What is Complexity?
Making sense of the whole as more than the sum of its parts.
Complex systems are made up of components, which interact with each other and their environment. Through layers and networks of interaction, novel information is created which makes it hard to predict the future behavior of the system. Studying components of these systems in isolation, without interaction, simply isn't enough information! Join us on our quest as we attempt to understand the relationship between these networks of interaction and the "emergent" properties they produce within important, real-world complex systems.
Explore Complexity from Different Perspectives
Discover diverse and inclusive approaches to tackle global issues.
Complexity is an interdisciplinary and inclusive framework for studying, designing, and controlling complex system behavior, such as global pandemics, extreme weather events, electoral politics, economic recovery, and poverty. Many of the individuals and teams participating at our events continue collaborating to this day.
What Can You Expect During a Summit?
There are many ways to participate in a Summit cohort, and all of them are equally valid. Choose your own adventure! All modes of participation are welcome as we navigate our personal and team Complexity journeys together.
April 2023 Summit Guides
At Complexity Adventures events, Guides lead interactive sessions, mentor teams, share Complexity knowledge and experience, host impactful connections, introduce problem-solving frameworks and tooling, and ultimately help individuals and teams accomplish their goals.
Shaun Applegate-Swanson
Shaun co-founded Complexity Weekend to empower teams to "Learn Complexity by Doing" while working to solve the world's toughest problems together. At Microsoft, Shaun leads a team of full-stack (Python/Scala) data scientists and engineers, which has developed access management scoring and anomaly detection systems to enforce the Principle of Least Privilege throughout data centers worldwide. His personal research interests involve combining Complexity Science with Thermodynamics/Statistical Mechanics axioms to peek at fundamental properties of emergent phenomena.
Shaun Applegate-Swanson
Principal Data Scientist at Microsoft; Co-Founder at Gem Finders; Co-Founder at Complexity Adventures
Michaela Emch
With 20 years of experience in communication, training, coaching, and facilitation, Michaela is a communication and marketing specialist, translator, cultural mediator, biomimicry practitioner, safari guide, keen naturalist, and biology enthusiast. She is looking for links where people have not yet connected the dots. Her Masters in International Relations, and the capacity for abstraction gained from her MBA in Aviation Management, help her handle the multicultural and interdisciplinary impact of communication across diverse fields of application. Her fields of interest include: international relations, cultural adaptation, process optimization, sustainable and regenerative thinking, biomimicry, and systems thinking.
Michaela Emch
Founder at Eclosions; Member at Biomimicry Switzerland
What people are saying about Complexity Adventures
Since 2019, over 100 Guides have mentored over 750 Adventurers, with more than 50 teams emerging to work on complex issues together. Join this robust global community of Applied Complexity practitioners
April 2023 Organizers
Organizers are often in the background as Guides and Adventurers interact. Their mission is to create accessible environments and structures to encourage prosocial and productive interactions among community members, and to support Guides as much as possible.