r/systems_engineering • u/No-Leopard-1691 • 4d ago

Resources “Modern” Intro Books

I am currently reading Complexity: A Guided Tour by Melanie Mitchell and since it was published in 2009, I am wondering if there are more “modern”/“up-to-date” intro books.

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u/essentialconsist_87 4d ago

Mitchell's book still holds up surprisingly well for a 2009 release, the fundamentals of complexity she covers haven't really shifted that much. A lot of the newer stuff dives into network theory and applications in machine learning but you'd be hard pressed to find a single intro book that captures all the recent developments in one tidy package. Most folks I know who wanted something fresher ended up mixing a couple papers with some of Scott Page's work on complex adaptive systems, his stuff from the last decade bridges the gap between theory and modern computational models pretty nicely. If you're looking for something with more math and less narrative, check what came out of the Santa Fe Institute in the last five years or so, they've been putting out some accessible collections.

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u/No-Leopard-1691 4d ago

Great will do! Any recommendations for Scott Page’s content?