The idea of watching network of free agents "'living in their own dreamworld', subject to different forces of propaganda, economic constraints, and so on" in which "people in power 'follow their gut'", is provocative. Is that feasible and would it help, though?
As Robert points out there are lots of reasons a direct simulation couldn't be built. I think if some semblance succeeded in creating recognizable patterns that people could use to sensitize themselves to particular types of information, then maybe it would be useful. One possible case concerns (what seems to me) the approximately one month long war feaver that led us into Iraq. That was a time when the 'gut feelings' of people across the country went through a non-linear dynamic and nearly everone was swept up in the emotional experience. Bush felt the readyness of the country and went ahead, ultimately based on the war hysteria he partly helped to produce. My clear impression is that we went to war because of a rush of popular feeling that we were going to have to fight Sadam sooner or later and if it was inevitable we should just get it out of the way. It seems to have been an error to trust our gut feelings about that, but we got worked up and did it anyway. Potentially complex system theory could design measures to give people an outside view of these things we get swept up in. Maybe it could sense and map those dynamics, say linking that month to data on all the other war feavers in history. There's a distinct difference between foresight and hindsight on seeing the importance of little things, but with good information, might we not have seen we were acting hysterically in the absence of any threat? Phil Henshaw ¸¸¸¸.·´ ¯ `·.¸¸¸¸ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 680 Ft. Washington Ave NY NY 10040 tel: 212-795-4844 e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] explorations: www.synapse9.com > -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Marcus G. Daniels > Sent: Saturday, August 05, 2006 11:30 PM > To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group > Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Friam Digest, Vol 38, Issue 3 > > > Robert Cordingley wrote: > > Unfortnately, neither business management nor governing is a total > > disclosure game. [..] I wonder, what hope is there of > computationally > > solving problems involving millions of agents in dozens of > countries > > acting in myriads of ways (for example)? May be that > wasn't the question. > > > Well, one motivation for a computational model is to get ideas about > what needs to be measured in order to make useful > predictions, but not > necessarily to be the mechanism of prediction. > Computationally, making > useful predictions could be as simple as a regression once a set of > appropriate signals have been acquired, e.g. by measuring > dynamics in a > simplified simulated world and finding the same dynamics in the real > world. Running a simulation of millions of simple agents > with thousands > of variant scenarios ought to be doable for a government or > big company, > but even that following that approach doesn't mean anyone is actually > thinking in terms of `solving' the game, or even claiming to know the > rules. Rather, the goal is just to shift the odds. > > Marcus > > > ============================================================ > 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 > > ============================================================ 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
