Modelling of the Natural Evolutionary Computation
in the Human Society
Igor Weisband
Weisband Informatik, Florastr. 9, D-41460 Neuss, Germany
Keywords: Evolutionary Computation, Elites, Basis, Revolutions, Social Evolution, Adaptation, Model, Variation,
Selection, Heredity, Zeitgeist.
Abstract: Under consideration is the theoretical model of social evolution proposed in 1851 by Herbert Spencer with a
slightly modified interpretation of basic evolutionary concepts: adaptation, heredity, variation and selection.
Some of the new concepts belong to informatics: the model (as the most important factor in adaptation and
as the core of clans and elites gathering), marshaling and unmarshaling (heredity). Others were taken from
sociology: ideologies, the revolutionary process (variation and selection). The paper presents an approach to
computer simulation of these processes. It may seem that in the article too much sociology, but it is neces-
sary in order to make the model most adequate. In addition, it is easier to explain the sociological aspects to
computer scientists than aspects of informatics - to sociologists.
1 INTRODUCTION
For the developing computer models of natural evo-
lutionary computation in a society can be useful
studies of mechanisms of such evolution. One of
such mechanisms was postulated by social evolution
theory planted by Herbert Spencer (1851, 1852).
Evolutionism was the first and remains the last
more or less satisfactory explanation of some intel-
lectual act (in this case - creating a "crown of crea-
tion" - people). The most "intellectual" modern
software such as a navigator or a program for play-
ing chess achieves the result by an exhaustive
search. That is, the computer shows not so much its
intelligence as its perseverance.
Social information processing mechanism is un-
doubtedly the intellectual and creative process that
ensures the survival and development of the society
in constantly changing and often critical circum-
stances. We have two choices - wait for the emer-
gence of new hypotheses about the nature of the
intellectual movement to the truth, or, following the
principle of Occam's razor, first try to explain the
entire observed facts by the only existing hypothesis
– the evolutionary one.
Hypothesis 1: The main mechanism of infor-
mation processing in the society is the mechanism of
social evolution.
Most of the hypotheses underlying the consi-
dered computer model are drawn from the work
(Weisband, 2010).
Structure of the paper: we discuss first the inter-
pretation of the basic evolutionary concepts in the
model: adaptation, variation, inheritance and selec-
tion (chapter 2 and 3). Further, we discuss the dy-
namics of clans and elites (chapter 4), because the
process of birth, struggle for power, ruling and col-
lapse of elites we consider as the essence of the evo-
lutionary process in the society. Chapters 6 and 7
consider some important for building of the comput-
er model sociological and historical phenomena
related to elite’s dynamic.
2 ADAPTATION AND CONCEPT
OF MODEL
Adaptation to the environment - one of the basic
concepts of Darwinian doctrine – plays an even
greater role by Herbert Spencer. It is here not limited
to biological objects, but provides rather the appear-
ance of the entire structure of the universe.
Anthropologists Leslie White (1900-1975) and
Julian Steward (1902-1972) laid the foundations of
neoevolutionismus, considering culture as an in-
strument of society's adaptation to the environment.
Both considered the technology component in cul-
ture as the leading one (i.e., they were close to the
314
Weisband I..
Modelling of the Natural Evolutionary Computation in the Human Society.
DOI: 10.5220/0005153403140319
In Proceedings of the International Conference on Evolutionary Computation Theory and Applications (ECTA-2014), pages 314-319
ISBN: 978-989-758-052-9
Copyright
c
2014 SCITEPRESS (Science and Technology Publications, Lda.)
ideas of modern social informatics), and if White
emphasized the technology development of energy
sources, Steward believed backbone is the infor-
mation technology. In terms of neoevolutionismus
culture is a reflection of the environment, i.e. - its
model.
Definition 1: System M is called a model of sys-
tem S, if experiments on M possible to obtain new
information about S (Uyomov, 1971).
For example, a navigator is a model of the real
country and even of the real future: we can put him
on experiments introducing some data about the trip,
and get information about the geographic points that
will pass, road conditions, travel time.
Postulate 1: Adaptation of system A to system B
is only possible if the system A incorporates a model
of the system B.
Indeed, in order to adapt a subject to certain en-
vironmental factor is necessary to build, at least in
the mind of the subject, a model of this factor (you
cannot solve the problem, knowing nothing about it).
