The question I have for hierarchy theorists is how the structuring of such a system avoids the arbitrary negation or deprivation of potentially valuable parts that have been deemed at a lower level of value? — JerseyFlight

It would seem that this logically follows from the conclusion that structures can only be as strong as the quality of their individual parts/ at the same time there is a dialectic here, the individual parts receive their quality from the nature of the whole. — JerseyFlight

That's how hierarchy theory works. It is about the dialectical interaction between parts and wholes. And the two have to complement each other for the structure to persist.

So the whole - the global scale of the system - has to provide the constraints that shapes the right kind of parts. And the parts have to have the right kind of shape to meet the goals of the whole. The parts, in all their freedom, have to be acting in ways that re-construct that whole, in other words.

Think about an army. You need soldiers that act like soldiers and generals that act like generals.

That is the soldiers need to be good at acting on the ground in ways that produce a functional army. They must have the right habits to deal with the here and now of any combat situation.

Then the generals in their field headquarters need to be good at acting in ways that also produce a functional army. They must make the broad command decisions that shape the local combat situations as they will likely pop up during battle.

The hierarchical organisation works because it has a global view which gives shape to the local action. And the local action has enough of a view - enough of its own creative freedom - that on average it produces the kind of result which keeps the army rolling.

The notion of a hierarchy has gathered a lot of negative connotations. No one wants to get told what to do. No one wants to be on the bottom rung of anything.

But if you want a system that is intelligently adaptive, then it needs to have this kind of organisation. It needs to be able to apply its intelligence over multiple scales of being, multiple spatiotemporal horizons of action.

If the balance between the local and global scales are right, then the right outcomes will result. The local scale will continue to construct the whole, and the whole will continue to give coherent form its own parts. The system will survive and function, locked into a dynamic of mutual benefit.

And part of the dynamic is that there is internal mobility. Privates can get made generals. Generals can get busted to privates.

Or at least this is part of the democratic ideal we instinctively understand as being a smart way to operate.

That's how hierarchy theory works. It is about the dialectical interaction between parts and wholes. And the two have to complement each other for the structure to persist. — apokrisis

I thought it was about organizing complexity into hierarchical structures? The notion of "complement" could be problematic here.

So the whole - the global scale of the system - has to provide the constraints that shapes the right kind of parts. And the parts have to have the right kind of shape to meet the goals of the whole. The parts, in all their freedom, have to be acting in ways that re-construct that whole, in other words. — apokrisis

"The right kind of part," this is where it gets into it. "Right kind of shape to meet the goals," [of the system]. Surely you admit this is not a straight-forward or uncontroversial process? I am not claiming that hierarchy theory is false or that it should not be utilized, these are just my preliminary thoughts. What concerns me is a kind of instrumental tyranny. How does the system avoid this? What criteria does it use to determine what is "right?" How does it come to generate its idea of "goal?"

I imagine at the end of the day, depending on how this is calculated (and I'm not sure that pragmatism is good enough here) the creation of a kind of tyrannical hierarchy. Why is this not a potential danger of the system?

Surely you admit this is not a straight-forward or uncontroversial process? — JerseyFlight

Usual evolutionary logic applies. If it works, it will survive.

What concerns me is a kind of instrumental tyranny. How does the system avoid this? — JerseyFlight

What would that tyranny look like? How often would it occur in Nature where hierarchy theory is all about self organising systems?

What would that tyranny look like? — apokrisis

Tyranny could possibly look like a hierarchy systems model that organizes society in such a way that it ends up negating value. A so-called scientifically justified class structure. As I said in my introduction, "one must be able to locate the thwarting of potential, developmental value."

However, it should be made clear that all human systems of organization, including religion, face this same dilemma. It is not unique to any one system.

How often would it occur in Nature where hierarchy theory is all about self organising systems? — apokrisis

I have a hard time embracing the idea of self-organization in terms of Nature. Further, it is not clear to me that Nature's movement (I purposely did not call it organization) provides a model of intelligence for human society. I believe thought may be the only thing suited to such a procedure. If you are talking about mimicking patterns you claim to find in Nature, I would need more than just the fact that you believe you found a pattern, and therefore it automatically becomes normative, designated a form of intelligence.

