Complex mind, simple mind

In early March, Sina Finance published my signed article "Zhang Peng, CEO of Neutron Star Finance: A Thinking Perspective on a Complex World.". Recently, Professor Chen Mingzhe sent an e-mail from the United States to discuss this topic with me further in depth, saying that including humanistic care can bring more subtle and strong and endless strength to the dimension of "fragility- anti-fragility", which is what is missing in the current economy and society, especially the Chinese business society.

Dr. Mingzhe Chen, currently a chair professor at the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia, a tenured fellow of the Academy of Management and the Strategic Management Society, is a world-renowned expert in corporate strategy and the founder of dynamic competition theory and cultural integration. Professor Chen, who served as President of the International Institute for Management (2012-2013), with nearly 20,000 members worldwide, is the world's most influential management academic organization, the first president in 68 years without a university education in the United States.

Professor Chen received his Ph.D. in Business Administration from the University of Maryland in 1988 and has taught at Columbia Business School and the University of Penn Wharton. He is a full-service scholar who balances the profession with the humanities, theory and practice, and received the International Management Institute's Outstanding Educator Lifetime Achievement Award in 2014 in recognition of his outstanding contributions to management education and practice.

The following is the original text of Professor Chen Mingzhe's email, hoping to bring readers some thoughts and inspiration.

Peng Ruhui:

Reading the article "Thinking Perspectives on Complex Worlds" has brought me a lot of gains and deeply touched me. Combining your rich practical experience in the field of economics and finance, as well as your integration of Chinese and Western learning, you will comment on Taleb's writings, and your insightful exposition and interpretation of today's information technology-driven economic phenomena and models will certainly be very enlightening for readers. At the same time, I also find that behind your deep understanding of Taleb's rationality, you have not yet touched on a seemingly "stupid" truth: the simple mind is the source of the ultimate elevation and correct use of the complex mind.

1. The mind can be complex, but the mind cannot be impure

The various problems of Today's Chinese economy and society mentioned in your comments, such as the collapse of giants supported by increased leverage, the illegal fund-raising of P2P (Peer-to-Peer) finance, etc., from the level of "technology", on the surface, it is not a serious disregard for the deadly risks brought about by black swans and fragility; from the level of "Tao", is it a prominent reflection of "people's hearts are in danger and the Tao's hearts are small" in the current commercial society?

China's economy and even its rapid catch-up in high-tech fields such as artificial intelligence and 5G are not short of brilliant business leaders with superb and complex thinking capabilities, but looking at the world, have Chinese companies become respected competitors?

The more immediate question is whether an increasingly complex and intelligent Chinese business society will help more professionals achieve true peace of mind, happiness and happiness. Perhaps only by having a pure heart, starting from the "big foundation" of "benevolent people love people" and "wise people benefiting people", and finding constant and unchanging principles while changing at a high speed, can we help China's economy and society achieve peace of mind and healthy development at all levels.

2. A simple mind does not obscure a complex mind, but rather makes complex thoughts more powerful

You have shown a wealth of knowledge structure and connotation between the lines, and the application of economics, management, physics, complexity science (such as systems theory, evolution and fractal geometry), political philosophy, Western classical philosophy, and even the wisdom of the Tao Te Ching is what you call "systematic thinking". However, from what I know about you, you also have a "simple heart". In fact, a simple mind does not make the mind simple, on the contrary, a simple mind can maximize and play a complex mind, which to some extent has something in common with the "Jingyi" management I proposed.

From the perspective of the complexity science you mentioned, the complexity and infinite patterns of fractal geometry are essentially derived from the continuous iteration of a simple formula. Continuous iteration and effort between finite, or even a very small number of obvious principles, can create infinite wisdom and value (this in Chinese wisdom, it is very similar to the fractal structure of heaven and earth as a large universe and man as a small universe, as stated in the Zhou Yi Zhi Biography, "The world returns to the same place and is different (the way), consistent and multi-minded", which may be a connotation of the unity of heaven and man and the unity of all things). "Yi", derived from Qianyuan and Kunyuan, derives the systematic wisdom of the cycle and endless life, which fundamentally only keeps the unchanging "yuan", which may have metaphysical similarities with the complex science of fractal geometry.

