Glen, et alii -
I have listened to the chatter on this mail list for years now and with
only a few exceptions, we don't seem to put our models where our mouth
is. We are all "here" ostensibly because we know something about
Complexity and Modeling, or at least that we are Complexity Groupies of
some sort... and yet... but still...
I do know (of) Nick's, Eric's, Owen's, Stephen's, and Shawn Barr's
collaboration on the MOTH (Myway Or The Highway) model of the prisoners
dilemma:
http://ccl.northwestern.edu/netlogo/models/community/LogoMoth
but not much otherwise (I'm sure there are more, I just don't know of
them!).
I too share the feeling that complex systems studies/modeling might help
in the problems of governing. Doug, I know, has had a good taste of
building models and running studies for Government Agencies and
Policy/Decision Makers who are known to directly disregard highly
refined results and make decisions on (apparently) an entirely political
basis.
I still do work on decision support systems (mostly for Gov't customers)
and still hold the opinion that our job is not to help decision makers
make more informed decisions, but rather help prevent them from making
uninformed decisions. This may sound like splitting hairs, but my
experience is that decision makers often have already made their
decisions and decision support systems (including simple human analysis)
are often used to justify the decisions already chosen. By building
well motivated models with a clean stream of source data, I believe that
at best, our systems occasionally prevent an overzealous decision (or
policy) maker from making a rash, uninformed decision based on personal,
political, or in some cases whimsical opinions. Sometimes they might
pull back because they are enlightened by our enhanced
information/analysis, but more likely because they know that others will
be enlightened by it enough to question their decisions.
While I think I understand Glen's point about delegation... there are
reasons for a representative government... I think that making *more
explicit* a shared hierarchical model of the things we are making
decisions about, "we the people" can make better decisions about our
popular (or electoral) support for issues and candidates. While I think
the professional decision maker deserves better tools, better support,
such may only be adopted if the unwashed masses have access to the same
information/tools...
The news stream and more aptly, the opinion/analysis cloud that trails
it, is an attempt to do this. One might think that we could make this
more formal? Perhaps Tom Johnson and the School of Analytical
Journalism might be able to steer us to something in that regard?
In an ideal world, I would like to think that with enough transparency,
enough broadly disseminated information, enough understanding at many
levels, the answers (or decisions) would flow easily from the
questions. I believe this to be the main way things happen science...
the question is refined until the answer becomes obvious.
Unfortunately, I think there is something more going on, and it is "the
stories we tell" which I believe formally is "the models we choose".
My friend and colleague, David Thompson who some of you might know from
his time at Bios Group, has a blog around his new work in "Story
Resolution". In particular, this entry on "Affording to Know" seems
fairly apt for the current discussion:
http://storyresolution.org/2011/03/the-value-of-affording-to-know/
What leaps out at me from David's postings and our private discussions
is that we can fit many models to the same data, or we can tell many
different stories based on the same observed events. Multiple observers
can report the very same events but tell radically different stories
about them.
This sobers my thoughts that if we could just "write a better model" we
could understand the world more clearly, make better decisions, etc.
But then, it is not uncommon for us to challenge eachother with "tell a
better story" when we are using the facts to make ourselves miserable or
abusive.... The important question (as always) might be "what do we
mean by better?".
At the risk of sounding newage (rhymes with "sewage"?), I do think the
models we have of the world, the stories we tell, are critical in
defining the world we are generating. "Visualize Whirled Peas" comes to
mind. The pragmatists (or pessimists, or warmongers or hawks or ...)
might say that we have ample evidence that humans are always in violent
conflict and that any semblance of peace is an illusion or at best
fleeting, etc. The Optimists (or Polyannas, or Candides or
LaLaLanders) might be accused of ignoring important facts when choosing
to view the world through rose colored glasses. But we do know that to
some extent we find what we look for, we optimize what we measure, our
big hammers make everything look like nails, etc. What about that, really?
This seems to be a meta-modeling question, and one I suspect many of us
have answered (partially) in relatively limited but more technical
domains. Is there broader application? Is it actionable?
Sorry for the ramble... I suspect only a dedicated few could stick with
me on this one, but if I make the effort to go back and tighten it up, I
will probably just delete it.
- STeve
I started thinking about writing a toy model after this article was
referenced in another forum:
http://www.economist.com/node/18563638
I've always viewed the initiative process a bit suspiciously. It's not
that I don't trust myself or the other yahoos on the street... but I do
believe in delegation. We delegate legislating to the professional
legislators for a reason, I think. (which is also why I'm not a fan of
electing non-legislators - laypeople, doctors, programmers, hollywood
actors, etc. - to legislative positions.) But, I'm torn because, having
worked in lots of multi-disciplinary teams, especially involving
students, the value of a fresh perspective is ... well, priceless.
It just seems we could "apply complexity" to this sort of thing and come
out the other end a little more facile. I'd love to meet, say, Raul
Castro's consultants and give them a modeling and simulation elevator pitch!
Steve Smith wrote at 05/03/2011 08:41 PM:
I fear that there is not an obvious market. That is not to say there
is no value, it is (perhaps) hard to translate that into the market in
terms of political or economic capital. I think there is huge
(potential) social capital available, but how to translate that into a
gradient agents will follow?
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