Powerful ideas from top nonfiction
Try Blinkist to get the key ideas from 7,000+ bestselling nonfiction titles and podcasts. Listen or read in just 15 minutes.
Start your free trial
Blink 3 of 8 - The 5 AM Club
by Robin Sharma
Listen to the Intro
Simply Complexity summary
Neil F. Johnson
A Clear Guide to Complexity Theory
18 mins
Brief summary
Simply Complexity by Neil F. Johnson is a comprehensive guide to understanding the science of complexity. It offers insightful perspectives on how complex systems occur and interact in our world, using both historical and modern examples.
Topics
Table of Contents
Simply Complexity
Summary of 8 key ideas
Audio & text in the Blinkist app
Key idea 1 of 8
Complexity arises through collective interaction and studying this can help resolve challenging problems.
If you didn’t think about it too hard, you’d probably agree that traffic jams and financial markets are complex things. But ponder over it a little longer and you’ll discover that complexity is actually quite difficult to define. In fact, even the scientific community struggles to provide a clear definition of the term.
However, the author has come up with the following definition of complexity science: the study of phenomena which emerge from a collective of interacting objects. One real-world example of this could be a crowd, in that it emerges from a collection of interacting people.
As an ever-present part of life, complexity manifests in our everyday experience when objects or people compete for resources such as food, space or wealth.
For example, a crowd of financial traders who all want to sell are competing for buyers, and when people get stuck in traffic, they’re competing with other drivers for space on the road. Even a cancer tumor is a “war” in which two competitors – cancer cells and normal cells – fight for space.
As competition sometimes goes awry and leads to conflicts or market crashes, the resulting complexity creates a problem that complexity science can help unravel. The advantage of complexity science is that, drawing on ideas from other sciences such as biology, sociology and ecology, it can solve problems by forming otherwise hidden connections between complex systems.
If we can uncover universal patterns in a complex system in one area of science, this can expedite our understanding of complex systems in other disciplines, therefore enabling us to resolve the problems that stem from them.
So, although complexity science is still in its teething stages, it has a wide range of potential application to different fields, which may make it extremely important in our everyday lives.
Want to see all full key ideas from Simply Complexity?
Key ideas in Simply Complexity
More knowledge in less time
Read or listen
Get the key ideas from nonfiction bestsellers in minutes, not hours.
Find your next read
Get book lists curated by experts and personalized recommendations.
Shortcasts New
We’ve teamed up with podcast creators to bring you key insights from podcasts.
What is Simply Complexity about?
In Simply Complexity, Neil F. Johnson presents an introduction to complexity theory, explaining what complex systems are, where we can spot them in everyday life and how we can benefit from understanding complexity. Although a young field, complexity science already offers us ways to help explain and potentially avoid complex phenomena, such as traffic jams, financial market crashes and modern warfare.
Best quote from Simply Complexity
Complexity is deeply ingrained in our everyday lives.
—Neil F. Johnson
Who should read Simply Complexity?
- Anyone interested in new explorations in science
- Anyone intrigued by the increasing complexity of today’s world
- Anyone who wants to better understand complex phenomena such as dating and warfare
Categories with Simply Complexity
Book summaries like Simply Complexity
People ❤️ Blinkist
Sven O.
It's highly addictive to get core insights on personally relevant topics without repetition or triviality. Added to that the apps ability to suggest kindred interests opens up a foundation of knowledge.
Thi Viet Quynh N.
Great app. Good selection of book summaries you can read or listen to while commuting. Instead of scrolling through your social media news feed, this is a much better way to spend your spare time in my opinion.
Jonathan A.
Life changing. The concept of being able to grasp a book's main point in such a short time truly opens multiple opportunities to grow every area of your life at a faster rate.
Renee D.
Great app. Addicting. Perfect for wait times, morning coffee, evening before bed. Extremely well written, thorough, easy to use.
People also liked these summaries
4.7 Stars
Average ratings on iOS and Google Play
28 Million
Downloads on all platforms
10+ years
Experience igniting personal growth