FW: SFI Seminar: Complexity, Parallel Computation, and Statistical Physics
Locked
FW: SFI Seminar: Complexity, Parallel Computation, and Statistical Physics
 
|
Has anyone seen any papers on logical depth in the context of agent-based
modeling? I know we could talk about n agents * t steps * a rough description of agent and environment complexity, but I was wondering if anyone's done some more formal work... -Steve > *** SFI SEMINAR *** > > Wednesday, June 7, 2006 . 12:15 pm . Medium Conference Room > > Complexity, Parallel Computation, and Statistical Physics > Jonathan Machta > > Department of Physics, University of Massachusetts, Amherst > > Abstract > > The intuition that a long history is required for the > emergence of complexity in natural systems is formalized > using the notion of depth. The depth of a system is defined > in terms of the number of parallel computational steps needed > to simulate it. Depth provides an objective, irreducible > measure of history applicable to systems of the kind studied > in statistical physics. It is argued that physical complexity > cannot occur in the absence of substantial depth and that > depth is a useful proxy for physical complexity. The ideas > are illustrated for a variety of systems in statistical physics. > > http://www.santafe.edu/events/abstract/445 > |
|
|
Where is the difference between steps, "depth" and time, if "the depth of a system" is simply defined in terms of the number of parallel computational steps needed to simulate it ? Depth seems to be just another word for (virtual) time. Much more interesting is the question if there is a unified theory for complex systems in terms of agents and multi-agent systems. In psychology and sociology we have a patchwork of theories, which arises from the complexity of the research object. A complex system is often described by several theories and multiple models, depending on the particular perspective. We have the psychology of Sigmund Freud, of C.G. Jung, of Skinner, of William James, etc. In sociology we have the sociology of Durkheim, of Weber, of Luhmann, a few smaller theories like role theory and "rational choice theory" and a lot of vague theories like Giddens "theory of structuration". These theories can be correlated to one another if we place them in a grid or coordinate system with two axes: * historical vs. regular behavior (exceptional vs. expected events) * micro vs. macro behavior (low-level vs high-level patterns) The behavior of a complex system depends neither solely on individual events and accidents nor on universal laws. Both sites play an important role, historical accidents (see for example the principles "sensitivity to initial conditions", butterfly effect, frozen accidents, path dependence) and regular laws. Likewise, the behavior of complex systems depends neither solely on individual microscopic actions nor on macroscopic structures, institutions and organizations. Both layers are important (see for example the principles emergence, swarm intelligence, self-organization). The most interesting behavior occurs in the center or at the middle, if microscopic actions have a strong effect on macroscopic behavior and vice versa, or if historical accidents become global patterns. An ideal theory would combine both aspects, historical and regular behavior, micro and macro behavior by defining universal "laws of history" or "theories of emergence". Do you think it is possible to discover or formulate such a unified theory? Or at least a unifying principle, such as evolution in Biology ? Probably evolution is again the unifying principle here.. -J. -----Original Message----- From: Stephen Guerin Sent: Monday, June 05, 2006 9:10 PM To: friam at redfish.com Subject: [FRIAM] FW: SFI Seminar: Complexity, Parallel Computation,and Statistical Physics Has anyone seen any papers on logical depth in the context of agent-based modeling? I know we could talk about n agents * t steps * a rough description of agent and environment complexity, but I was wondering if anyone's done some more formal work... -Steve |
|
|
Interesting idea. In various and sundry experiments with drug ABM's
it seemed like assumptions were being made that were candidate assertions for a "canonical society." For instance, we set up networks on a power law distribution assumption following Barabassi. We assumed that openness to change among agents followed the normal distribution shown by Rogers' work on Diffusion of Innovation. Do these tend to be how "normal" small societies organize themselves? If so, why is that? If so, in what kinds of social ecologies do they depart from it? Then there's an interesting connection between ABMs and the robust trend across many social and psychological theories that a theory has to be "trifocal." Agents are the centerpiece, then a level down to model their knowledge and rules, then a level up to observe the system that they create on the one hand and that effects them in turn. Is that a minimal requirement for a unified social theory? Then there's the natural selection principle. Some sort of co- evolutionary mechanisms would seem to be required, but they'll have to be different from the classic Darwinian. For instance, human agents are telic, they organize around imagined future