Out of Control by Kevin Kelly

Brooks [...] defined an artificial being as a creation that can do useful work while surviving for weeks or months without human assistance in a real environment. (P.77)

Robert Axelrod mused on the consequences of understanding coevolution and then added, "I hope my work on the evolution of cooperation helps the world avoid conflict. If you read the citation which the National Academy of Science gave me." (P.125)

I truly was a self because of what it displaced. A constant autoregulated flow of water translated into a constant autoregulated clock and relieved a king of the need for servants to tend the water clock's water vessels. In this way, "auto-self" shouldered out the human self. From the very first instance, automation replaced human work. (P.152)

All of Gaudi's work squirms with the flow of life. Ventilator chimneys sprouting on the roofs of his Barcelona apartments resemble a collection of mounted life forms from an alien planet. Window eaves and roof gutters curve in organic efficiency rather than follow a mechanical right angle. Gaudi captures that peculiar living response which cuts across a square campus lawn and traces a graceful curving shortcut. His buildings seem to be grown rather than constructed. (P.215)

Where there is an ecosystem, there are local experts. An outsider can muddle through an unfamiliar wilderness at some level, but to thrive or to survive a crisis, he'll require local expertise. Gardeners regularly surprise academic experts by growing things they aren't supposed to be able to grow because, as local experts, they tune into the neighbourhood soil and climate. The work of managing a natural environment is inescapably a work of local knowledge. A roomful of mechanical organisms improvising with each other demands a similar local knowledge. (P.223)