Spread

I did some reading today on Von Neumann machines. To any reader who is not a complete nerd, John Von Neumann was a Hungarian-American mathematician born in 1903. He did some work on the Manhattan Project and the later hydrogen bomb project. Anyway, a Von Neumann machine is a device that, in addition to carrying out its primary function, is capable of self-replication. The only non-living Von Neumann machines in existence today are viruses. And, like Von Neumann's theoretical machines, viruses are generally not terribly good things to have around long-term. I'd contend that ideas are like Von Neumann machines. Richard Dawkins (someone of whom I am not fond) proposed that memes (cultural constructs) are capable of complex evolution and replication. This, I think, is the result of a much simpler idea. Rather, the result of two ideas.

First of these is the idea that ideas multiply and propagate. This should be fairly obvious. Let's say I decide that it is "cool" to wear hats inside out (and not just when the Cubs are behind). Suppose further I am someone anyone cares about regarding popular fashion. The idea to wear caps backward spreads to a few friends and then to a few more and so on exponentially until the entire hat-wearing population of the world look like idiots who can't figure out which way to wear caps. This wouldn't actually happen though, of course. Why? Because the idea of inverse hat-wearage lacks inherent force. To propagate, an idea must be one that can really spread itself. Consider democracy. Democracy, once established, tends to want to spread. The same is true of most religions. The ideas that endure are the ones that either claim to be necessary or that really bring some tangible benefit. In other words, the ideas that survive are the ones that shape their surroundings to encourage spread. If we regard ideas as Von Neumann machines, this second idea has some startling implications.

If ideas are capable of altering their surroundings and of replication, then we have an explanation for why ideas evolve over time. An idea arises under a given set of conditions and then alters them. Under new conditions the idea may or may not be capable of survival so it will have to change. The variants of an idea that survive will be adapted to the new environment will continue propagation and further alter the environment in a continuous cycle. This cycle occurs because an idea will invariably result in an environment ill-suited to its continuation. Democracy again provides an example. Democracy is popular (almost by definition) but democracies usually choose bad policies. This causes a new form of government (usually a less friendly one) to step in a restore power/order to a chaotic situation. Then the system slides back the other way over time.

What can we learn from this? Any idea, even after successful implementation, will tend to suffer distortion over time. This is why, if an idea is to last, it must be tied to something it is powerless to directly change. This, I assert, is where the U.S. Constitution failed. The ideas in the document were subject to interpretation, and interpretation was based in external conditions. External conditions were altered by the Constitution, and the feedback loop has caused some, ah, issues. The solution? No clue, except one. Contrive a system that cannot be altered by its own influences. Isolate an idea from its effects and allow it to spread to the limits of its jurisdiction. Thus, stability is attained. The drawback is that it limits the idea's operational lifetime. Unable to evolve, it will die rather abruptly. Still, this may be worth the cost if the idea can last long enough. An example of this would be a constitution with no means of amendment. Change would come suddenly but only after a considerable period. This may be preferable to gradual decline. Pick your poison. The world of self-replicating, evolving entities is a bizarre one, but limitation of evolution may delay damage.