Emergent complexity: what uphill analysis or downhill invention can not do

TL;DR

This paper reviews how complex systems exhibit emergent phenomena, especially near critical points, and discusses the hypothesis that the brain operates near criticality, highlighting universal mechanisms behind complexity.

Contribution

It proposes that the brain's near-critical state explains emergent collective behavior, integrating recent findings and emphasizing universal mechanisms in complex systems.

Findings

Evidence supporting the brain's operation near criticality

Universal mechanisms underlying emergent phenomena

Implications for understanding complex system behavior

Abstract

In these notes we review emergent phenomena in complex systems, emphasizing ways to identify potential underlying universal mechanisms that generates complexity. The discussion is centered around the emergence of collective behavior in dynamical systems when they are poised near a critical point of a phase transition, either by tuning or by self-organization. We then argue the rationale for our proposal that the brain is naturally poised near criticality reviewing recent results as well as the implications of this view of the functioning brain.