states. If we consider memes--a problematic concept, I know, but one that brings ideas into the picture--reproduction rates can vary from extremely slow to extremely quick. With memes mutations occur frequently and sometimes dramatically. Memetic crossover occurs in all kinds of interesting ways. A unified social theory will have to take all this into account in addition to natural selection on biological variation if it wants to explain human social conditions. Been out of the FRIAM loop for a bit so hope all that isn't a re-run. A good challenge, Jochen, that phrase. Vielversprechend. Mike On Jun 6, 2006, at 4:18 AM, Jochen Fromm wrote: > > Where is the difference between steps, "depth" and time, > if "the depth of a system" is simply defined in terms of the > number of parallel computational steps needed to simulate it ? > Depth seems to be just another word for (virtual) time. > > Much more interesting is the question if there is a unified > theory for complex systems in terms of agents and multi-agent > systems. In psychology and sociology we have a patchwork of > theories, which arises from the complexity of the research object. > A complex system is often described by several theories and > multiple models, depending on the particular perspective. We > have the psychology of Sigmund Freud, of C.G. Jung, of Skinner, > of William James, etc. In sociology we have the sociology of > Durkheim, of Weber, of Luhmann, a few smaller theories like role > theory and "rational choice theory" and a lot of vague theories > like Giddens "theory of structuration". > > These theories can be correlated to one another if we > place them in a grid or coordinate system with two axes: > * historical vs. regular behavior (exceptional vs. expected events) > * micro vs. macro behavior (low-level vs high-level patterns) > > The behavior of a complex system depends neither solely on > individual events and accidents nor on universal laws. > Both sites play an important role, historical accidents (see > for example the principles "sensitivity to initial conditions", > butterfly effect, frozen accidents, path dependence) and > regular laws. Likewise, the behavior of complex systems > depends neither solely on individual microscopic actions nor > on macroscopic structures, institutions and organizations. > Both layers are important (see for example the principles emergence, > swarm intelligence, self-organization). > > The most interesting behavior occurs in the center or at the > middle, if microscopic actions have a strong effect on macroscopic > behavior and vice versa, or if historical accidents become global > patterns. An ideal theory would combine both aspects, historical and > regular behavior, micro and macro behavior by defining universal > "laws of history" or "theories of emergence". Do you think it is > possible to discover or formulate such a unified theory? Or at > least a unifying principle, such as evolution in Biology ? > Probably evolution is again the unifying principle here.. > > -J. > > -----Original Message----- > From: Stephen Guerin > Sent: Monday, June 05, 2006 9:10 PM > To: friam at redfish.com > Subject: [FRIAM] FW: SFI Seminar: Complexity, Parallel Computation,and > Statistical Physics > > Has anyone seen any papers on logical depth in the context of agent- > based > modeling? I know we could talk about n agents * t steps * a rough > description of agent and environment complexity, but I was > wondering if > anyone's done some more formal work... > > -Steve > > > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org |
|
|
Jochen writes:
> > Where is the difference between steps, "depth" and time, if > > "the depth > > of a system" is simply defined in terms of the number of parallel > > computational steps needed to simulate it ? > > Depth seems to be just another word for (virtual) time. Yes, I agree depth to be a measure of one kind of time, ie how much parallel time (processing cycles) does something take vs. elapsed background "wallclock" time. Maybe Gus can jump in and layout ~7 or so common types of time so we can figure out which kind of time we're really talking about. And as West and Brown's quarter-power allometric scaling (metabolic/system rate scales at 3/4, duration at 1/4, and cellular/agent rate -1/4) all are a function of time, I suspect one could find similar scaling laws with depth as you increase the number of agents/mass in certain types of ABM eg ones that exhibit self-organization or move through phase-transitions. -Steve |
|
|
In reply to this post by Jochen Fromm-3
Jochen Fromm wrote:
> Where is the difference between steps, "depth" and time, > if "the depth of a system" is simply defined in terms of the > number of parallel computational steps needed to simulate it ? > Depth seems to be just another word for (virtual) time. Hmm, if I find an two organisms that take in the particles B C D A and both return A B C D, but one does it in 16 and another in 5.5 units of energy or time (e.g. O(n^2) vs. O(n log n) time complexity) then I should infer the function being computed (their behavior) is different? |
|
|
In reply to this post by Michael Agar
Incidentally, the possibility of a 'unified' social theory has been the
