(1992). Chaos and constitutionalism: Toward a post‐modern theory of social evolution. World Futures: Vol. 34, Evolutionary Models in the Social Sciences, pp. 131-156.

(2000). Machines and meaning: Technological autonomy and social adaptation. World Futures: Vol. 55, Challenges of Evolution at the Turn of the Millennium: Part II: The Chllenges of Civilizational Transition, pp. 71-90.

(1993). Social Evolution: Paradigms and problems. World Futures: Vol. 38, Theoretical Achievements and Practical Applications of General Evolutionary Theory, pp. 1-16.

The new science of Complexity explains that limited knowledge prevents societies from predicting and controlling their developments. But Complexity further suggests that nature uses the limits of knowledge to evolve, which turns an apparent obstacle into an opportunity to reevaluate governmental institutions. As in nature, the limits of knowledge lead social systems to evolve by individuating, liberating, and empowering their members. Societies individuate and liberate their members to probe environments and exploit opportunities. Societies empower individuals to globalize their findings which (...) requires constitutionally constraining governmental powers. Societies that respect human rights thus gain selective advantage. Showing that what nature is models what societies ought to be, Complexity may finesse the "naturalistic fallacy" of Hume and Moore. (shrink)

European intellectuals diagnosed the end of the nineteenth century as “the sickness of an age.” Schopenhauer's pessimistic books suddenly became popular; Nietzsche announced the “death of god”; and Max Nordeau's Degeneration was an international best seller. To be sure, this mood of despair was initially limited to a handful of poets and philosophers. But once the outbreak of World War I revealed what “the treacherous years were all the while making for and meaning,” the sense that the West had somehow (...) been betrayed by its own most fundamental accomplishments and beliefs was globalized. Thomas Mann's Magic Mountain captured the idea neatly by describing Europe as a tuberculosis sanatorium behind whose walls splendid accomplishment rapidly rotted toward calamity. Spengler's Decay of the West and the early volumes of Toynbee's Study of History argued that decline was inevitable. As Europeans lost faith in their ability to erect The Heavenly City Of The Eighteenth Century Philosophers [Becker, 1932], the era of “enlightenment optimism” gave way to Auden's “Age of Anxiety.” If, as T.S. Eliot put it in East Coker, “the quiet-voiced elders” bequeathed us “merely a receipt for deceit,” then, to cite again W.B. Yeats’ famous poem, it became increasingly obvious that “things fall apart, the center cannot hold.” “[F]ollowing some rough beast” that “slouches toward Bethlehem to be born,” modern civilization began a desperate search for new values that could orient society in an unexpected world. (shrink)