I somehow didn't send this to the forum before - and it needed an edit anyway --------- The ambiguity about whether computer models are thought to be exploring actual social systems or not is definitely all over the place in the journal, and not discussed. That's what I usually take as a sign of confusion, so I'd have to tentatively conclude that the journal isn't concerned with the difference and assumes that their theories are the structures of human societies. To check exactly what they say, in the banner of the journal for example, top of the front page, it says "JASSS....an inter-disciplinary journal for the exploration and understanding of social processes by means of computer simulation." That specifically says the exploring of the social system is done by computer, but maybe the mean that they'd study models of how they think real systems work to help them study what makes actual systems different. That's my method, and could be what they mean to say. That view is also hinted at in the article on model realism, "How Realistic Should Knowledge Diffusion Models Be?" with the following abstract:
Knowledge diffusion models typically involve two main features: an underlying social network topology on one side, and a particular design of interaction rules driving knowledge transmission on the other side. Acknowledging the need for realistic topologies and adoption behaviors backed by empirical measurements, it becomes unclear how accurately existing models render real-world phenomena: if indeed both topology and transmission mechanisms have a key impact on these phenomena, to which extent does the use of more or less stylized assumptions affect modeling results? In order to evaluate various classical topologies and mechanisms, we push the comparison to more empirical benchmarks: real-world network structures and empirically measured mechanisms. Special attention is paid to appraising the discrepancy between diffusion phenomena (i) on some real network topologies vs. various kinds of scale-free networks, and (ii) using an empirically-measured transmission mechanism, compared with canonical appropriate models such as threshold models. We find very sensible differences between the more realistic settings and their traditional stylized counterparts. On the whole, our point is thus also epistemological by insisting that models should be tested against simulation-based empirical benchmarks. Here again I find confusion, though, in terms of clear ambiguities not discussed. It appears that the 'real world phenomena' are equated with general statistical measures in terms of 'benchmarks' rather than behaviors, and these may be "simulation-based empirical benchmarks". It's like the analysis of that plankton evolution data I studied, where the complex eruptions of developmental processes in the evolutionary succession I uncovered were for many years firmly defended as definite random walks because the statistical benchmark for their range of fluctuation was within the range reasonably likely for random walks. Benchmarks, are sometimes very useful for actual diffusion processes, of course, and much has been learned with them. What they are most definitely misleading for is as indicators of complex system design (lacking the 'requisite variety' I guess you'd say), and for any behavior that is pathway dependent. The whole field of systems and complexity is really supposed to be about building knowledge of the pathway dependent properties of nature. These authors clearly are not asking about that, so I guess I'd have to agree with you that the journal is unaware of the difference. Is knowledge 'diffusion' pathway dependent? You bet. So I guess the subject it not a 'diffusion' process at all, but a development process, and nearly any kind of 'benchmarks' will be reliably misleading. Phil Henshaw ¸¸¸¸.·´ ¯ `·.¸¸¸¸ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 680 Ft. Washington Ave NY NY 10040 tel: 212-795-4844 e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] explorations: www.synapse9.com <http://www.synapse9.com/> -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Robert Holmes Sent: Tuesday, July 03, 2007 8:06 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group Subject: Re: [FRIAM] JASSS (and despair) Read the articles and tell me what you think. But I believe the answer to your last question is "No". Robert On 7/3/07, Phil Henshaw < [EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: The task of associating abstract and real things is rather complicated, and often made more so by using the same names for them, so it appears that when you're referring to a physical system you're discussing entirely some network of abstract rules, for example. Even though you say the article refers to physical systems, is it possible they just switch back and forth between ways of referring to things, while being consistent with an 'information world' model they assume everyone understands to be the baseline of abstract discussion? Phil Henshaw ¸¸¸¸.·´ ¯ `·.¸¸¸¸
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