subject of many decades of philosophical debate since Kant under the heading ideographic vs nomothetic. One of the problems that early natural scientists had to contend with was that no one knew then what the relevant, effective ontology for scientific theories is. Should scientific laws be about 'essences' or 'forces' or only observables (there's about 4 centuries of debate encapsulated in that sentence!). I think that social science has the same problem, and it is interesting that Mike's candidate 'assumptions for a canonical society' are such different types of 'theory': two distributions, one selection principle and one attribute ('telic'). Personally, I believe that the most promising route is by identifying common processes of interaction, recognising that the outcomes of the processes may differ from one society to another, and on the initial conditions (e.g. there is some common logic to trading which results in markets of very different kinds; there is some common logic to belief and opinion diffusion which gives rise to a range of different types of network, and so on). An implication is that just observing distributions or gathering ethnographies at single moments in time is an unlikely basis for understanding what these generic processes are. Nigel On 6/6/06 17:27, "Michael Agar" <magar at anth.umd.edu> wrote: > Interesting idea. In various and sundry experiments with drug ABM's > it seemed like assumptions were being made that were candidate > assertions for a "canonical society." For instance, we set up > networks on a power law distribution assumption following Barabassi. > We assumed that openness to change among agents followed the normal > distribution shown by Rogers' work on Diffusion of Innovation. Do > these tend to be how "normal" small societies organize themselves? If > so, why is that? If so, in what kinds of social ecologies do they > depart from it? > > Then there's an interesting connection between ABMs and the robust > trend across many social and psychological theories that a theory has > to be "trifocal." Agents are the centerpiece, then a level down to > model their knowledge and rules, then a level up to observe the > system that they create on the one hand and that effects them in > turn. Is that a minimal requirement for a unified social theory? > > Then there's the natural selection principle. Some sort of co- > evolutionary mechanisms would seem to be required, but they'll have > to be different from the classic Darwinian. For instance, human > agents are telic, they organize around imagined future states. If we > consider memes--a problematic concept, I know, but one that brings > ideas into the picture--reproduction rates can vary from extremely > slow to extremely quick. With memes mutations occur frequently and > sometimes dramatically. Memetic crossover occurs in all kinds of > interesting ways. A unified social theory will have to take all this > into account in addition to natural selection on biological variation > if it wants to explain human social conditions. > > Been out of the FRIAM loop for a bit so hope all that isn't a re-run. > A good challenge, Jochen, that phrase. Vielversprechend. > > > Mike > > > > > On Jun 6, 2006, at 4:18 AM, Jochen Fromm wrote: > >> >> Where is the difference between steps, "depth" and time, >> if "the depth of a system" is simply defined in terms of the >> number of parallel computational steps needed to simulate it ? >> Depth seems to be just another word for (virtual) time. >> >> Much more interesting is the question if there is a unified >> theory for complex systems in terms of agents and multi-agent >> systems. In psychology and sociology we have a patchwork of >> theories, which arises from the complexity of the research object. >> A complex system is often described by several theories and >> multiple models, depending on the particular perspective. We >> have the psychology of Sigmund Freud, of C.G. Jung, of Skinner, >> of William James, etc. In sociology we have the sociology of >> Durkheim, of Weber, of Luhmann, a few smaller theories like role >> theory and "rational choice theory" and a lot of vague theories >> like Giddens "theory of structuration". >> >> These theories can be correlated to one another if we >> place them in a grid or coordinate system with two axes: >> * historical vs. regular behavior (exceptional vs. expected events) >> * micro vs. macro behavior (low-level vs high-level patterns) >> >> The behavior of a complex system depends neither solely on >> individual events and accidents nor on universal laws. >> Both sites play an important role, historical accidents (see >> for example the principles "sensitivity to initial conditions", >> butterfly effect, frozen accidents, path dependence) and >> regular laws. Likewise, the behavior of complex systems >> depends neither solely on individual microscopic actions nor >> on macroscopic structures, institutions and organizations. >> Both layers are important (see for example the principles emergence, >> swarm intelligence, self-organization). >> >> The most interesting behavior occurs in the center or at the >> middle, if microscopic actions have a strong effect on macroscopic >> behavior and vice versa, or if historical accidents become global >> patterns. An ideal theory would combine both