蚂蚁在组成群体时为何会表现出如此的精密性和具有目的性?数以亿计的神经元是如何产生出像意识这样极度复杂的事物?是什么在引导免疫系统、互联网、全球经济和人类基因组等自组织结构?这些都是复杂系统科学尝试回答的迷人而令人费解的问题的一部分。

理解复杂系统需要有全新的方法.需要超越传统的科学还原论，并重新划定学科的疆域。借助于圣塔菲研究所的工作经历和交叉学科方法，复杂系统的前沿科学家米歇尔以清晰的思路介绍了复杂系统的研究，横跨生物、技术和社会学等领域，并探寻复杂系统的普遍规律，与此同时，她还探讨了复杂性与进化、人工智能、计算、遗传、信息处理等领域的关系。

In the Origin of Wealth, Eric Beinhocker offers a thorough and convincing new way to think about economic growth and business management. The author begins by exploring the roots of modern economic theory and ultimately declares it outmoded and wrong. Instead, he suggests, markets and growth can best be explained by drawing on the emerging field of complexity economics: the study of markets and social systems as complex adaptive systems. Although biological metaphors in business have become familiar (i.e., organizations are living organisms), Beinhocker moves beyond metaphor to explain the revolutions in science that will inevitably change the way we think about economics, competition, and business. The Origin of Wealth raises important questions such as: How can one create strategy in uncertain and fast moving environments? Why is it hard for large organizations to be innovative and how should we organize for better results? What role should governments play in this new era?