road, in that, he discusses complexity issues from a broad categorical perspective, rather than rely on numerical equations, and applying specific mathematical techniques to address a problem (I think these books, such as Bar-Yam's "Dynamics of Complex Systems" are good in that they do bring *current* mathematical techniques to bear, but I believe the mathematics has some catching up to do). He adresses the *ideas* associated with complexity, and that to me, is why this book is signficant for me. I particular like his discussion on uniting deterministic and stochastic concepts (pg 248). Just to give you perspective, my background is in statistical mechanics, military operations research, and natural algorithms for global optimization. I'm currently doing some agent based modeling for the military. Artificial Worlds: Computers, Complexity, and the Riddle of Life By Richard Morris. Plenum Trade, 1999, 200 pp. ISBN: 0-306-46002-5 Price: $25.95 (US and Canada) / $31.14 (elsewhere) "An eminently readable account of the profound ideas that inspire research today; must reading for those following complexity, cosmology and biological and chemical evolution." -- Julius Rebek, Jr., Director, Skaggs Institute for Chemical Biology, Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, California Publisher's blurb: At the cutting edge of discovery, an exciting, new branch of research, called the "sciences of complexity," offers novel ways to explore such provocative questions. This fascinating book shows that complexity scientists have been experimenting with complex chemicals displaying some of the characteristics of life, and have created electronic computer virus-like life forms that are born, die, reproduce, mutate and evolve. Through these artificial worlds they have actually been able to monitor evolution as it happens, since it takes place at a much more rapid pace within a computer. Among the phenomena that these scientists hope to observe are the evolution of multicellular life forms, and possibly even the evolution of electronic intelligence. Could it be that life itself is an emergent property that arises spontaneously when a chemical system attains a certain degree of complexity? Richard Morris makes this major field of inquiry accessible to a popular readership as never before, while he reveals its potential to solve the greatest of all questions to puzzle humankind: what is life? Contents 1. What Is Life? 2. Creating Life in the Laboratory 3. The Evolution of Complexity 4. Fitness Landscapes 5. Artificial Life 6. Is Natural Selection the Whole Story? 7. Artificial Life on the Internet 8. Swarm 9. The Promise of Complexity Annotated Bibliography World Wide Web Resources Index _____________________________________________ Darren Schreiber Attorney at Law Graduate Student Political Science, UCLA dschreib@ucla.edu Here's another - we are using it for a grad seminar this semester, so can give a full report on how the student's liked it in a couple of months: H.J.Jensen's "Self-Organized Criticality. Emergent complex behaviour in physical and biological systems," Cambridge, 1998. Cheers, Lou Gross Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and Mathematics I highly recommend Stu Kauffman's book, Origins of Order (John W. Fondon III (Trey)" )