Introducing the Oscillations Based Paradigm: The Simulation of Agents and Social Systems

341 Pages·2016·8.29 MB·English

by  Darius Plikynas (auth.)

Darius Plikynas
Introducing
the Oscillations
Based
Paradigm
The Simulation of Agents and Social
Systems
Introducing the Oscillations Based Paradigm
Darius Plikynas
Introducing the Oscillations
Based Paradigm
The Simulation of Agents and Social Systems
123
DariusPlikynas
Research andDevelopment Center
Kazimieras Simonavičius University
Vilnius
Lithuania
and
Institute of Mathematics andInformatics
Vilnius University
Vilnius
Lithuania
ISBN978-3-319-39039-0 ISBN978-3-319-39040-6 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-39040-6
LibraryofCongressControlNumber:2016940118
©SpringerInternationalPublishingSwitzerland2016
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Foreword by Prof. Andrea Omicini
Whathappenswhenonetriestolinktogethertheresearchonneuroscience,artificial
intelligence,multi-agent systems,andsocialnetworks?Afterdecadeswhenmulti-,
inter-, and trans-disciplinary research were mostly the result of scattered, isolated
activity, or, the rare consequence of some specific, application-oriented research
project,researchoncomplexsystemsdemonstratedhowalltheissuesandproblems
arising from the diversity of the conceptual landscapes, the methods, and the
peculiar languages could (and should) actually be resolved. Two decades ago, the
emergenceofcomplexnetworksmadeitapparenthowasinglecommonviewpoint
overheterogeneousfieldssuchasbiologicalsystems,computerscience,economics,
and social sciences, to name a few, could lead to spectacular results.
Nowadays, social systems represent a novel frontier for inter-disciplinary stud-
ies, as witnessed, for instance, by the surprisingly successful application of statis-
tical mechanics to economics. Generally speaking, their multi-faceted articulation
first primarily motivates regrouping of models and methods across all of those
disciplines involving complex systems. Also, the huge access to data, along with
the lack of reliable models allowing for actual predictability in other words, an
abundance of evidence devoid of clear explanations motivates combining and
integrating a spectrum of approaches, models, and methods from the hard and soft
sciences. Then, the many diverse interpretations to which social systems are
amenable, encourage the applications of different methods from a heterogeneous
collectionoffields:forinstance,socio-technicalsystems,likesocialnetworks,areat
thesametimesoftwaresystemsaswellassocialsystemsintheirownright,butthey
could also be modeled as economical systems, statistical mechanics systems,
organizational type, and so on.
Well-placed along this train of ideas, the book Introducing the
Oscillations-Based Paradigm: the Simulation of Agents and Social Systems, by
Prof. Darius Plikynas, provides us with quite an original viewpoint towards social
system simulation, by exploiting a mixture of research methods and approaches to
generate the desired mechanisms. The aim of the book is to create an
oscillation-based paradigm for simulation of agents and multi-agent systems that
v
vi ForewordbyProf.AndreaOmicini
shares some of the features that are typical of realizable social systems. The
objectiveofthebookisextremelyambitious,andinvitesthereadertobewillingto
cross disciplinary boundaries, as well as to establish connections that may some-
times appear to be somewhat counterintuitive.
Thefirstpointofinterestofthisbookisthatitreviewsawiderangeoftheories
across various disciplines, while looking for some common field-theoretical ele-
ments. In this way, it outlines the fundamental principles of coordination and
self-organization as they emerge at the quantum, cellular, and social levels. The
findings bring to the forefront a number of principles deemed to be universal, and
which are further adopted to formulate the main premises and postulates for the
proposed OSIMAS (oscillation-based multi-agent systems) simulation paradigm.
When I first met the author, during his visit in Cesena in November 2014, the
firstthingthatstruckmewastheoriginalityofhiswayofthinking.Inthisbook,the
reader will find that sort of originality, at least from two different perspectives. On
theonehand,thebookcanbeproperlyreadasa(muchwelcome)callforasurvey
of cross-disciplinary work, providing the research-oriented reader with some tools
forsimulationforavarietyoftopics.Ontheotherhand,thisworkconnectsseveral
disciplinary domains that can be very difficult to interconnect, in general. In doing
so, the author has produced an impressive intellectual accomplishment that seems
quite remarkable within the landscape of contemporary social science.