For clarify: dialectics originally meant bringing far apart ideas together thru discursive reasoning. After Hegel, dialectic meant bring contradictions into a unity of synthesis. With Hegel you have thesis, antithesis, and conclusion as synthesis. Sometimes Hegel had four or more terms in a syllogism of this kind

Tyranny could possibly look like a hierarchy systems model that organizes society in such a way that it ends up negating value. — JerseyFlight

Right. So the theory says top down constraints and bottom up construction must be opposed forces in balance. And guess what? Humans figured out that democracy was a good idea because it could balance those two aspects of social organisation - local scale competition and global scale cooperation.

From the functional view of hierarchical organisation we can of course also diagnose the dysfunctional.

[

If you are talking about mimicking patterns you claim to find in Nature, I would need more than just the fact that you believe you found a pattern, and therefore it automatically becomes normative, designated a form of intelligence. — JerseyFlight

What you believe is neither here nor there.

With Hegel you have thesis, antithesis, and conclusion as synthesis. — Gregory

No friend, this is the most common distortion of Hegel. This is refuted in Jon Stewart, Hegel Myth and Legends. :smile:

I've seen the YouTube video where it's claimed the formula of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis is not in Hegel. But I've read it in Hegel! He simply uses more than three terms at times in his syllogisms

Humans figured out that democracy was a good idea because it could balance those two aspects of social organisation - local scale competition and global scale cooperation. — apokrisis

My questions are meant to probe Hierarchy Theory in terms of its general framework, not the specific findings of any one theorist. While I agree with Democracy, my questions are along the lines of, is it possible for a Hierarchy theorist to arrive at an alternative conclusion, meritocracy perhaps? As I understand it, we are talking about the successful arrangement of complex information? What is informing the calculation of success here? As I see it Hierarchy Theory would not specifically mean the conclusion of Democracy.

But I've read it in Hegel — Gregory

Then you will have to cite it.

Being+Nothing=Becoming is one example

As I see it Hierarchy Theory would not specifically mean the conclusion of Democracy. — JerseyFlight

As you see it? If you knew something about hierarchy theory, then your opinions might carry more weight.

I gave you a simple example of the organisation of an army. If you can think of a better alternative functional structure, than present that.

Which is the more intelligent and effective fighting force, the Greek citizen-soldier hoplite or some barbarian horde?

As I understand it, we are talking about the successful arrangement of complex information? — JerseyFlight

What I am talking about is the natural logic of hierarchical organisation. It is the obvious way that Nature is going to arrange itself to achieve any function or finality.

Human social order is just one tiny example.

It is my goal not to get caught up in anything personal here. I would not have started a thread on Hierarchy Theory if I didn't have a basic understanding of it. But that is just it, my understanding here is only basic, that's why this thread is title Preliminary Questions. I appreciate your discourse because you are well versed in Hierarchy Theory.

As per your army analogy,"the soldiers need to be good at acting on the ground in ways that produce a functional army. ...the generals in their field headquarters need to be good at acting in ways that also produce a functional army."

The question of functionality is just my point. One can produce a system that is functional, while at the same time lacking intelligence, thwarting of potential value, unless you claim that functionality is synonymous with intelligence and value inflation? That is, where you have functionality there you also have the maximization of value. This premise is difficult for me to embrace. My concern is whether or not the formation of a hierarchical system could produce functionality, while at the same time negating potential value?

What I am talking about is the natural logic of hierarchical organisation. It is the obvious way that Nature is going to arrange itself to achieve any function or finality. — apokrisis

I see that you are calling it "natural," but my point is that if true, 1) this wouldn't automatically make it a form of intelligence and 2) this notion of natural order could be used to justify a system of hierarchy, that though functional, would ultimately lead to the negation of value.

The question of functionality is just my point. One can produce a system that is functional, while at the same time lacking intelligence, thwarting of potential value, unless you claim that functionality is synonymous with intelligence and value inflation? — JerseyFlight

The brand of hierarchy theory I am talking about is the one that comes out of theoretical biology. So it is the modern science-based view of self organisation in nature. But it also reflects the long tradition of organicism and dialectics in metaphysical thought. As such, it embraces finality as a fundamental cause - one half of the dialectic which is final cause and efficient cause (or alternatively, formal cause and material cause).

Thus functionality is a general way to talk about final cause. And this finality can be just a "dumb" material tendency - the kind of brute physical goal encoded in the Laws of Thermodynamics. Or it could be the "intelligent" desires of some human community.