aspects, historical and >> regular behavior, micro and macro behavior by defining universal >> "laws of history" or "theories of emergence". Do you think it is >> possible to discover or formulate such a unified theory? Or at >> least a unifying principle, such as evolution in Biology ? >> Probably evolution is again the unifying principle here.. >> >> -J. >> >> -----Original Message----- >> From: Stephen Guerin >> Sent: Monday, June 05, 2006 9:10 PM >> To: friam at redfish.com >> Subject: [FRIAM] FW: SFI Seminar: Complexity, Parallel Computation,and >> Statistical Physics >> >> Has anyone seen any papers on logical depth in the context of agent- >> based >> modeling? I know we could talk about n agents * t steps * a rough >> description of agent and environment complexity, but I was >> wondering if >> anyone's done some more formal work... >> >> -Steve >> >> >> >> ============================================================ >> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv >> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College >> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org > > > ________________________________________________________________ Professor Nigel Gilbert, ScD, FREng, AcSS, Professor of Sociology, University of Surrey, Guildford GU2 7XH, UK. +44 (0)1483 689173 |
|
|
Hi Nigel. If I'd known you were out there I'd have been more careful
about being busted for felonious possession of incompatible ontological categories (: We grew up with ideographic vs nomothetic as well, though in Berkeley I always assumed it was the result of controlled substances. Ward Goodenough encoded it in the old days as "language of description" vs. "language of comparison." It all depends on what theory is taken to mean in the social realm. (When faced with a contradiction, make a distinction, advised a philosopher friend.) My list was a Rorschach reaction to Jochen's email. But there was an unresolved purpose in the madness. 1. A social theory isn't a theory in the old-fashioned sense. It's a lens, a conceptual system through which people see how their world works in a different way. You can get hypotheses out of there to test, and there will be consequences for action aplenty, but the theory won't look like Euclid or Newton. 2. Theory is about making sense out of how the social world works. As such it requires entities of different types, just as a story requires actors, plots, motives, setting, etc, just as a film requires lighting, sets, a screenplay, makeup, costume, etc. Social theory is a narrative. 3. I'm trying to learn about cultural evolution now, that mysterious thing that exploded onto the scene about 50 thousand years ago. It changed the co-evolution game with language and consciousness. The new parameters and possibilities map out the universal human territory that the social theory has to account for. Enough. Many old issues and known philosophical hazards in that tentative list, but it's interesting to think in general of "artificial societies" as requiring some clarity on necessary basic assumptions about society that must be made to model them at all and then asking for a coherent non-computational theory that integrates and justifies them. You probably wrote something that answers that question years ago. Pointers appreciated. At any rate, this theory trail requires inclusion of entities of many different types and a framework for their integration, with narrative a current candidate to do that work. Mike On Jun 6, 2006, at 1:04 PM, Nigel Gilbert wrote: > Incidentally, the possibility of a 'unified' social theory has been > the > subject of many decades of philosophical debate since Kant under > the heading > ideographic vs nomothetic. > > One of the problems that early natural scientists had to contend > with was > that no one knew then what the relevant, effective ontology for > scientific > theories is. Should scientific laws be about 'essences' or > 'forces' or only > observables (there's about 4 centuries of debate encapsulated in that > sentence!). I think that social science has the same problem, and > it is > interesting that Mike's candidate 'assumptions for a canonical > society' are > such different types of 'theory': two distributions, one selection > principle > and one attribute ('telic'). Personally, I believe that the most > promising > route is by identifying common processes of interaction, > recognising that > the outcomes of the processes may differ from one society to > another, and on > the initial conditions (e.g. there is some common logic to trading > which > results in markets of very different kinds; there is some common > logic to > belief and opinion diffusion which gives rise to a range of > different types > of network, and so on). An implication is that just observing > distributions > or gathering ethnographies at single moments in time is an unlikely > basis > for understanding what these generic processes are. > > Nigel > > > > > On 6/6/06 17:27, "Michael Agar" <magar at anth.umd.edu> wrote: > >> Interesting idea. In various and sundry experiments with drug ABM's >> it seemed like assumptions were being made that were candidate >> assertions for a "canonical society." For instance, we set up >> networks on a power law distribution assumption