If the level of difficulty of the problem does not
allow dealing with it on individual level, for its solu-
tion must be created a certain community of people,
which we will define below as "clan".
Hypothesis 2: Social evolution provides adapta-
tion of the humankind as specie to the environment,
creating a series of successive, more and more ade-
quate and complete models of the main aspects of
the outer and internal environment: nature, war,
ideology, etc.
3 VARIATION, SELECTION,
HEREDITY AND THEIR
CARRIERS
Darwinism exists today within the Synthetic Theory
of Evolution (STE), where it is linked to genetics.
Herbert Spencer proposed an elegant solution to the
chicken or the egg causality dilemma: a hen is only
an egg's way of making another egg. The STE para-
digm allows rephrasing this statement: man is only a
mean by which a strand of DNA generates another
strand of DNA. This phrase is not as cynical as it
seems at first glance: genetic and cultural code - the
two most important components we pass to count-
less future generations. For example, life of a scien-
tist is subordinated to writing or evaluation certain
texts too, and will be finally evaluated by how the
written, approved or rejected by her or him texts
effect adequacy of the scientific area, to which she
or he this life dedicated.
In biology, we can fairly accurately estimate the
number of write cycles of DNA, allowing achieving
the specific results. For example, if we take the peri-
od separating the generations, in 25 years, to achieve
the changes in the human genetic code that have
occurred over the last million years, it took 40,000
rewrites. This number is comparable to the number
of known sources in a particular scientific field.
Each source rewrites partly the model of the object
studied in this scientific area.
But writing in existence for only 0.5% last the
duration of this period, printing - 0.05%. Meanwhile,
it is clear that the adaptation of species was at least
as much through the promotion at the sociological
level as at the biological one. What is the analogy of
DNA on a sociological level? On what media could
be repeatedly rewritten the formula not of human,
but rather of human society? (In informatics we can
compare it with marshaling and unmarshaling of
Java-objects.) According to the ideas of neoevolu-
tionismus - it is material and spiritual culture. But
both on an intuitive level and by deeper considera-
tion, it is impossible to separate any culture from its
carriers.
Explaining the term "culture carriers" we must
refer to the fact that we deal with in depth hierar-
chical system. The biosphere is made up of species
one of which is humanity. Humanity is made up of
countries. Countries do not consist of people, but of
the elements that we shall call clans (parties, corpo-
rations, nations, etc.).
Definition 2: Clan is a group of people united by
a partial model of the real world they share and
associate it with their identity. Using a term from
informatics, we will say that the clan implements
this model; and the model we name the bearing
model of this clan: the model that provides clans
unity.
Clans also form a hierarchical structure. Ele-
ments of the lower level clans (families, companies)
are people.
Hypothesis 3: Medias, on which in the course of
social evolution are overwritten partial models of
the environment (sociological analogue of DNA) are
the elements of material and spiritual culture of
human communities, which we called clans.
Countries and nations also fall under the defini-
tion of clan. Obviously, for example that Russia
implements other model of the real world as Germa-
ny.
We need the terms "super-clan", "sub-clan", de-
noting clans of neighbouring levels. For example,
considering the English aristocracy in 1455 as a
clan, we call England super-clan of this clan and
ModellingoftheNaturalEvolutionaryComputationintheHumanSociety
315
sub-clans - groups of Lancaster and York, who start-
ed this year's 30-year war of the Roses.
It was a war for the command. Distribution of
command in the country is apparently no less essen-
tial than Marx's distribution of property of the means
of production. And the subjects of command are
usually elites.
Definition 3: Elite – is a clan, claiming one type
of command in its super-clan. The set of all clan
members, regardless of affiliation to the elites,
called a basis.
The mention of "one type of" command due to
the fact that the pursuit of totalitarian command is
not so often found in history. For example, profes-
sional elites tend to dominate only in their areas of
expertise. Clergy claim to another kind of command
than the nobility.
Note that the term "elite" in our definition is not
evaluative; it reflects only the fact of desire of a clan
to command in its super-clan. However, in healthy
elites this commitment is associated with a deep
sense of inner rightness, dignity and chivalrous atti-
tude towards opponents. Healthy elites are the rule
rather than the exception in history, because they
give their members the prerequisites for personal
psychological health. But also a variety of widely
corrupt elites are known, in which fear of losing
privileges takes place of dignity.
