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Simplifying Complexity

The Economy and Complexity Science: Part 1

Dec 26, 2022
29:06

Episode guests

Podcast summary created with Snipd AI

Quick takeaways

  • The economy should be understood as a non-equilibrium system with booms and busts, challenging the prevailing equilibrium-based approach of economics.
  • Increasing returns, driven by positive feedback, play a crucial role in shaping dynamic economies and can lead to the emergence of dominant solutions or companies.

Deep dives

Brian Arthur's Journey to Complexity Science

Brian Arthur's interest in complexity science was sparked by his dissatisfaction with the equilibrium-based approach of economics. He saw that real-world systems, like the economy, exhibited non-equilibrium behavior with booms and busts. This motivated him to study the economy as a non-equilibrium system. Despite initial resistance from the economics community, he delved into the concept of increasing returns, which examines how positive feedback impacts the economy. Brian's work challenged the prevailing belief that economies were static and in equilibrium. Instead, he argued that systems could self-organize and exhibit dynamic behavior due to increasing returns.

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