following Barabassi. >> We assumed that openness to change among agents followed the normal >> distribution shown by Rogers' work on Diffusion of Innovation. Do >> these tend to be how "normal" small societies organize themselves? If >> so, why is that? If so, in what kinds of social ecologies do they >> depart from it? >> >> Then there's an interesting connection between ABMs and the robust >> trend across many social and psychological theories that a theory has >> to be "trifocal." Agents are the centerpiece, then a level down to >> model their knowledge and rules, then a level up to observe the >> system that they create on the one hand and that effects them in >> turn. Is that a minimal requirement for a unified social theory? >> >> Then there's the natural selection principle. Some sort of co- >> evolutionary mechanisms would seem to be required, but they'll have >> to be different from the classic Darwinian. For instance, human >> agents are telic, they organize around imagined future states. If we >> consider memes--a problematic concept, I know, but one that brings >> ideas into the picture--reproduction rates can vary from extremely >> slow to extremely quick. With memes mutations occur frequently and >> sometimes dramatically. Memetic crossover occurs in all kinds of >> interesting ways. A unified social theory will have to take all this >> into account in addition to natural selection on biological variation >> if it wants to explain human social conditions. >> >> Been out of the FRIAM loop for a bit so hope all that isn't a re-run. >> A good challenge, Jochen, that phrase. Vielversprechend. >> >> >> Mike >> >> >> >> >> On Jun 6, 2006, at 4:18 AM, Jochen Fromm wrote: >> >>> >>> Where is the difference between steps, "depth" and time, >>> if "the depth of a system" is simply defined in terms of the >>> number of parallel computational steps needed to simulate it ? >>> Depth seems to be just another word for (virtual) time. >>> >>> Much more interesting is the question if there is a unified >>> theory for complex systems in terms of agents and multi-agent >>> systems. In psychology and sociology we have a patchwork of >>> theories, which arises from the complexity of the research object. >>> A complex system is often described by several theories and >>> multiple models, depending on the particular perspective. We >>> have the psychology of Sigmund Freud, of C.G. Jung, of Skinner, >>> of William James, etc. In sociology we have the sociology of >>> Durkheim, of Weber, of Luhmann, a few smaller theories like role >>> theory and "rational choice theory" and a lot of vague theories >>> like Giddens "theory of structuration". >>> >>> These theories can be correlated to one another if we >>> place them in a grid or coordinate system with two axes: >>> * historical vs. regular behavior (exceptional vs. expected events) >>> * micro vs. macro behavior (low-level vs high-level patterns) >>> >>> The behavior of a complex system depends neither solely on >>> individual events and accidents nor on universal laws. >>> Both sites play an important role, historical accidents (see >>> for example the principles "sensitivity to initial conditions", >>> butterfly effect, frozen accidents, path dependence) and >>> regular laws. Likewise, the behavior of complex systems >>> depends neither solely on individual microscopic actions nor >>> on macroscopic structures, institutions and organizations. >>> Both layers are important (see for example the principles emergence, >>> swarm intelligence, self-organization). >>> >>> The most interesting behavior occurs in the center or at the >>> middle, if microscopic actions have a strong effect on macroscopic >>> behavior and vice versa, or if historical accidents become global >>> patterns. An ideal theory would combine both aspects, historical and >>> regular behavior, micro and macro behavior by defining universal >>> "laws of history" or "theories of emergence". Do you think it is >>> possible to discover or formulate such a unified theory? Or at >>> least a unifying principle, such as evolution in Biology ? >>> Probably evolution is again the unifying principle here.. >>> >>> -J. >>> >>> -----Original Message----- >>> From: Stephen Guerin >>> Sent: Monday, June 05, 2006 9:10 PM >>> To: friam at redfish.com >>> Subject: [FRIAM] FW: SFI Seminar: Complexity, Parallel >>> Computation,and >>> Statistical Physics >>> >>> Has anyone seen any papers on logical depth in the context of agent- >>> based >>> modeling? I know we could talk about n agents * t steps * a rough >>> description of agent and environment complexity, but I was >>> wondering if >>> anyone's done some more formal work... >>> >>> -Steve >>> >>> >>> >>> ============================================================ >>> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv >>> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College >>> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org >> >> >> > > ________________________________________________________________ > Professor Nigel Gilbert, ScD, FREng, AcSS, Professor of Sociology, > University of Surrey, Guildford GU2 7XH, UK. +44 (0)1483 689173 > > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org |
|
|
I love it when you ethno types talk dirty.