Hierarchy theory is broad enough to span the full gamut of natural teleology. And it in fact constructs its hierarchy on the emergence of grades of telos - physics at the bottom, human psychology at the top.

So your remarks don't feel accurately target. You already have some distorted impression about hierarchical organisation. And that leads you to seek some wedge complaint like "functional doesn't necessarily mean intelligent".

But hierarchy theory already deals with that. Functionality is Nature self-organising in ways that permit it to actually exist - as a persisting flow or process. It is simply an expression of the evolutionary principle.

That is neither "dumb" nor "intelligent". It is simply the logic of nature. To want to paint it as dumb or intelligent is to believe nature must meet some human standard of behaviour. Or worse yet, the standard of some divine intellect.

I see that you are calling it "natural," but my point is that if true, 1) this wouldn't automatically make it a form of intelligence and 2) this notion of natural order could be used to justify a system of hierarchy, that though functional, would ultimately lead to the negation of value. — JerseyFlight

It "automatically" subsumes any notion of what counts as being intelligent or valuable.

You are applying the perspective of transcendent idealism. You speak of intelligence and value as if they are Platonic finalities. That leads you to complain about the huge potential for the real world to be imperfect when held up against the shining example of the thoughts in the mind of some divine intellect.

The whole point of hierarchy theory - as an expression of natural philosophy - is to instead accept that the world creates itself through its own emergent self-organising logic. Nature is rationally structured because that is what works. So no need for creating gods. This is a metaphysics of immanent bootstrapping.

You are talking about hierarchies being a choice. And as humans, we do think we can design our own social systems. But how much freedom do we really have on that score?

I think your comments reflect the unrealistic expectations people build up because they don't look close enough at actual human society and fail to appreciate the telos it ends up pursuing.

Why are we so "dysfunctionally" burning fossil fuel and living it large as a species of consumers? Well, hierarchy theory tells us that natural systems are naturally focused on just that mission of maximising entropy production.

And if you look far enough into the future and discover you don't like where that leads, then you need to "intelligently" turn the ship around.

Either that or civilisation collapses.

And what of it, in Nature's eyes? Another failed species to add the long list. Or maybe even a successful species that popped up to liberate a geologically trapped store of entropy in a sudden exponential burst, then departed the scene, job well done.

To start saying Nature has to choose - either decide to be smart of dumb - is to lapse back into transcendental idealism. It is pretending that the human mind in all its proven short-sightedness is somehow also the divine ideal informing metaphysical existence.

At best, humans are a particular complex expression of Nature. And hierarchy theory gives us the dialectical logic of how Nature could immanently self-organise its way into such a state of complexity.

And it in fact constructs its hierarchy on the emergence of grades of telos - physics at the bottom, human psychology at the top. — apokrisis

Hard to see how it could be any other way, though I suppose in social terms the relationship here is dialectical, one accounts for the quality of the other.

Functionality is Nature self-organising in ways that permit it to actually exist - as a persisting flow or process. It is simply an expression of the evolutionary principle. — apokrisis

What I am getting at is simply the question of thought's mediation. We used to eat each other. One could argue that because that was the way nature organized itself, therefor it comprised functionality. And in a real sense I suppose it did, but we can see a greater functionality beyond it. To observe human society at the point of cannibalism and then conclude that this is nature organizing itself... What am I missing here?

To want to paint it as dumb or intelligent is to believe nature must meet some human standard of behaviour. Or worse yet, the standard of some divine intellect. — apokrisis

This is not my position. My position is that nature is not a standard. My position is that intelligence can construct better procedures. What I am against is the dumb declaration that what we observe in nature is somehow a standard of intelligence in terms of social process.

It "automatically" subsumes any notion of what counts as being intelligent or valuable. — apokrisis

If by this you mean, what you observe, and then claim to demarcate as natural order, automatically incurs to itself intelligence or value, this is what I do not accept. I do not deny that we find processes in nature, but just because we find humans eating each other at some point in history, is not enough to claim that this automatically makes it a process of intelligence or value just because we find it bin nature.

I am not a transcendental idealist, if anything, it seems you are positing a kind of natural idealism. When I refer to the mediation of thought, I am not referring to supernaturalism, if anything I am referring to criticism, most specifically negative dialectics. This is a continuing process not some Platonic finality. Thought can and does correct the chaos of the natural order.