As for your concern with Taleb for complex scientific qualities such as non-linearity, "Spring and Autumn" "Precious and Micro Beginnings" ("Spring and Autumn Flourishing • Two Ends"), "Watching the movement of things, and forgetting its germination, chaos is harmful to the time when it will be invisible" ("Spring and Autumn Flourishing • Ren Yi Fa"),"Yi" is known as the gentleman's cautious beginning. Seemingly simple and cautious traditional Chinese ideas such as the difference is a thousand miles (Li Ji • Jing Xie), the of a thousand miles, destroyed in the ant nest, etc., can also perceive the subtlety of the word risk with non-linear characteristics.

In these senses, the seemingly fancy qualities of complex systems thinking, such as wholeness, globalization, development, nonlinearity, distribution, emergence, self-similarity, and adaptation, are nothing more than simple principles, the product of simple mental interaction with the outside world, and nothing more than the wisdom of human nature. In human society, the reason can only be that human behavior follows human nature, and nature gives birth to all kinds of laws; "those who do their best know their nature" (Mencius, "Mencius, Dedication"), and the simple mind grasps human nature and the complexity of human nature. So, I believe that a simple mind can sublimate a complex mind to the maximum.

3. Complex minds desperately need humanistic care

Technological rationality and instrumental rationality are the advantages and expertise of Western science, and they have also greatly promoted economic and social development. Your practical work and deep background of rational knowledge amplify the brilliance of technical rationality and logical positivism, which is of great help to readers. However, on the other hand, it is also important to consider that when we often use buzzwords such as "quantum mechanics, wave-particle duality, self-organization, borderlessness, distributed" as metaphors for the business world, we undertake the wisdom of reason, but also jump into its cold, inhuman rigidity and limitations. While we focus on the cultivation of the dual abilities of the same individual employee, "fluctuating state" and "particle state", we are thinking about paradoxes, dialectical integration, and duality( likeness); but when we consider it from the perspective of "accomplishing people", "caring people", "inspiring people" and "making people happy", people are no longer the embodiment of wave-particle duality, but only people.

To be in two or more human affairs is the essence of the concept of cultural dual integration. Balancing humanities and rationality is itself one of the propositions of cultural integration, but this may be far more complex than complex systems thinking. Taleb constructed a three-dimensional structure of "fragility (damaged and collapsed from uncertainty) - tough (insensitive to uncertainty) - antifragility (benefiting from uncertainty)", which was then applied to the barbell strategy, that is, choosing the poles of fragility and anti-fragility without falling in the middle, which does have its own wisdom in the field of finance and risk management. However, as a philosophical claim, although Taleb claims in the book that no inspiration is found in Aristotle's Golden Mean, this does not mean that humanistic care lacks wisdom. For example, in terms of cultural dualism and the philosophy of moderation, it may be a pity that Taleb is not proficient in Chinese. Taleb may have been able to discern from the following excerpt from the Analects of the Analects of Learning that he did not value at the philosophical level:

Zi Gong Said: "Poor and unscrupulous, rich and arrogant, how?" Zi Yue: "But also." Those who are not poor and happy, but those who are rich and courteous are also." Zi Gong Yue: "Poetry Cloud: Such as cutting as a discussion, such as pondering as a mill, and its Si is said to be with?" Zi Yue: "Give it to you, and then you can say that the "poem" has been completed, and tell those who know the past."

Poor-no-good, rich-no-arrogant-good manners, in this context, to some extent correspond to Taleb's so-called "fragile-tough-anti-fragile" three-way structure, but also reflect his so-called barbell strategy. However, from the perspective of moderation or cultural integration, Taleb's ternary structure and barbell strategy only conceal the static optimality caused by humanistic care and simple heart; at the same time, "such as cutting like a discussion, like grinding" is a very important transformation force behind it. In this continuum, there is no fixed answer, or even a fixed boundary: in the context of the need for anti-fragility, the concept of double integration inspires us to "do everything to the extreme, without entering and not being complacent"; in the case of the need to be free from external influences, the concept of double integration inspires us to be "neutral and not dependent"; in more complex situations, the concept of double integration tells us that it is impossible to separate "fragility, toughness and anti-fragility". As far as the concept of double integration in Jingyi Persistence is concerned, including humanistic care, it can bring more subtle and strong and endless strength to the dimension of "fragility- anti-fragility", which is what is missing in the current economy and society, especially in China's commercial society. Perhaps, this is another revelation that Taleb brings to us.

Please take care. Shun wishes the mansion good health and all things go smoothly

Ming Zheqi

2020/05/11