The book draws specifically on artificial intelligence, cognitive science, neuro-
science, quantum physics, finance and economics, and mathematics. Despite the
traditionaldifficultyindealingwithsuchhighlyformalizedfields,theauthordoesa
commendablejobinmakingmostofthetechnicalcontentofthebookaccessibleto
scientists, in a way that can be more or less independent of their disciplinary
background.
Notwithstanding the appealing empirical power of the currently applied meth-
ods, modern social research is still fragmented with a lack of a cohesive modeling
media for understanding and simulating the highly complex nature of social
behavior. This book addresses that problem the lack of a multidisciplinary con-
necting paradigm by bringing together a mosaic of research in the fields of neu-
roscience, artificial intelligence, multi-agent systems, and social network domains.
The need for a common multidisciplinary research framework arises essentially
becausethesefieldsshareacommonobjectiveofinvestigationandsimulation,that
is, the study of individual and collective behavior. The tremendous advance in
computationalpoweroverrecentyearshasgreatlywidenedthescopeofsimulation
options available to social scientists: since it is quite apparent that many of them
have not realized this yet, this book could also be seen as a way forward to
demonstrate the significant potential that lies right at their fingertips.
First of all, the book includes a number of introductory chapters aimed at
establishing the groundwork for the OSIMAS approach; then it moves to appli-
cations,drawingupondifferentapproachesandadiversityofdisciplines,whichare
exemplified in the later chapters. The appendices appear particularly valuable in
thattheydescribeanumberofkeytheoreticalparadigmsthatareembeddedintothe
scopeoftopics.Itisworthnotingthattheseappendicesreadverywell,eventhough
ForewordbyProf.AndreaOmicini vii
they cover quite a broad range of topics that are at the same time philosophically
dense and somewhat off the mainstream. Originality, indeed, has its price: setting
thetheoreticalbackboneofthebookintheappendicesandnotatthebeginningwill
not appear familiar to most readers; thus some may be a little unsettled. The most
common approach, of course, is to first establish the theoretical/conceptual
framework, and then construct within that framework. But originality can pay
dividendsaswell:afterreadingthebook,Ifoundthecurrentarrangementoftopics
to be working quite well since much of the conceptual content is stationed outside
of the main text, so as to leave the necessary space to cover technicalities, thus
adding to the fluency of reading.
From the viewpoint of methodological approaches, this book has a lot to offer,
not only to social scientists but also to a much broader audience. The current
fragmented state of our science is more and more challenged by multimodal
complexity and inter-relationships of concepts: as such, it implies a vital need for
the deeper and the simultaneously wider understanding of how common funda-
mentalorganizationalprinciplesmayestablishinter-disciplinaryconnections.Such
aformidablechallengehasbeenundertakeninthismultidisciplinarywork,whichat
the same time incorporates the qualities of a novel, conceptually integrative, and
experimentally based simulation research framework.
Prof. Andrea Omicini
Alma Mater Studiorum—Università di Bologna
Bologna/Cesena, Italy
Foreword by Prof. John T. Cacioppo
Oscillations-basedparadigmstartsfromareviewofawiderangeoftheoriesacross
various disciplines in search of some common field-like fundamental principles of
coordination and self-organization existing on the quantum, cellular, and social
levels. Findings that are described as suggesting universal principles are employed
to formulate main premises and postulates for the proposed OSIMAS
(oscillation-based multi-agent system) simulation paradigm. The OSIMAS draws
on three conceptual models—oscillating agent model (OAM), pervasive informa-
tion field (PIF) and wave-like interaction mechanism (WIM)—as well as work on
the oscillating nature of brain activity and of the nonlocal field-like
self-organization properties of modern information societies. Arguments based on
conceptualanalyses,experimentalevidence,andsimulationsareusedtosupportthe
premises underlying the OSIMAS paradigm.