That leads you to complain about the huge potential for the real world to be imperfect when held up against the shining example of the thoughts in the mind of some divine intellect. — apokrisis

This is strange to me, I don't see why you assume that thought is powerless to mediate? We are not talking about a divine intellect, we are talking about human thought. And neither am I saying that Hierarchy Theory is false, valueless or incapable of mediation. I am trying to ask critical questions against what I perceive to be a kind dogmatism, possibly even a naivety that has to do with an idealized version of nature.

The whole point of hierarchy theory - as an expression of natural philosophy - is to instead accept that the world creates itself through its own emergent self-organising logic. Nature is rationally structured because that is what works. So no need for creating gods. This is a metaphysics of immanent bootstrapping. — apokrisis

Yes, this is a metaphysics that I am calling into question. There is a non-transparent interpretation taking place here which seems to project itself as a finality. Where you say, accept the fact of self-organizing-logic, I see the potential for tyranny. I am trying to analyze it to see if this is the case. Like Adorno, I believe the highest duty of philosophy is to prevent things like Auschwitz from ever happening.

You are talking about hierarchies being a choice. And as humans, we do think we can design our own social systems. But how much freedom do we really have on that score? — apokrisis

You have already mentioned the foundation in this sense, physics and psychology. Of course, everything is out of our control in terms of the universe, but not in terms of our own provincialism. Marx understood that freedom was a product of determining the order of systems. In other words, one attempts to control the levers of determinism. One becomes conscious of how individuals are shaped by systems, one then tries to construct qualitative systems. I'm guessing we agree on this point, and by God, what other option do we have?

I think your comments reflect the unrealistic expectations people build up because they don't look close enough at actual human society and fail to appreciate the telos it ends up pursuing. — apokrisis

You are one of the most intelligent thinkers I have discoursed with on this Forum, and because of this I would not rule out what you say here.

To start saying Nature has to choose - either decide to be smart of dumb - is to lapse back into transcendental idealism. It is pretending that the human mind in all its proven short-sightedness is somehow also the divine ideal informing metaphysical existence. — apokrisis

Man is nature, nature is man. Again, I am not referring to mysticism, just the power of thought. History proves that progress can be made... of course, we are now tumbling into a kind of black hole insofar as the future is concerned. Knowing how to proceed at this stage of existential awareness is a most interesting and urgent question. I for one just can't resign myself to hedonism.

We used to eat each other. — JerseyFlight

And in what evolutionary context exactly? Let's have a little more precision in our arguments.

To observe human society at the point of cannibalism and then conclude that this is nature organizing itself... What am I missing here? — JerseyFlight

The easily available anthropological examination of where "cannibalism" appears in nature as a functional behaviour.

If you want to argue it isn't nature organising itself, what you are missing is the effort you would need to make to get acquainted with the evidence. Dispute that first, talk about your beliefs after.

What I am against is the dumb declaration that what we observe in nature is somehow a standard of intelligence in terms of social process. — JerseyFlight

You are arguing against a position you don't yet understand - by your own admission.

And why should I worry about dragging you kicking and screaming to your conversion? What's in it for me?

I am not a transcendental idealist, — JerseyFlight

You think you aren't and yet the argument you make is. I'm just pointing up that contradiction.

it seems you are positing a kind of natural idealism. — JerseyFlight

Yep. The pan-semiotic kind.

I am trying to ask critical questions against what I perceive to be a kind dogmatism, possibly even a naivety that has to do with an idealized version of nature. — JerseyFlight

Why ask a question when you have already assembled your reasons to never believe?

Where you say, accept the fact of self-organizing-logic, I see the potential for tyranny — JerseyFlight

Of course. The facts have to be twisted to fit your prejudices. You make that clear in every response.

Like Adorno, I believe the highest duty of philosophy is to prevent things like Auschwitz from ever happening. — JerseyFlight

Argument by virtue signalling. Seems legit.

Of course, everything is out of our control in terms of the universe, but not in terms of our own provincialism. — JerseyFlight

The Universe has a flow. As organisms, we are embedded in that flow. To the degree we don't question the impact of that, we will unthinkingly get carried along by that flow. All that is agreed.

The question then is what we will actually think about the situation once we realise we are entrained by it? That is where the "philosophy" can start.

And the answer probably isn't "nature is bad".

However my point remains - how could one even address this question unless one has a crystal clear understanding of Nature as it actually is?