Fortunately (for democracy) basis is able to rec-
ognise such elites. That's why it does not always
remain politically neutral. That‘s why democracy is
still the best kind of power.
Hypothesis 4: In the evolutionary process, which
ensures the survival and development of a society,
heredity is provided mainly by clans, variability -
mostly by elites, and the selection of elites mainly
provided by basis.
Traditionally, it is assumed that variation is ran-
dom (for example - the random mutations of DNA);
the selection is external factor for specie. Thus, the
only domestic "intelligent" element of the evolution-
ary mechanism is the mechanism of inheritance
(which is even a little ridiculous). Hypothesis 4
gives a much greater evolutionary mechanism inher-
ent intelligence: the elites are not accidental; the
basis provides internal selection before as an inade-
quate elite will led to the death of its super-clan.
May be the biological evolutionary mechanism is
also more complicated as usually assumed.
If not in order to proof, then in order to explain
the hypotheses 3 and 4, we must give a few exam-
ples of current or historical clans and elites, reveal-
ing their bearing models. These examples can be
made more meaningful if first say a few words about
the dynamics of clans and elites.
4 DYNAMICS OF CLANS AND
ELITES
Vilfredo Pareto was talking about constant cycling
and change of elites; he called history the "graveyard
of aristocracies" (Pareto, 1923). He strove for purely
descriptive interpretation of the term "elite" not
making it evaluative. But, on the one hand, he char-
acterizes the elite members as the most capable and
skilled in a particular activity as a result of some sort
of natural selection. On the other hand, in his "Trac-
tate" there are allegations that people can wear "la-
bel" of elite, lacking the respective qualities (Hoff-
man, 2001).
One assumption about the true and seeming
elites - that we are talking about different phases of
the life cycle of an elite: young and growing in the
first case, and dying, weakening - in the second.
Indeed, we find many examples in history when
selfishness and quarrelsomeness once cohesive and
effective elites led to the fall they headed clans.
It can be said of the Polish gentry XVIII-th cen-
tury, when after three sections of an independent
Poland was nothing left. Russian aristocracy begin-
ning of XX-th century split over the question of
Rasputin and actively assisted the various forces to
nail nails in the coffin of its own.
But did it a manifestation of the natural aging
and dying of relevant elites? No, if the mechanism
of elites functioning is not biology-related, but in-
formatics-related, it is not so.
Hypothesis 5: We highlight in the life of the elite
four phases (Weisband, 2010): emergence of an idea
(hypothesis, model) and the elite around it (N); elite
struggle for public acceptance (F); rise to power
and the introduction of the bearing model of the elite
in the life of society (S); institutionalization of this
model and embedding it into the existing system of
public institutions (read-discovered earlier models,
T).
We shall call the described here cycle and its
phase’s evolutionary cycle and evolutionary phases.
Letter designations of phases here please accept
without explanation, which would lead us away
from the topic. Evolutionary cycle is no life cycle, in
the sense that it does not end with the death of elite.
There are several examples showing that good clans
and elites in general are immortal - experiencing an
unlimited number of revolutions of the cycle. And
bad ones can die, unable to withstand the require-
ECTA2014-InternationalConferenceonEvolutionaryComputationTheoryandApplications
316
ments of that evolutionary phase, to which they are
not prepared enough (violation of the Ashby’s Law
of Requisite Variety (Ashby, 1956)).
At the core of any clan is an idea. Idea is some
cognitive structure, which is a model of the current
reality or of the desired state. For example, the basic
idea of Marx: "The bourgeoisie exploits the proletar-
iat." When Georgy Plekhanov translated "Com-
munist Manifesto" in Russian language and estab-
lished in 1883 a group of "Emancipation of Labour"
(the early years consisted of four or five people), it
was a typical N-elite, implementing this idea. Social
Democrats quarrelled hoarse, then shook hands and
went home. Then came a time when the Mensheviks
and the Bolsheviks ceased bowing in the streets of
Geneva and met, crossed to the opposite sidewalk.
They no longer spend time trying to prove some-
thing to each other, but actively promoted their ideas
among the masses. This meant that these elites
moved into "emotional” F-phase. By October 1917,
the Bolsheviks were turned by Lenin into a cohesive
fighting S-elite. They seized power and not just
avoided to say hello with their opponents, but killed
them. Stalin then turned Communists in oiled ma-
chine - T-elite, and the elite of this elite became
nomenclature - the ruling elite of the Soviet state.
