Perspective chapter: Affordance-based Reverse Engineering of Natural Systems

Abstract

Affordance-based Reverse Systems Engineering (ARSE) focuses on the key enabling relationships between elements of a complex system (part-to-part affordances), and the enabling relationships between the system and its end users (end-user affordances). A novel application of this methodology to natural systems assists in a deeper understanding of the issues surrounding biological evolution, and the critical role of those precursor systems upon which it depends for success. ARSE represents an objective approach to these important questions since affordances simply delineate what actions the elements of a complex system, including the end user, can potentially take. Life-related systems are characterized by dependent sequences of affordances that are both spatially and chronologically nested across a broad spectrum of scientific disciplines. A reverse engineering approach that attends to all these sequences contributes to a more philosophically satisfying retrodiction in applying abductive reasoning to both the human condition and the cosmos as a whole.