Hierarchy theory - as the basic structuralist model of complex reality - is the way to arrive at that understanding. It's inherent organicism stands opposed to both a mechanical conception of nature, and a spiritual one.

Hierarchies are triadic structures. The systems science story. The step that leads on to a semiotic conception of nature. It accounts for complexity in terms of self-organising immanence.

So that makes it a self-consistent metaphysics. It is its own tradition in the history of ideas.

And what it stands against is the monism of a mechanical view of nature - a place where only a dumb atomistic simplicity is considered as real. There just is no such thing as final cause. That would be an "unscientific" delusion.

It likewise stands against the dualistic tradition we find from Plato to Descartes. The mechanical view can't explain how an orderly world could get created. The idealist instead take the creating mind for granted. There is final cause, but it comes from outside of creation.

So it boils down to a choice between three broad metaphysical alternatives. Hierarchy theory is part of the way that science can assert the natural philosophy point of view.

It is the way that the dialectic of the material and the ideal can be properly fused into the one larger story.

If you think "hierarchy theory" is all about hierarchical organisation gone bad, then you are likely thinking of machine-like situations in human history and not of Nature itself.

Study hierarchy theory and you will see that this mechanical conception of Nature is precisely what it critiques. It has a model of what "bad" looks like. It talks of machines as brittle and senescent - overly constrained and lacking in adaptive intelligence.

It is hard to think of any complex human-made system – from brick buildings to software systems, societies, and institutions – that does not have a hierarchical structure — JerseyFlight

Isn't the global Internet a perfectly obvious counterexample?

Of course the Domain Name System (DNS) is hierarchical, but the Internet would work fine without it, if less conveniently. The Backbone system is an engineering hierarchy that makes the system more efficient, but again it's not necessary to the functioning of the Internet. The Internet itself is peer-to-peer and even its basic design and protocols are public and developed through collaborative technical proposals called RFCs, with no central authority. There is no central authority on the Internet.

Isn't the global Internet a perfectly obvious counterexample? — fishfry

The internet is hierarchical in its hardware design - https://www.hierarchystructure.com/internets-hierarchical-structure/

But much more interestingly, it is hierarchical in the fashion of a scalefree network. It exhibits the natural fractal or powerlaw behaviour of any freely branching "far from equilbrium" system.

Two observations. First, the salient feature of a hierarchy is that one element is superior to every other element; but there are complex and self-organising structures in which this is not the case; edit: and these are not hierarchical. Second, that we can form hierarchies does not imply that we ought form hierarchies.

The internet is hierarchical in its hardware design - https://www.hierarchystructure.com/internets-hierarchical-structure/ — apokrisis

That article uses the word hierarchical incorrectly and fails to back up its incorrect assertion; in fact, it perfectly well describes the peer-to-peer nature of the Internet as implemented via the TCP/IP protocol suite. TCP/IP is a pure software specification and does not specify any particular hardware implementation. I did mention the Backbone network in order to get ahead of this particular objection regarding the engineering aspects of the Internet, as opposed to its essential nature as a pure peer-to-peer network. I distinguish the essential and original design of the Internet from its current implementation, which does have hierarchical features: namely the DNS system and the Backbone networks.

First, the salient feature of a hierarchy is that one element is superior to every other element; but there are complex and self-organising structures in which this is not the case. — Banno

So it's a salient feature unless it's not? Well, that clears up any confusion I guess.

Second, that we can form hierarchies does not imply that we ought form hierarchies. — Banno

The question is about nature and why it does in fact organise itself hierarchically - the logical inevitability of that.

The salient feature of a hierarchy is that one element is superior to every other element; but there are complex and self-organising structures in which this is not the case. And these are not hierarchical.

The implied conclusion, which I thought obvious, italicises for you.

More interesting might be tangled hierarchies.

TCP/IP in fact is a pure software specification and is not hierarchical in any way. — fishfry

So the peer-to-peer is implemented at a software level ... not the hardware level? And the article was about the hardware level.

And then at the software level - given a carefully-levelled playing field - we find, as I said, a scalefree network structure emerging?

One with a fat tail distribution of connectivity? One where no designing hand was involved and yet a hierarchical distribution of "significance" was formed? We see agglomeration and disintermediation as the signature of the dynamics?

