———. Hidden Order: How Adaptation Builds Complexity.Helix Books, 1994.
Janssen, Marco A., ed. Complexity and Ecosystem Management: The Theory and Practice of Multi-Agent Systems.Cheltenham Press, 2002.
Johnson, Steen. Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities and Software.Scribner, 2001.
Kauffman, Stuart. At Home in the Universe: The Search for the Laws of Self-Organization and Complexity.Oxford University Press, 1995.
———. The Origins of Order.Oxford University Press, 1993.
Kingsland, Sharon E. Modeling Nature: Episodes in the History of Population Ecology.University of Chicago Press, 1985.
Levin, Simon. Fragile Dominion: Complexity and the Commons.Helix Books, 1994.
Lewin, Roger. Complexity.Macmillan, 1992.
Lotka, Alfred J. Elements of Mathematical Biology.Dover Press, 1924.
Lumsen, Charles J. Genes, Mind, and Culture: The Coevolutionary Process.Harvard University Press, 1981.
Nowak, Martin A., and Robert M. May. Virus Dynamics: Mathematical Principles of Immunology and Virology.Oxford University Press, 2000.
Ruse, Michael. The Evolution Wars: A Guide to the Debates.Rutgers University Press, 2001.
Strogatz, Steven H. Nonlinear Dynamics and Chaos with Applications to Physics, Biology, Chemistry, and Engineering.Addison-Wesley, 1994.
———. Sync: How Order Emerges from Chaos in the Universe, Nature, and Daily Life.Hyperion, 2003.
Ward, Mark. Virtual Organisms: The Startling World of Artificial Life.Thomas Dunne St. Martin’s, 1999.
Bonabeau, Eric, Marco Dorigo, and Guy Theraulz. Swarm Intelligence: From Natural to Artificial Systems.Oxford University Press, 1999.
Eisner, Thomas. For Love of Insects.Belknap Press, 2003.
Gordon, Deborah M. Ants at Work: How an Insect Society Is Organized.Free Press, 1999.
Gotwald, William H. Army Ants: The Biology of Social Predation.Cornell University Press, 1995.
MacArthur, Robert M., and E. O. Wilson. The Theory of Island Biogeography.Princeton University Press (reprint), 2001.
Schnierla, T. C. Army Ants: A Study in Social Organization.W. H. Freeman, 1971.
Wheeler, William Morton. Ants: Their Structure, Development and Behavior.Columbia University Press, 1910.
Three individuals deserve special mention here, as I have played particularly fast and loose with their work. E. O. Wilson is practically a household name, while Walter J. Fontana is one of the rising stars of biocomplexity theory. Andy Ilachinski created the synthetic weapon system, ISAAC/EINstein, on which EMET was loosely based.
What follows does not even come close to being a full accounting of their work, but it does include the books and articles that sparked some of the ideas at the heart of this novel. And needless to say, none of them can be held even remotely responsible for Arkady and Arkasha’s misadventures.
Ancel, L. W., and Walter J. Fontana. “Evolutionary Lock-in and the Origin of Modularity in RNA Structure.” In Modularity: Understanding the Development and Evolution of Complex Natural Systems,edited by W. Callebaut and D. Rasska. MIT Press, 2002.
Fontana, Walter J. “Beyond Digital Naturalism,” Artificial Life1/2 (1994): 211-27.
———. “Modelling Evo-Devo with RNA.” BioEssays24 (2002): 1164-77.
———. “Perspective: Evolution and Detection of Genetic Robustness.” Evolution57, no. 9 (2003): 1959-72.
Fontana, W., J. Lobo, and J. H. Miller. “Neutrality in Technological Landscapes.” 2004.
Fontana, W., and P. Schuster. “Continuity in Evolution: On the Nature of Transitions.” Science280 (1998): 1451-55.
Fontana, Walter J., B. M. R. Stadler, and G. Wagner. “The Topology of the Possible: Formal Spaces Underlying Patterns of Evolutionary Change.” Journal of Theoretical Biology213, no. 2 (2001): 241-74.
Ilachinski, Andrew. Artificial War: Multiagent-Based Simulation of Combat.World Scientific Publishing, 2004.
———. Cellular Automata: A Discrete Universe.World Scientific Publishing, 2001.
Wilson, E. O. Naturalist.Warner Books, 1995.
———. The Social Insects.Harvard University Press, 1971.
———. Sociobiology: The New Synthesis.Belknap Press, 2000.
Wilson, E. O., and Bert Holldobler. The Ants.Belknap Press, 1990.
———. Journey to the Ants: A Story of Scientific Exploration.Belknap Press, 1994.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
A number of friends and colleagues made contributions to this book that went far above and beyond the call of duty. Heartfelt thanks to the following creative, intelligent, and generous people:
Andy Ilachinski for his poetic musings on science fiction, complexity, and cellular automata… and for writing the realsemitechnical primer on nonlinear dynamics, deterministic chaos, and complex adaptive systems.
Lt. Col. Martin E. LaPierre, USMC, for his profound knowledge of expert systems and synthetic weapons design, and his willingness to hear out my wildest speculations and top them.
Tom Seeley and Stephen Pratt for revealing the secret and astounding world of social insects.
Sam Arbesman, Charlie Bennett, Ciro Cattuto, Mavis Dunkor, Lauri Johnsen, Cliff Lasser, Derek Paley, John Smolin, and Steven Strogatz for their willingness to spend otherwise productive segments of their lives on fake science instead of the much more exciting stuff they do.
Kirsten Underwood, Tim Weed, Jim McLaughlin, and Ian McCullough for being the loyal, patient, and insightful readers I have come to rely on.
Anne Groell for remaining her serene self when this book was a year late and running.
And always and above all to Mitchel.
SPIN CONTROL
A Bantam Spectra Book / July 2006
Published by Bantam Dell
A Division of Random House, Inc.
New York, New York
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved
Copyright © 2006 by Chris Moriarty
Bantam Books, the rooster colophon, Spectra, and the portrayal of a boxed “s” are trademarks of Random House, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Moriarty, Chris, 1968–
Spin control / Chris Moriarty.
p. cm.—(A Bantam spectra book)
eISBN-13: 978-0-553-90273-0
eISBN-10: 0-553-90273-3
1. Artificial intelligence—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3613.O749S67 2006
813’.6—dc22
2005057156