Editing Heterarchy (section)

{{Short description|System of organization where the elements of the organization are unranked}}
A '''heterarchy''' is a system of organization where the elements of the organization are unranked (non-[[Hierarchy|hierarchical]]) or where they possess the potential to be ranked a number of different ways.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Crumley | first = Carole L. | title=Heterarchy and the Analysis of Complex Societies| journal = Archeological Papers of the American Anthropological Association | volume = 6| issue = 1 |date=January 1995  | pages = 1–5 | url= http://www.sonoma.edu/users/p/purser/Anth590/crumley%20heterarchy.pdf| access-date = 26 February 2014 | doi=10.1525/ap3a.1995.6.1.1| citeseerx = 10.1.1.502.397 }}</ref> Definitions of the term vary among the disciplines: in social and information sciences, heterarchies are [[Network theory|networks]] of elements in which each element shares the same "horizontal" position of power and authority, each playing a theoretically equal role. In biological taxonomy, however, the requisite features of heterarchy involve, for example, a species sharing, with a species in a different [[Family (biology)|family]], a common ancestor which it does not share with members of its own family. This is theoretically possible under principles of "[[horizontal gene transfer]]".

A heterarchy may be orthogonal to a [[hierarchy]], subsumed to a hierarchy, or it may contain hierarchies; the two kinds of structure are not mutually exclusive. In fact, each level in a hierarchical system is composed of a potentially heterarchical group.

The concept of heterarchy was first employed in a modern context by [[cybernetics|cybernetician]] [[Warren Sturgis McCulloch|Warren McCulloch]] in 1945.<ref>McCulloch (1945), "A heterarchy of values determined by the topology of nervous nets", pp. 89–93</ref> As Carole L. Crumley has summarised, "[h]e examined alternative [[Cognition|cognitive]] structure(s), the collective organization of which he termed heterarchy. He demonstrated that the human brain, while reasonably orderly was not organized hierarchically. This understanding revolutionized the neural study of the brain and solved major problems in the fields of [[artificial intelligence]] and computer design."<ref>Crumley (1995), "Heterarchy and the analysis of complex societies", p. 3.</ref>