All Topics  
Stuart Kauffman

 

 
   Email Print
   Bookmark   Link
 

 

Stuart Kauffman
 
 
  Topics Stuart Kauffman Topic Home

Stuart Alan A. Kauffman (28 September, 1939) is an American theoretical biologist
Biologist

A biologist is a scientist devoted to and producing results in biology through the study of life.Typically biologists study organisms and their relationship to their environment....
 and complex system
Complex system

A complex system is a system composed of interconnected parts that as a whole exhibit one or more properties not obvious from the properties of the individual parts....
s researcher concerning the origin of life on Earth. He is best known for arguing that the complexity of biological systems and organisms might result as much from self-organization
Self-organization

Self-organization is a process of attraction and VSEPR theory in which the internal organization of a system, normally an open system , increases in complexity without being guided or managed by an outside source....
 and far-from-equilibrium dynamics as from Darwinian natural selection
Natural selection

Natural selection is the process by which favorable heritable trait become more common in successive generations of a population of Reproduction organisms, and unfavorable heritable traits become less common, due to differential reproduction of genotypes....
, as well as for proposing the first models of Boolean network
Boolean network

A Boolean network consists of a set of Boolean variables whose state is determined by other variables in the network . They are a particular case of sequential dynamical systems, where time and states are discrete, i.e....
s.

fman presently holds a joint appointment at the University of Calgary
University of Calgary

The University of Calgary is a research-intensive public university in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. The University is composed of 24,000 undergraduate and 5,500 graduate students....
 in Biological Sciences and in Physics and Astronomy, and is an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Philosophy.






Discussion
Ask a question about 'Stuart Kauffman'
Start a new discussion about 'Stuart Kauffman'
Answer questions from other users
Full Discussion Forum



Encyclopedia


Stuart Alan A. Kauffman (28 September, 1939) is an American theoretical biologist
Biologist

A biologist is a scientist devoted to and producing results in biology through the study of life.Typically biologists study organisms and their relationship to their environment....
 and complex system
Complex system

A complex system is a system composed of interconnected parts that as a whole exhibit one or more properties not obvious from the properties of the individual parts....
s researcher concerning the origin of life on Earth. He is best known for arguing that the complexity of biological systems and organisms might result as much from self-organization
Self-organization

Self-organization is a process of attraction and VSEPR theory in which the internal organization of a system, normally an open system , increases in complexity without being guided or managed by an outside source....
 and far-from-equilibrium dynamics as from Darwinian natural selection
Natural selection

Natural selection is the process by which favorable heritable trait become more common in successive generations of a population of Reproduction organisms, and unfavorable heritable traits become less common, due to differential reproduction of genotypes....
, as well as for proposing the first models of Boolean network
Boolean network

A Boolean network consists of a set of Boolean variables whose state is determined by other variables in the network . They are a particular case of sequential dynamical systems, where time and states are discrete, i.e....
s.

Biography

Kauffman presently holds a joint appointment at the University of Calgary
University of Calgary

The University of Calgary is a research-intensive public university in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. The University is composed of 24,000 undergraduate and 5,500 graduate students....
 in Biological Sciences and in Physics and Astronomy, and is an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Philosophy. He is also an iCORE (Informatics Research Circle of Excellence) chair and the director of the .

He graduated from Dartmouth
Dartmouth College

Dartmouth College is a private university, coeducational university located in Hanover, New Hampshire, New Hampshire. Incorporated as "Trustees of Dartmouth College,"...
 in 1960, was awarded the BA (Hons) by Oxford University in 1963, and completed a medical degree (M.D.) at the University of California, San Francisco
University of California, San Francisco

The University of California, San Francisco is one of the world's leading centers of health sciences research, patient care, and education. UCSF's medical, pharmacy, dentistry, nursing, and graduate schools are among the top health science professional schools in the world....
 in 1968. After completing his residency in Emergency Medicine, he moved into developmental genetics of the fruitfly, holding appointments first at the University of Chicago
University of Chicago

The University of Chicago is a private university located principally in the Hyde Park, Chicago neighborhood of Chicago. Although an older university by the same name existed prior to its founding, the modern University of Chicago credits its founding to the oil magnate John D....
, then at the University of Pennsylvania
University of Pennsylvania

The University of Pennsylvania is a private research university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is America's first university and is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States....
 from 1975 to 1995, where he rose to Professor of Biochemistry
Biochemistry

Biochemistry is the study of the chemistry processes in living organisms. It deals with the structure and function of cellular components such as proteins, carbohydrates, lipids, nucleic acids and other biomolecules....
 and Biophysics
Biophysics

Biophysics is an interdisciplinary science that employs and develops theories and methods of the physical sciences for the investigation of biology systems....
. Kauffman held a MacArthur Fellowship, 1987-1992.

