Re:There’s no such thing as a tree (phylogenetically)
by lukeasrodgers on Thursday March 09, 2023 @05:21PM
(#35087645)
For me, the sense in which it "unites a lot of seemingly disparate phenomena" is not that different than the sense in which "purple" unites a lot of purple things. It is true that they are all purple, but ultimately not very interesting or useful. Of course as a concept it is more complex and richer than "purple" hence why academics are able to write so many books and articles using it. I just don't recall ever having read anything that used these concepts to describe phenomena X and then felt like I better understood phenomena X, other than that I know realized it was sort of rhizomey.
I think this is basically the point. Understand the world around you, and especially the connections and influences between different components of a system (broadly defined), to form and verify more holistic, nth-order models rather than disconnected, first-order-only analyses.
I think it goes beyond "cool idea" and really strikes at the same kinds of intuitions that many on HN appreciate as regards simple models that explain complex phenomena. In this sense, then, D&G's work is a sort of "meta-model" for guiding intuitions when building specific models about specific systems.
It is not a predictive framework. I guess I would call it an "ontological/architectural" framework.