Behind the bipolar view of the world (the USSR and
Warsaw Pact countries against the U.S. and NATO)
was hidden possibly the confrontation between two
T-elites: nomenclature and "gentlemen".
Last elite was born in Britain, showed its power
by insisting its language and its principles in the
Babel of North America, Australia. (Multinational
U.S. residents seem almost more Anglo-Saxon than
the British themselves.) Until today, this elite has no
equal for authenticity - gentleman is usually really a
gentleman, and not only pretending to be a gentle-
man. And authenticity is the main combat perfor-
mance of any elite, which basis sees and evaluates
very well. Was the result of the confrontation prede-
termined?
5 EVOLUTIONARY
CLASSIFICATION OF
HISTORIC PERIODS
Are evolutionary cycles endogenous - determined
only by internal conditions of each elite, or exoge-
nous - defined by some external factors? In favour of
the second assumption would indicate confirmation
of the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 6: There are historical periods when
one or another evolutionary phase dominated in
different countries or even worldwide (“Zeitgeist”).
For example, between the American Revolution
of 1775 and the Europe-wide revolution of 1848 was
the most profound revolutionary upheaval period (F-
period), completely changed the face of our planet
(Hobsbawm, 2004). Here was the French Revolu-
tion of 1789 and a series of revolutions in each of
the countries: Greece, Spain, Italy and other, the
industrial revolution. This period was dominated by
the masses, forcing the ruling elites in all countries
go on the defensive.
As a counter-example can be considered the pe-
riod from 1914 to 1945, when in Germany, Russia,
Italy, Japan was formed authoritarian regimes. The
main activity was generated not from below - by
masses, but rather from top - by cohesive elites seiz-
ing power, and then by they themselves - already as
the ruling regimes. This period was followed by the
bloodiest in the entire previous history wars, the
horrendous human rights violations. It says not
against the elites in general, but rather against those
specific elites, as well as for the fact that people
have to keep the elites under control.
6 CYCLING HYPOTHESIS
There are hypotheses (also owned by the author) that
the historical process has not just a cyclical nature,
but even the regular cyclical nature - with constant
and accurately expressed periods. We do not consid-
er these hypotheses in all cases wrong, but believe
their premature for the following reasons: a) works
in this area affect too often by their scientific dis-
honesty and disrespect of the natural-scientific ap-
proach; b)causes of uniform cycles in most ap-
proaches remain completely unknown – will be pre-
sented only unconvincing coincidence of dates.
But we cannot abandon the presentation in this
paper the results of one of our experiments, because
it indirectly confirms the existence of four phases of
the evolutionary cycle. (This fact is important for
computer simulation of this process.) Namely, it can
be demonstrated for the cycle with a period of 12
years.
One hypothesis suggests that the occurrence of
revolutions more likely during the first two phases
of the cycle (N and F), that is to say - in the first half
of the period. Problem to prove this hypothesis is the
selection of an objective test set of revolutions. To
eliminate arbitrariness of researcher, we decided to
form this collection of several independent sources.
ModellingoftheNaturalEvolutionaryComputationintheHumanSociety
317
We used:
1) The events referred to in the Russian- and
2) German-language article "Revolution" of Wik-
ipedia.
3) Lists of revolutions given in English- (http://en.
wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_revolutions_and_re
bellions),
4) Czech- (http://cs.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seznam_po
vst%C3%A1n%C3%AD_a_revoluc%C3%AD)
5) and German language (http://de.wikipedia.
org/wiki/Bauernkrieg) Wikipedia.
6) List of revolutions on the site http://www. agitclu
b.ru/museum/revolution1/revolution1.htm.
Table 1: Revolutions mentioned not less than by 4 from 6 used sources.