Kauffman rose to prominence through his association with the Santa Fe Institute
Santa Fe Institute

The Santa Fe Institute is a non-profit research institute located in Santa Fe, New Mexico and dedicated to the study of complex systems....
 (a non-profit research institute dedicated to the study of complex systems), where he was faculty in residence from 1986 to 1997, and through his work on models
Model (abstract)

In mathematical logic, the formal languages, formal systems, and theory which are studied have no meaningful content until they are given an interpretation within some other system....
 in various areas of biology
Biology

Biology is a branch of the natural sciences concerned with the study of living organisms and their interaction with each other and their environment ....
. These included autocatalytic set
Autocatalytic set

An autocatalytic set is a collection of entities, each of which can be created catalytically by other entities within the set, such that as a whole, the set is able to catalyze its own production....
s in origin of life research, gene regulatory network
Gene regulatory network

A gene regulatory network or genetic regulatory network is a collection of DNA segments in a cell whichinteract with each other and with other substances in the cell, thereby governing the rates at which genes in the network are transcribed into mRNA....
s in developmental biology
Developmental biology

Developmental biology is the study of the process by which organisms grow and develop. Modern developmental biology studies the genetic control of cell growth, cellular differentiation and "morphogenesis," which is the process that gives rise to biological tissues, organ s and anatomy....
, and fitness landscape
Fitness landscape

In evolutionary biology, fitness landscapes or adaptive landscapes are used to visualize the relationship between genotypes and reproductive success....
s in evolutionary biology
Evolutionary biology

Evolutionary biology is a sub-field of biology concerned with the origin of species from a common descent and descent of species, as well as their evolution, multiplication and diversity over time....
.

In 1996, Kauffman started BiosGroup
BiosGroup

BiosGroup, founded in 1997 by Stuart Kauffman and Ernst & Young , was a spin off from the Santa Fe Institute. The company aimed to commercialize complexity science software in applications that helped companies manage projects and supply chains....
, a Santa Fe
Santa Fe, New Mexico

Santa Fe is the Capital of the U.S. state of New Mexico. It is the List of cities in New Mexico and is the county seat of . Santa Fe had a population of 62,203 at the United States Census, 2000; the estimate for July 1, 2006, is 72,056....
, New Mexico
New Mexico

New Mexico is a U. S. State located in the Southwestern United States of the United States. Inhabited by Native Americans in the United States populations for many centuries, it has also has been part of the Spanish Empire viceroyalty of New Spain, part of Mexico, and a U.S....
-based for-profit company that employs complex systems methodology to attempt to solve business problems. BiosGroup was acquired by NuTech Solutions in early 2003. As of 2003, Kauffman was a director of NuTech which is no longer doing business.

Work

Kauffman is best known for arguing that the complexity of biological systems and organisms might result as much from self-organization
Self-organization

Self-organization is a process of attraction and VSEPR theory in which the internal organization of a system, normally an open system , increases in complexity without being guided or managed by an outside source....
 and far-from-equilibrium dynamics as from Darwinian natural selection
Natural selection

Natural selection is the process by which favorable heritable trait become more common in successive generations of a population of Reproduction organisms, and unfavorable heritable traits become less common, due to differential reproduction of genotypes....
.

Some fellow biologists working in Kauffman's area reserve judgment on Kauffman's claims about self-organization and evolution. A case in point is the introduction to the 2002 book "Self Organization in Biological Systems".

Kauffman has been increasingly important in management theory. His NK model, and the idea of epistatic links, have been used to describe the way information is shared in a firm.

Publications

Kauffman has written several books and articles. Books, a selection:
  • 1993, Origins of Order: Self-Organization and Selection in Evolution, Oxford University Press, Technical monograph.
  • 1995, At Home in the Universe. Oxford University Press.
  • 2000, Investigations. Oxford University Press.
  • 2008, Reinventing the Sacred: A New View of Science, Reason, and Religion. - ISBN 0465003001 -
    ()


Articles, a selection:
  • 1969, "Metabolic stability and epigenesis in randomly constructed genetic nets," in: Journal of Theoretical Biology, 22:437-467, 1969.
  • 1991, "Antichaos and Adaptation," in: Scientific American, August 1991.
  • 2004, "Prolegomenon to a General Biology", in William A. Dembski, Michael Ruse, eds., Debating Design: From Darwin to DNA, Cambridge University Press.
  • 2004, "Autonomous Agents", in John D. Barrow, P.C.W. Davies, and C.L. Harper Jr., eds., Science and Ultimate Reality: Quantum Theory, Cosmology, and Complexity, Cambridge University Press.


About Stuart Kauffman:
  • Dana MacKenzie, , Discover Magazine, Vol. 23, No. 2, 59-63, February 2002.
  • Kauffman about Kauffman:


External links

  • with Stuart Kauffman on a complexity organization website.
  • "The adjacent possible" by Kauffman on autonomous agents.
  • iCORE Chair.
  • , paper by Kauffman on reductionism
    Reductionism

    Reductionism can either mean an approach to understanding the nature of complex things by reducing them to the interactions of their parts, or to simpler or more fundamental things or a philosophical position that a complex system is nothing but the sum of its parts, and that an account of it can be reduced to accounts of individual consti...
    .
  • "Reinventing The Sacred" Stuart Kauffman on his new book. Video talk for a Conference in Doha, Katar, produced, May 17.2008


  • on his book "Reinventing the Sacred" (recorded June 6, 2008).