The question is about nature and why it does in fact organise itself hierarchically - the logical inevitability of that. — apokrisis

Always? Everywhere? Everywhen?

...but there are complex and self-organising structures in which this is not the case. And these are not hierarchical. — Banno

Sounds legit. Did you want that lack of hierarchical order computer generated or nature generated?....



Bleeding Hofstadter. You really need to read some other book on the subject.

So the peer-to-peer is implemented at a software level ... not the hardware level? — apokrisis

Yes. TCP/IP is a pure software networking protocol. It's independent of any particular hardware implementation. As you may know, every single Internet packet includes the source address and the final destination address. The routing is entirely up to the network. All Internet communication is essentially peer-to-peer. No packet has any idea how it will be routed. It only knows its ultimate destination. This is very basic technical information about how the 'net works.

And the article was about the hardware level. — apokrisis

We have huge telecommunication companies so it's no surprise that the current hardware implementation is hierarchical, as I mentioned in my initial post -- precisely to avoid this objection. How the Internet happens to be implemented is separate from its essential peer-to-peer nature. See for example Comer, Internetworking with TCP/IP, the standard text on the subject.

https://www.pearson.com/us/higher-education/program/Comer-Internetworking-with-TCP-IP-Volume-One-6th-Edition/PGM138190.html

And then at the software level - given a carefully-levelled playing field - we find, as I said, a scalefree network structure emerging? — apokrisis

I don't see that at all, except as a byproduct of the contingent hardware implementation. One could in theory imagine a fully-connected graph of nodes, in which AT&T and the other monster telcos would not have a death grip on human communication. One could argue that this is exactly the vision the original Internet developers had in mind. One wouldn't have to argue too strenuously, since they explicitly intended a pure peer-to-peer network.

One with a fat tail distribution of connectivity? — apokrisis

Again, this is a byproduct of the contingent hardware implementation resulting from the existing hierarchical structure of huge telecommunication companies. It's neither required by the fundamental protocols nor is it necessary to the functioning of the Internet. One could argue compellingly that it's become counter to the original intent of the Internet.

One where no designing hand was involved and yet a hierarchical distribution of "significance" was formed? We see agglomeration and disintermediation as the signature of the dynamics? — apokrisis

Only because the telecommunications behemoths already existed and got their (grubby) hands on it; to the detriment of the original open and free aims intended by the original academic designers.

Perhaps you are arguing that the original Internet designers were naive academics and should have seen it all coming. Or perhaps since the original Arpanet was funded by the government, the naive academics were tools and their vision of unfettered open communications among all humanity was a delusion. You'd have a point, based on how things turned out.

Always? Everywhere? Everywhen? — Banno

What exception did you have in mind?

-

It seems to me that your reply is made up of many reductions and mischaracterizations, but it also contains substance. I have learned from reading your posts and often appreciate your compacted style.
Where you accuse me of dogmatism I must deny the charge. Instead of actually engaging some of my objections you classify them in a negative light.

When I said, 'Where you say, accept the fact of self-organizing-logic, I see the potential for tyranny.'

Your reply here was not only condescending, but fallacious: "Of course. The facts have to be twisted to fit your prejudices. You make that clear in every response."

Not at all. I am open to this, but I am wisely contesting its authority. It is a tremendously authoritative claim.

When someone starts talking about accepting self-organizing logic, they are going to bear the burden of proof.

When I said, 'Like Adorno, I believe the highest duty of philosophy is to prevent things like Auschwitz from ever happening.'

Your reply is another false framing of my position:

"Argument by virtue signalling. Seems legit."

The reason I address this is because my position on the purpose and duty of philosophy is more important to me than this entire conversation. You make it sound like I am trying to enlist some technique of rhetoric here. This is not the case. This was Adorno's position and it is also mine. I do not believe the duty of philosophy is to play abstract games, but use thought to affect reality in a positive way. Philosophy has no higher duty or purpose than to enlist itself against social horrors like Auschwitz or the Soviet Union. "The whole point of philosophy," said Adorno, "was to make sure that nothing like Auschwitz ever happens again." He was correct. I stand by it and will defend it.

What exception did you have in mind? — apokrisis

• pigmentation of a porphyry olive shell
• lichen growth
• zebra and giraffe coat patterns
• hexagonal Bénard convection cells
• spiral patterns produced by the Belousov-Zhabotinski reaction

That sort of thing.