On 6/7/06, Michael Agar <magar at anth.umd.edu> wrote: > > Hi Nigel. If I'd known you were out there I'd have been more careful > about being busted for felonious possession of incompatible > ontological categories -- Doug Roberts, RTI International droberts at rti.org doug at parrot-farm.net 505-455-7333 - Office 505-670-8195 - Cell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20060607/24a6e8ec/attachment.htm |
|
|
In reply to this post by Nigel Gilbert
I heard about ideographic vs. nomothetic in a lecture about sociological theory, but I didn't know that Kant coined these terms. This is indeed what I meant with historical vs. regular behavior (exceptional vs. expected events) - the contrast betwen narrative, descriptive and irreducible explanations on the one hand vs. predictive, comparative and compact explanations on the other hand. The sentence "human agents are telic, they organize around imagined future states" sounds interesting, can you explain it a bit? I also like the lens metaphor (a social theory as a conceptual system through which people see how their world works in a different way). If we use this metaphor, the original question was if there is a lens to see the whole system. Probably you are right, the most promising route seems to be to identify common processes of interaction. Yet perhaps the basic common processes of social interaction are already known and carry well-known names: Power, Freedom, Authority and Domination (Weber's "Herrschaft"), Discipline, Peace, Solidarity, Commitment, Progress, Conflict, Resolution, Resistance, Rights, Obligations, Conformity, Innovation, Association (Weber's "Verband") The interesting thing about all these abstract concepts is that they become concrete, observable and measurable phenomena in Multi-Agent Systems. Max Weber for example defined power, authority, discipline, etc. in concrete terms of social interactions among persons (i.e. individual agents), for instance in the case of "Macht" (power) "Macht bedeutet jede Chance, innerhalb einer sozialen Beziehung den eigenen Willen auch gegen Widerstreben durchzusetzen" (power is the chance of an "agent" to realize the own will in a social action even against the resistance of others "agents"). -J. |
|
|
If a discussion forum has an ecology of antagonists, perhaps I am a bit too much of a philosopher here. What kind of flame warrior are you ? http://redwing.hutman.net/~mreed/warriorshtm/philosopher.htm -J. |
|
|
Beautiful!
