Complex Adaptive Systems: An Introduction to Computational Models of Social Life (Princeton Studies in Complexity Book 14)

by John H. Miller

The key driving force behind self-organized criticality is that microlevel agent behavior tends to cause the system to self-organize and converge to critical points at which small events can have big global impacts. Such critical points are familiar to anyone who has ever built a house of cards; while initially such constructions go quite smoothly, at some point the structure goes critical and even the slightest jiggle causes it to collapse. Similarly, in self-organized critical systems, the agents throughout the system tend to be poised in critical states where small disturbances can trigger large relaxation events that may encompass any number of agents.