# Each node on the tech tree can recursively be decomposed into more nodes At the end of the day, [[New ideas need to come out of a single mind]] so the recursion base case is when the heuretic isn’t viable outside of one person’s brain. This is why [[Brains are wombs for heuretics]]. The ‘viability condition’ is admittedly vague. Something can be inviable away from one person’s brain for different reasons. In one situation they’ve actually created something that only they can create. For example a glass blowing method that only one person can do. Does that count as a heuretic? In their mind they might literally be unable to separate out the piece that’s different from how everybody else does it, even though they obviously didn’t reinvent ever piece of glass blowing. This example suggests that heuretics can be much more complex and non-modular than we would like to think. [[There are many pieces of equipment or tacit knowledge that only exist in one or two places in the world]] What about the situation where someone has a possibly really powerful theory in their head but it’s extremely hard for people to verify or build off of it? This seems to be the case with [[Stephen Wolfram’s Theory of Everything]] and [[Eric Weinstein’s Theory of Everything]]. Where is the line between them and crazy people? At the end of the day, doesn’t a heuretic need to unblock other people in some way? Combining nodes can lead to properties that neither of the original nodes contained. [[Emergent behavior happens when a system has properties that none of its subsystems have]]. The emergent behavior is another hint that heuretics can be much more complex and non-modular than we would like to think. ### Related * [[Design for roadmapping system]] * [[Roadmapping could be thought of as backwards-chaining together a series of conception-only heuretics]] * [[Every time you zoom in on a fractal, it presents the same pattern on a different scale]] * [[The tech tree is fractal]] * [[The creation of a heuretic has two steps - conception and implementation]] * In [[And Suddenly the Inventor Appeared]] it states that every technical system has a super system and sub systems. * A core piece of [[arthurNatureTechnologyWhat2009]] is the systematic hierarchical nature of technology * [[Module assembly and evolution are two ends of a spectrum]] <!-- #evergreen --> [Web URL for this note](http://notes.benjaminreinhardt.com/Each+node+on+the+tech+tree+can+recursively+be+decomposed+into+more+nodes) [Comment on this note](http://via.hypothes.is/http://notes.benjaminreinhardt.com/Each+node+on+the+tech+tree+can+recursively+be+decomposed+into+more+nodes)