Here's one of my favorites: *Ennui* only rouses himself from his torpor to cajole other Warriors to be more interesting - without, of course, ever contributing anything of interest himself. Ennui has limited weaponry at his disposal, but his majestic affectation of boredom provides an effective defense to attacks. When pressed in battle he will announce his intention of moving on to a more stimulating forum, but instead he will generally lurk quietly until the threat passes. Also, I do believe we have at least one Propeller Head in our midst: *Propeller Head* knows just about everything there is to know about computers and the internet, and is a little mystified that you don't. Often an inarticulate and clumsy fighter he is still much to be feared because with a few deft keystrokes he can reduce your computer to a smoking heap of ruined metal. On 6/8/06, Jochen Fromm <fromm at vs.uni-kassel.de> wrote: > > > If a discussion forum has an ecology of antagonists, > perhaps I am a bit too much of a philosopher here. > What kind of flame warrior are you ? > http://redwing.hutman.net/~mreed/warriorshtm/philosopher.htm > > -J. > > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org > -- Doug Roberts, RTI International droberts at rti.org doug at parrot-farm.net 505-455-7333 - Office 505-670-8195 - Cell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: /pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20060608/d68079fe/attachment.html |
|
|
I think I found myself. Even has 4 arms like an Internet Shiva. Now if we could post these at the UN and Congress - "please choose your countenance before entering the assembly" it might save a lot of posturing. Douglas Roberts wrote: > Beautiful! > > Here's one of my favorites: > > *Ennui* only rouses himself from his torpor to cajole other Warriors > to be more interesting - without, of course, ever contributing > anything of interest himself. Ennui has limited weaponry at his > disposal, but his majestic affectation of boredom provides an > effective defense to attacks. When pressed in battle he will announce > his intention of moving on to a more stimulating forum, but instead he > will generally lurk quietly until the threat passes. > > > Also, I do believe we have at least one Propeller Head in our midst: > > *Propeller Head* knows just about everything there is to know about > computers and the internet, and is a little mystified that you don't. > Often an inarticulate and clumsy fighter he is still much to be feared > because with a few deft keystrokes he can reduce your computer to a > smoking heap of ruined metal. > > > On 6/8/06, *Jochen Fromm* <fromm at vs.uni-kassel.de > <mailto:fromm at vs.uni-kassel.de>> wrote: > > > If a discussion forum has an ecology of antagonists, > perhaps I am a bit too much of a philosopher here. > What kind of flame warrior are you ? > http://redwing.hutman.net/~mreed/warriorshtm/philosopher.htm > <http://redwing.hutman.net/%7Emreed/warriorshtm/philosopher.htm> > > -J. > > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org > > > > > -- > Doug Roberts, RTI International > droberts at rti.org <mailto:droberts at rti.org> > doug at parrot-farm.net <mailto:doug at parrot-farm.net> > 505-455-7333 - Office > 505-670-8195 - Cell > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: /pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20060608/4d453faa/attachment.html |
|
|
In reply to this post by Jochen Fromm-3
On Jun 8, 2006, at 7:56 AM, Jochen Fromm wrote: > > > The sentence "human agents are telic, they organize around > imagined future states" sounds interesting, can you > explain it a bit? There's a lot to talk about here. For now, it's one of many problems that fall out of the emergence of language/consciousness/culture, creating issues for use of biological evolution as a model for social theory. There's still a biological story to tell, but now it interacts with a newer system that moves at a much faster pace, a system where "variation" and "selection" follow rules that the agents themselves create and change several times within a biological reproductive cycle. I'm just reading Axelrod and Cohen's Harnessing Complexity, a book that means to introduce a broader audience who are thinking about organizations to complexity science. They organize the book in sections on variation, interaction and selection and do a nice job of introducing some of the differences that have to be included in a social and cultural millieu. Long pedigree on this issue with the Naturwissenschaft/Geisteswissenschaft debates, to use an old English expression I learned in grad school (:. > I also like the lens metaphor (a social > theory as a conceptual system through which people see how > their world works in a different way). If we use this > metaphor, the original question was if there is a > lens to see the whole system. Yes, that's the utopian dream, born of a desire to find better social theory that helps more comprehensively in applied work. (I like Kurt Lewin's quote, there's nothing as practical as a good theory). In the social realm, in my experience, narrow application of a single theory usually fails, and once you get the picture of a specific situation and how it works, the best you can do is patch together several different theories in a kind of ad hoc eclectic way. In a way that's the nomothetic/idiographic problem. Maybe it's possible to get past the distinction and create idiographic theory. The "narrative/lens" metaphor is an experiment in that direction. It has a pedigree--Erve Goffman's "dramaturgical" perspective is a famous US example. Though I only learned it a bit in conversation with a colleague, I think Oevermann's "Objektive Hermeneutik" is another example in Germany, because my colleague explained that "objective" was used in the sense of a lens. I need to learn more about it. > > Probably you are right, the most promising route seems > to be to identify common processes of