Nr Revolution
Cou-
ntry
Start
Phase
year
12
1
1-st
half
2-nd
half
1-st
half
%
1 Jacquerie a peasant revolt in France (1356–1358)
2
FR 1356 4 1
2 Wat Tiler peasants’ Revolt (England, 1381)
2
GB 1381 5 1
3 German Peasants' War (1524–1525)
2
DE 1524 4 1
4 Eighty Years' War, or Dutch War of Independence NL 1568 0 1
5 English Revolution (1642–1660, Oliver Cromwell) GB 1642 2 1
6 Glorios Revolution in England (1688) GB 1688 0 1
7 Pugachev's Rebellion in Russia (1773–1775)
2
RU 1773 1 1
8 American Revolution (1775–1783)
3
US 1775 3 1
9 French Revolution (1789)
2
FR 1789 5 1
10 Dos de Mayo Uprising (Madrid, 1808) ES 1808 0 1
11 French Revolution of 1848
FR 1848 4 1
12 Revolutions of 1848 in the German states
2
DE 1848 4 1
13 Hungarian Revolution of 1848 HU 1848 4 1
14 Revolutions of 1848 in the Italian states IT 1848 4 1
15 American Civil War US 1861 5 1
16 Revolution of 1905 in Russian Empire RU 1905 1 1
17 Xinhai Revolution in Chine CN 1911 7 1
18 February Revolution 1917 in Russia
2
RU 1917 1 1
19 October Revolution 1917 in Russia
2
RU 1917 1 1
20 German Revolution of 1918–19
2
DE 1918 2 1
21 Spanish Civil War ES 1936 8 1
22 Vietnamese Revolution 1945 (Ho Chi Minh) VN 1945 5 1
23 Egyptian Revolution of 1952 (Gamal Abdel Nasser) EG 1952 0 1
24 Iranian Revolution of 1979
2
IR 1979 3 1
25 Rose Revolution of 2003 in Georgia GE 2003 3 1
26 Orange Revolution of 2004 in Ukraine UA 2004 4 1
27 Tulip Revolution of 2005 in Kyrgyzstan KG 2005 5 1
Total, by 704 events mentioned in some of used sources 401 303 56,96
Total, by 27 revolutions (at least 4 sources) 25 2 92.59
Total, by 10 revolutions (at least 5 sources) 10 0 100.00
1
Phase‐yearofacertaineventforagivencycleisdefinedastheremainderofdividingthedistanceoftheeventdate(inyears)froma
yeartakenastheinitial(weusedthe1400‐th)bytheperiodofthecycle(inthiscase‐12).
2
Revolutionismentionednotlessthanin5sources.
ECTA2014-InternationalConferenceonEvolutionaryComputationTheoryandApplications
318
In these sources appeared 1024 records that re-
flect 704 historical events.
We were interested in the preponderance of the
number of revolutions that began in the first half of
the 12-year cycle period over occurred during the
second half-cycle. It was relative insignificant: 401
events vs. 303 events.
But we noticed that the studied regularities ap-
pear the more clearly, the more powerful and mean-
ingful revolutions considered (it happens when a
powerful main factor will be shaded by full of ran-
dom and secondary factors).To exclude local and
random artefacts and take into account only the most
powerful and significant revolutions, we have used
only those events that are mentioned in at least two,
three or more of these sources. With the increasing
of rigidity of restrictions the preponderance of the
first half period grew. Of 27 revolutions mentioned
no less than in four of listed sources, in the first half
of the 12-year cycle occurred 25 (92%).
The t-test (criterion of Student) showed that this
result is statistically significant. This set of revolu-
tions is shown in Table 1. With five sources (10
revolutions, they are marked in the table with a foot-
note) test indicator reaches 100%. This result sug-
gests that the 12-year cycle can really exist as an
evolutionary cycle.
The fact that it coincides with the cycle used in the
eastern horoscope shows that even a hypothesis that
has not found its proof for thousands of years may
be finally correct.
7 MODELING APPROACH
We are currently exploring the possibility of com-
puter simulation of the above hypothetical mecha-
nism. The following questions are to be decided.
We must create an artificial community of multi-
ple agents having the capacity of cooperative as well
as conflict behaviour.
We have to simulate an artificial aggressive envi-
ronment. Community of agents can adapt to this
environment, only advancing hypotheses about its
character. To test these hypotheses agents must
combine into larger groups.
We need to develop cognitive apparatus for con-
structing of hypotheses and models concerning the
selected artificial external environment. This appa-
ratus should allow agents to exchange models and
hypotheses, evaluate them, and join groups (clan’s,
elites) for their joint support.
We need to develop cognitive apparatus for evaluat-
ing the nature of existing elites. This apparatus is
designed to allow the bulk of agents, without delving
into the specifics of the different models, to support
or reject this or that elites.
8 CONCLUSIONS
We proposed a system of hypotheses about the
mechanism of information processing in the human
society. It seems to be quite robust to serve as a
working hypothesis for the computer modelling and
other studies.
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