Some Thoughts On The Value of Networks: Nature

When I wrote a bit about Metcalfe's 'Law', my thoughts drew to the whole idea of how one could assess the value of a network. There are probably a lot of people running around, tripping over their intellectual shoe-strings, shouting about the values of networks. I've read some of the better original works about collective intelligence and scoffed at the books-as-memes-department of recent years because at some levels, they don't seem to get it. I don't know what it is that they don't get, but something seems intuitively wrong with many of the things I've read. Granted, I may be wrong, but if I am wrong I'll reveal my thoughts and wait for feedback.

Let's toss technology completely out of this for now. Let's talk about nature's networks. For example, bees pollinating a flower.

Networking: Of Birds and Bees

A few mornings ago, I witnessed a spectacular thing. I'd been up all night and watched the sun rise - but in my regular morning standing area, I heard an insistent buzz. It was almost an electrical sort of buzz - I am used to hearing such buzzes given my life experiences around electrical things - but it was subtlely different. It was the sound of what must have been a few thousand bees buzzing around the limonella tree, which blossomed at night and whose fragrance was quite high. Still dark, the bees were up early - I don't know how early - but they were there with an ominous buzz. I got my emergency epinephrine, just in case.

I walked to within 6 feet of them, sat down with my coffee and watched. The sun slowly rose. A small hummingbird amazingly negotiated all of the bees and made it's way into the inner sanctum of many flowers. A bumblebee fought for purchase. The sun crept up to the point on the horizon where it suddenly leaps across it - and by the time it had done so, petals were scattered on the ground - bees landed on them and were frustrated. A few errant bees made it my way, I stayed still. The feeding birds which ate insects stayed away from that tree - a tribute to the ominous sound of the swarm, perhaps. Within an hour, the swarm diminished and the Great Kiskedees and Tropical Mockingbirds ate a few of those who lagged behind.

While this was a wonderful scene which I could not capture with my camera - I did try - it was also a merging of networks.

Eusocial bees are known for their social structure, and a swarm even of this small magnitude is something which requires a healthy respect and caution. The wrong action could send a swarm to defend a hive or food source, and few people over the age of 3 would willingly do so. They are many, and through communication which mankind is still evaluating - they are a dynamic network. The value of that network can be best seen as survival. We do not know what bees think - or if they do - but we do know that they are quite effective at harvesting food sources and assuring the safety of the hive.

What isn't too well known is that honey bees have a dance language which was observed by Aristotle in 330 BC, and studied further over the centuries - Karl von Frisch received a Nobel Prize for work studying the dance. This dance allows bees to tell other bees where there is food - some also believe odor is involved as well. What we do know is that we're not 100% sure how bees do what they do, but we have some ideas. However that information gets across to other bees, it certainly does - and is acted upon with great efficiency, or at least an efficiency greater than our own.

That is an information network, per se. But it isn't, either. Can we say that the value of the hive increases with the number of bees in the hive? Maybe. But then how do we explain the semisocial bees? They, too, have survived - and have done so without swarms. A point to ponder.

Let's get back to the flowering tree. The right things happened, and suddenly the flowers blossomed and sent the fragrance out. Each flower has reproductive organs. Each flower, if pollinated, has the potential to become viable seed - and that seed may become a tree in turn to continue the cycle. But is the tree a network? Yes - and no. It is only a network when it is being pollinated, at least in this context (there are other variations we could look at). What is the value of that network? Again, survival.

When these two networks meet, we humans may be think of more flowering plants with pleasing scents and honey for someone to collect and place on a store shelf. Our knowledge of the networks typically doesn't go beyond the products we want - be it the collection of honey or the picking of flowers to woo a female. Yet networks produced these things - and they are networks in the sense which we have mimicked in some ways. In fact, even my description here is rudimentary: We don't know exactly how all of this works. We have some theories, and they seem to be pretty good - but they aren't all-encompassing. That is why people study such things.

Do we count the value of honey and flowers in the number of bees and flowers on the planet? No. We do not. We mix the products of these things into our own economy of values - which is somewhat disconnected from the networks which created these items.

More coming...