Re: <nettime> rage against the machine

[James Wallbank <james@lowtech.org>]

Hi All,

This circumstance (increasing complexity introducing critical errors, 
unforseeable by any one developer) is equally true in wider human society.

Individual consumers, businesses and corporations are, effectively, 
subroutines, modules or components of a larger, complex mechanism that 
is the global polity. Dealing successfully with complex systems is just 
not what we humans collectively do.

While this is a significant concern when it comes to self-driving cars, 
self-targeting bombs, or self-crashing aeroplanes, it's considerably 
more pressing when we think about climate. Unless we can develop 
entirely new systems of governance, that don't just come to cleverer 
conclusions, but do so because they are motivated by different factors, 
then a crash is coming. But I think we all know this.

Fridays for the future.

James
=====

On 15/03/2019 05:29, Morlock Elloi wrote:
> This is the key. Designers do not understand impact of the complexity 
> that emerges from combining relatively simple components. This is 
> especially amplified in real-time processing of multiple inputs.
>
> In a completely different field (packet switching from millions of end 
> points) we had to design separate monitoring system because it was 
> impossible to understand what our own system is doing in real time. 
> The monitoring code was almost as complex as the switching code. We 
> are talking less than 100K lines each.
>
> Airline modules are in millions of code lines. My assessment is that 
> human life should not depend on anything with more than 50K lines of 
> code total, period. Anyone claiming that there are proper testing 
> procedures for huge systems is either a liar on an idiot. Enterprise 
> software contractors are often both. The general public has no 
> slightest idea of the dismal state of the software development industry.
>
>
> > Sarter said, “We now have this systemic problem with complexity, and it
> > does not involve just one manufacturer.
>
> #  distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission
> #  <nettime>  is a moderated mailing list for net criticism,
> #  collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets
> #  more info: http://mx.kein.org/mailman/listinfo/nettime-l
> #  archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@kein.org
> #  @nettime_bot tweets mail w/ sender unless #ANON is in Subject:
#  distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission
#  <nettime>  is a moderated mailing list for net criticism,
#  collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets
#  more info: http://mx.kein.org/mailman/listinfo/nettime-l
#  archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@kein.org
#  @nettime_bot tweets mail w/ sender unless #ANON is in Subject: