> I'm sorry to say that pretty much all the biological examples and analogies you give are either wrong or at best controversial and not widely accepted.
Controversial or not, if policy makers hold the idea, it may be sufficient to justify/sell the strategy. And since when has universal buy-in been prerequisite to a course of action?
> Mitochondra don't even cooperate "willingly" with their host cells, but rather the host cell must incentivize them by withholding essential nutrients from the "slackers" until they shape up.
Haidt uses the term "freeloaders" instead of "slackers", but incentivizing the freeloaders to "shape up" is exactly the point of the analogy.
> I'm not familiar with Jonathan Haidt's work, so I can't comment directly on that
All of his writings and talks touch on it, but here's a good overview:
> In many industries the only stable equilibrium is a monopoly [2], which is arguably the least entropic "market state" possible. The "optimal" market according to capitalism is perfect competition among a large number of small independent firms, which is arguably the maximum-entropy state. So it seems that increased entropy should be a good thing.
It's about balance. Unrestrained corporate growth in its current form is unsustainable to the biosphere. We have limited natural resources. What's good for one group may be detrimental to the whole.
> The word "prism" has a mathematical meaning and a physical meaning, and I think it's pretty clear that when the NSA called their spying program PRISM, they were invoking the physical meaning of a tool.
I don't know how you can argue anything the NSA does is "pretty clear." Look up doctrinal meaning vs literal meaning, or double entendre (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_entendre).
Many in today's foreign policy circles agree with Haidt's analogies -- see Foreign Policy's "Top 100 Global Thinkers in 2012" (http://www.foreignpolicy.com/2012globalthinkers?wp_login_red...).
Controversial or not, if policy makers hold the idea, it may be sufficient to justify/sell the strategy. And since when has universal buy-in been prerequisite to a course of action?
> Bacteria do not group to form mitochondria;
"The Evolution of the Cell" (http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/begin/cells/organelle...)
"Cells within cells: An extraordinary claim with extraordinary evidence" (http://undsci.berkeley.edu/lessons/pdfs/endosymbiosis.pdf)
Mitochondrion Origin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondrion#Origin)
Endosymbiotic Theory (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endosymbiotic_theory)
> mitochondria do not group to form cells.
Eukaroyte (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eukaryote) vs. Prokaryote (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prokaryote)
> Mitochondra don't even cooperate "willingly" with their host cells, but rather the host cell must incentivize them by withholding essential nutrients from the "slackers" until they shape up.
Haidt uses the term "freeloaders" instead of "slackers", but incentivizing the freeloaders to "shape up" is exactly the point of the analogy.
> I'm not familiar with Jonathan Haidt's work, so I can't comment directly on that
All of his writings and talks touch on it, but here's a good overview:
"Jonathan Haidt: Religion, evolution, and the ecstasy of self-transcendence" (http://www.ted.com/talks/jonathan_haidt_humanity_s_stairway_...)
Papers & Citatations (http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=VafYYacAAAAJ&hl=en)
Google Tech Talk: "Hive Psychology and the Moral Life of Organizations" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2APK3tlPL_0)
> The concepts of entropy and order don't really apply in a social system.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_entropy
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_entropy
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entropy_and_life
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entropy_(disambiguation)
> In many industries the only stable equilibrium is a monopoly [2], which is arguably the least entropic "market state" possible. The "optimal" market according to capitalism is perfect competition among a large number of small independent firms, which is arguably the maximum-entropy state. So it seems that increased entropy should be a good thing.
It's about balance. Unrestrained corporate growth in its current form is unsustainable to the biosphere. We have limited natural resources. What's good for one group may be detrimental to the whole.
> The word "prism" has a mathematical meaning and a physical meaning, and I think it's pretty clear that when the NSA called their spying program PRISM, they were invoking the physical meaning of a tool.
I don't know how you can argue anything the NSA does is "pretty clear." Look up doctrinal meaning vs literal meaning, or double entendre (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_entendre).