[From Bill Powers (961004.1440 MDT)]
For all those who have requested a copy of my paper on the evolution of
purpose, I've asked Cliff Joslyn if it's available on WWW (Principia
Cybernetica), but haven't heard from him yet (not sure I have his current
address). My ASCII copy doesn't have last-minute changes or complete
references, and there is one figure I can't send in text. Mary and I will be
observing Ed Ford and Tom Bourbon introducing Ed's program to a lot of Dine
at the Lukachukai School on the Big Res, Sunday. When we get back I'll
enquire further.
···
--------------------------------------------
Bill Benzon (961004)--
What interests me is the possibility that, once some size
threshold is reached, people can no longer achieve their familiar purposes
in familiar ways.
There's a theoretical explanation for this phenomenon that puts some strong
backing behind your idea. See my paper "CT Psychology and Social
Organizations" in _Living Control Systems II_. The idea is that no more than
N control systems can control independently in an environment having N
degrees of freedom. Of course the degrees of freedom in question must be the
most important ones, not things like how many ways cars can be parked in a
given lot. As soon as you have more than N people trying to control
simultaneously, conflict has to arise. This conflict is probably an
important factor in groups breaking up when they reach some particular size.
Best,
Bill P.