Dealing with the complexity

The fundamental problem to overcome is the limitation of our human brains to cope with complexity. Human physiology has evolved in environments where massive connectivity has never ever been present. Humans haven't had the opportunity to evolve any specialised brain mechanisms, or, emotional programming, to cope with or take advantage of a massively connected environment.

Fortunately, the human brain and computers deal with the storage and processing of information in very similar ways, so, with a little ingenuity, the computer can be used to compensate for the deficiencies of the evolutionary process.

This was the view taken in "Magical A-Life Avatars" where the main theme of the book was that the highly complex world of the Internet would need tools that enhanced the natural ability of the human brain to cope with complexity (Note: the emphasis is on enhancement, not replacement).

The book used a conceptual model where it was imagined that a single gargantuan library was being used to store every piece of information in the world. The amount of information in this library is beyond the capabilities of the library staff to organise or catalogue properly. Only about twenty percent is indexed and, as millions of new documents are being added each day, the whole library appears to be totally disorganised.

Entering such a library would be a nightmare. You'd liable to find so many irrelevancies, discover so much that you didn't know you didn't know that any search would probably leave you more confused than when you started. All the information you could ever need would be there somewhere, but, the problem is how to extract it efficiently?

In "Magical A-Life Avatars", it was concluded that going into such a library, searching around for information would be hopelessly inefficient. The best strategy might be to start by going into the library cafe and trying to find people who had already spent some time in the library and knew where things were.

Of course, you couldn't expect to find anyone who knew where everything in the library is, but, you'd probably find people who knew where information relating to their own particular area of speciality could be found. The trick would be to find someone in the cafe whose speciality corresponded to the area of knowledge you were interested in yourself.

Immediately, it becomes clear that a strategy to get knowledge will become a strategy for finding people in the cafe rather than a strategy for finding information in the library. The limitation of this strategy would be the time it would take to find these people.

The trick now is to imagine a library cafe filled with millions of people. You cannot talk to them all, so, you have to start listening in on discussions, talking to people, asking if they know of people who are specialising in the knowledge you are looking for. You might then find there are groups whose common interest has brought them together. One of those groups might be discussing just the sort of things you want to know about. Given enough time, you might find several people who'd have answers to the questions you want to ask.

The problem with this scenario is that there are millions of people and an almost infinite amount of information. As nobody can know all there is to know, the people you find are liable to come up with different kinds of answers. Also, through talking to various people, you might find you are asking the wrong questions, or, looking for answers in the wrong groups. You might discover new information that completely changes the nature of the problem you want to solve.

Going from one person to another and from group to group you might arrive at a satisfactory conclusion, but, it could take quite a lot of time. Far better if you could get all the different people who might be able to throw light on your problem together in one place. This would make it easier to combine and compare their knowledge and opinions. Biases could be ironed out; misconceptions corrected; knowledge gaps filled.

There might be others in this huge cafe, trying to solve similar problems and using a similar strategy to yourself and . If you could only find them, you'd be able to swap notes, help each other out to save much of the leg work. Wouldn't it be convenient if you could bring them all together at a single table in the cafe to have a discussion with you?

The goal then, of a suitable communication strategy, might be to get all the people who may be able to to help you with your problems to come together at one single place in the cafe where they would be conveniently on hand to give you all the information, advice and services you require.

An unrealistic goal? Impossible in a gigantic cafe of millions of busy people competing with each other for attention? Maybe, it would be impossible in the world of bricks and mortar, but, in the magical world of the Internet such things are possible: if only you can find the right strategy.

The right strategy would involve seeing this cafe as a Hilbert Space: a Solution Space where all the people in the cafe are the dimensions. Gathering a selection of these people to together in one spot is simply a matter of connecting to them. In this way, you place yourself at the centre of a communication hub which then becomes your Solution Point in the Solution Space.

This effectively allows you to make everyone in the cafe leave, except for the people you are connected to. These will be those you have identified as being the most ideal mix of people to help you solve all your problems.