This book is not for the reader who seeks a well-developed and empirically
supported overview of the science of social behavior. This book is controversial,
provocative, speculative, and sometimes maddening, but it is also stimulating. For
instance,OSIMASisbasedonthenotionthatthephysicalbasisofconsciousnessis
a bioelectromagnetic field that exhibits wave-mechanical dynamics. It is certainly
the case that any electrical current produces a magnetic field. The neural activity
underlying human thought produces a bioelectromagnetic field, and the miniscule
currentsproducedbyneuronalactivityproduceminisculemagneticfieldsthatexert
forces and torques on each other. We do not live in isolation but rather we live in
the context of and interact with other people. Professor Plikynas argues that fields
produced by individual brains can be modeled as a system of bioelectromagnetic
fields. I found more controversial the contention that the miniscule bioelectro-
magnetic fields produce societal-level bioelectromagnetic fieldthat form some sort
ofcoherentfieldofcommonmentalactivity,andIsuspectmanyreadersmayshare
this skepticism.
However,thisbookisnotdesignedtocommunicate theestablished;itspurpose
is to stimulate novel conceptual and methodological approaches to the scientific
study of the physical basis of social cognition and behavior. There are risks when
ix
x ForewordbyProf.JohnT.Cacioppo
new scientific fields are explored or at least new connections between academic
fields are pursued. Hints for applications are provided, which need to be tested.
The goal of the simulation framework outlined in this book is to provide a
common platform for addressing prospective applications in the field of social
neuroscience, distributed cognition, multi-agent systems, computational intelli-
gence, team neurodynamics, neuroeconomics, etc. The lack of an integrative
research framework is one of the core problems in social theory. Agent-based
modelingsystemsforinvestigatingsocialbehaviorexist,butnonetomyknowledge
that attempt to span as many disciplines as OSIMAS.
The perspective adopted by the author is absolutely original. Although the
results it seeks to describe and organize are drawn from the extant scientific liter-
ature,theapproachisreallynewandprovocative.Ithoughtthebookwassounique
in its viewpoint that I found it well worth reading even though I repeatedly found
myself disagreeing with premises and details. There is an important role for con-
troversialbookslikethisoneinscience.Whetherornotyouagreewiththespecific
processesdescribedinthisbook,theoriginalityofsomeoftheideasaboutmaterial
basis for behavior at the societal level may well leave you ruminating about new
questions and possibilities. And, to me, that is the strength of this book.
Prof. John T. Cacioppo, Ph.D.
Tiffany and Margaret Blake Distinguished Service
Professor of Psychology and of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience
and
Director
Center for Cognitive and Social Neuroscience
The University of Chicago
Chicago, IL, USA
Preface
This book presents a conceptually original, oscillations-based paradigm aimed at
the modeling of agents and their systems as coherent, stylized, neurodynamic
processes. Putting into perspective the various pathways of research as they are
interrelated, the book provides a philosophical underpinning, experimental back-
ground and some modeling tools. In this effort, some general fundamental design
principles of the field-theoretical view of the oscillating agent are outlined, as well
as of coherent economic or social systems in general.
The conceptual insights presented here are employed for the formulation of the
main postulates and principles of the proposed Oscillation-Based Multi-Agent
System (OSIMAS) simulation paradigm.1 The OSIMAS provides a foundation for
the creation of an oscillations-based social simulation research framework. It
explores various stylized oscillating agent models (OAM), which can be further
expanded to the multi-agent system (MAS) simulation model. For that reason, a
canonical pervasive information field (PIF) and wave-like interaction models
(WIM) are also employed.
Consequently, this study not only discusses the major conceptual assumptions
oftheproposed(OSIMAS)paradigm,butalso presentsanelectroencephalography
(EEG)-basedexperimentalvalidationframeworkandsomepriorempiricalresultsto
validate or disprove the OSIMAS assumptions. Based on the conceptual, experi-
mental and simulation findings, a modeling framework is constructed aimed at the
prospective development of the proposed pioneering paradigm.2 This book also
systemizes some other studies and applications, which were most relevant to the
work presented here.
However, this is a challenging multidisciplinary research area, which is only
starting to evolve following recent technological advances. The major problem
concerning these fundamental and applied research areas is related to the lack of a
1TheOSIMASproject’swebsiteisavailableathttp://osimas.ksu.lt.
2The OSIMAS simulation platform and interactive models are available at http://vlab.vva.lt; for
login,entertheusernameGuestandpasswordguest555.
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