interaction. > Yet perhaps the basic common processes of social interaction > are already known and carry well-known names: > Power, Freedom, Authority and Domination (Weber's "Herrschaft"), > Discipline, Peace, Solidarity, Commitment, Progress, Conflict, > Resolution, Resistance, Rights, Obligations, Conformity, > Innovation, Association (Weber's "Verband") Weber's sociology is a major resource, along with Schutz's synthesis of Weber and Husserl for some key foundations. > > The interesting thing about all these abstract concepts is > that they become concrete, observable and measurable phenomena > in Multi-Agent Systems. My interest as well. The models can certainly serve as a thought experiment lab, as Axelrod called them in an earlier book, to test a stripped down argument about some aspect of the social world. More interesting to me is whether there's a "minimal template" for a model to test any argument about how the social world works, like the question of initial network structure and distribution of risk that I mentioned from the drug models. > Max Weber for example defined power, > authority, discipline, etc. in concrete terms of social > interactions among persons (i.e. individual agents), > for instance in the case of "Macht" (power) > "Macht bedeutet jede Chance, innerhalb einer sozialen > Beziehung den eigenen Willen auch gegen Widerstreben > durchzusetzen" (power is the chance of an "agent" to > realize the own will in a social action even against the > resistance of others "agents"). Macht is what we need to do a job like this (: Viele Gruesse Mike > > -J. > > > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org |
|
|
I have read the book "Harnessing Complexity" as well, and was a bit disappointed. It is small and contains no interesting models. IMHO his classic books about "The Evolution of Cooperation" and "The Complexity of Cooperation" are much better. As you know, the first is about the iterated prisoner's dilemma, and in the second he presents the "Dissemination Model" which explains the emergence of culture through local convergence and global polarization, and his "Tribute Model" (for "building political actors") which captures some of the essential properties of power and tries to explain the origin of nations and empires. His agent based models are simple, but that's their beauty. The complexity should be in the results, not in the model itself. -J. -----Original Message----- From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Michael Agar Sent: Thursday, June 08, 2006 8:56 PM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Unified Theory [...] I'm just reading Axelrod and Cohen's Harnessing Complexity, a book that means to introduce a broader audience who are thinking about organizations to complexity science. They organize the book in sections on variation, interaction and selection and do a nice job of introducing some of the differences that have to be included in a social and cultural millieu. |
|
|
Yes, several colleagues here share your view of Harnessing
Complexity, though the SFI librarian told me it's seen as useful for newcomers at the SFI summer school. It's more of a beginner's book. I keep looking for good ones, because often I deal with groups who link their own general observation of systems they deal with with properties of CAS in general and get interested in how to look at problems in new ways. But then they don't know where to go next. Add to this their elaborate knowledge of an area the they work in that makes the interpretation of complexity concepts and models into their problems and the language they use to describe them extremely problematic. I just started up with a group who work with youth mental health who see in CAS new ways to think about services. They want to learn more. So several of them are reading and I'm helping them put some things together so a person who is interested can access them. There's a large gap in this field between initial observation of system behavior and the professional literature on concepts and models, I think. I'll share the results of what we do, with their permission, with the list in a few months. Have to go A nonlinear dynamic crew appears today to work on the house. Discrete charms of the bourgeoise adaptive systems (: On Jun 9, 2006, at 2:23 AM, Jochen Fromm wrote: > > I have read the book "Harnessing Complexity" as well, and was a > bit disappointed. It is small and contains no interesting models. > IMHO his classic books about "The Evolution of Cooperation" > and "The Complexity of Cooperation" are much better. As you know, the > first is about the iterated prisoner's dilemma, and in the second > he presents the "Dissemination Model" which explains the emergence > of culture through local convergence and global polarization, and > his "Tribute Model" (for "building political actors") which captures > some of the essential properties of power and tries to explain > the origin of nations and empires. His agent based models are simple, > but that's their beauty. The complexity should be in the results, not > in the model itself. > > -J. > > > -----Original Message----- > From: friam-bounces at redfish.com [mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] > On Behalf > Of Michael Agar > Sent: Thursday, June 08, 2006 8:56 PM > To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group > Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Unified Theory > > [...] I'm just reading Axelrod and Cohen's Harnessing > Complexity, a book that means to introduce a broader audience who are > thinking about organizations to complexity science. They organize the > book in sections on variation, interaction and selection and do a > nice job of introducing some of the differences that have to be > included in a social and cultural millieu. > > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org |
«
Return to Friam
|
1 view|%1 views
| Free forum by Nabble | Edit this page |