Table Of ContentSpringer Proceedings in Complexity
Alfredo J. Morales · Carlos Gershenson
Dan Braha · Ali A. Minai · Yaneer Bar-Yam
Editors
Unifying
Themes in
Complex
Systems IX
Proceedings of the Ninth International
Conference on Complex Systems
Springer Proceedings in Complexity
Springer Complexity
Springer Complexity is an interdisciplinary program publishing the best research
and academic-level teaching on both fundamental and applied aspects of complex
systems—cutting across all traditional disciplines of the natural and life sciences,
engineering, economics, medicine, neuroscience, social, and computer science.
Complex Systems are systems that comprise many interacting parts with the
ability to generate a new quality of macroscopic collective behavior the
manifestations of which are the spontaneous formation of distinctive temporal,
spatial, or functional structures. Models of such systems can be successfully
mapped onto quite diverse “real-life” situations like the climate, the coherent
emission of light from lasers, chemical reaction–diffusion systems, biological
cellular networks, the dynamics of stock markets and of the Internet, earthquake
statistics and prediction, freeway traffic, the human brain, or the formation of
opinions in social systems, to name just some of the popular applications.
Although their scope and methodologies overlap somewhat, one can distinguish
the following main concepts and tools: self-organization, nonlinear dynamics,
synergetics, turbulence, dynamical systems, catastrophes, instabilities, stochastic
processes,chaos,graphsandnetworks,cellularautomata,adaptivesystems,genetic
algorithms, and computational intelligence.
ThethreemajorbookpublicationplatformsoftheSpringerComplexityprogram
are the monograph series “Understanding Complex Systems” focusing on the
various applications of complexity, the “Springer Series in Synergetics”, which is
devoted to the quantitative theoretical and methodological foundations, and the
“SpringerBriefs in Complexity” which are concise and topical working reports,
case-studies,surveys,essays,andlecturenotesofrelevancetothefield.Inaddition
tothebooksinthesetwocoreseries,theprogramalsoincorporatesindividualtitles
ranging from textbooks to major reference works.
More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/11637
Alfredo J. Morales Carlos Gershenson
(cid:129)
Dan Braha Ali A. Minai
(cid:129)
Yaneer Bar-Yam
Editors
Unifying Themes
in Complex Systems IX
Proceedings of the Ninth International
Conference on Complex Systems
123
Editors
Alfredo J.Morales Ali A.Minai
NewEngland ComplexSystems Institute Department ofElectrical Engineering
Cambridge, MA, USA andComputer Science
University of Cincinnati
Carlos Gershenson Cincinnati, OH,USA
Instituto deInvestigaciones enMatemáticas
Aplicadasy enSistemas Yaneer Bar-Yam
UniversidadNacionalAutónomadeMéxico NewEngland ComplexSystems Institute
Mexico, DistritoFederal, Mexico Cambridge, MA, USA
Dan Braha
NewEngland ComplexSystems Institute
andUniversity of Massachusetts
Cambridge, MA, USA
ISSN 2213-8684 ISSN 2213-8692 (electronic)
SpringerProceedings in Complexity
ISBN978-3-319-96660-1 ISBN978-3-319-96661-8 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96661-8
LibraryofCongressControlNumber:2018950772
©SpringerNatureSwitzerlandAG2018
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New England Complex Systems Institute
President
Yaneer Bar-Yam
New England Complex Systems Institute
277 Broadway
Cambridge, MA 02143, USA
New England Complex Systems Institute (NECSI) is an independent academic
researchandeducationalinstitutionwithstudents,postdoctoralfellows,andfaculty.
In addition to the in-house research team, NECSI has co-faculty, students, and
affiliates from MIT, Harvard, Brandeis, and other universities nationally and
internationally.
NECSI has been instrumental in the development of complex systems science
and its applications. We study how interactions within a system lead to its
behavioral patterns, and how the system interacts with its environment. Our new
toolsovercomethelimitationsofclassicalapproximationsforthescientificstudyof
complexsystems,suchassocialorganizations,biologicalorganisms,andecological
communities. NECSI’s unified mathematically based approach transcends the
boundaries of physical, biological, and social sciences, as well as engineering,
management, and medicine.
NECSIresearchadvancesfundamentalscienceanditsapplicationstoreal-world
problems, including social policy matters. NECSI researchers study networks,
agent-based modeling, multiscale analysis and complexity, data analytics, artificial
intelligence, chaos and predictability, evolution, ecology, biodiversity, altruism,
systems biology, cellular response, health care, systems engineering, negotiation,
military conflict, ethnic violence, and international development.
v
vi NewEnglandComplexSystemsInstitute
NECSI conducts classes, seminars, and conferences to assist students, faculty,
and professionals in their understanding of complex systems. NECSI sponsors
postdoctoralfellows,providesresearchresourcesonline,andhoststheInternational
Conference on Complex Systems. Through its education, NECSI strives to con-
tribute to science and the betterment of society.
New England Complex Systems Institute
Series Editor
Dan Braha, Alfredo J. Morales, Carlos Gershenson,
and Ali A. Minai
New England Complex Systems Institute
277 Broadway
Cambridge, MA 20143, USA
Theworldaroundusisfullofthewonderfulinterplayofrelationshipsandemergent
behaviors.Thebeautifulandmysteriouswaythatatomsformbiologicalandsocial
systems inspires us to new efforts in science. As our society becomes more con-
cerned with how people are connected to each other than how they work inde-
pendently, science has become interested in the nature of relationships and
relatedness. Through relationships, elements act together to become systems, and
systems achieve function and purpose. The elements act together to become sys-
tems, and systems achieve function and purpose. The study of complex systems is
remarkable in the closeness of basic ideas and practical implications. Advances in
ourunderstandingofcomplexsystemsgivenewopportunitiesforinsightinscience
andimprovementofsociety.Thisismanifestinrelevancetoengineering,medicine,
management, and education. We devote this book series to the communication of
recentadvancesandreviewsofrevolutionaryideasandtheirapplicationtopractical
concerns.
vii
Introduction
Themysteriesofhighlycomplexsystemsthathavepuzzledscientistsforyearshave
finally been unraveling thanks to new analytical and simulation methods. A better
understanding of concepts like complexity, emergence, evolution, adaptation, and
self-organization has shown that seemingly unrelated disciplines have more in
common than we thought. These fundamental insights require interdisciplinary
collaboration thatusuallydoesnotoccur between academicdepartments.Thiswas
the vision behind the first International Conference on Complex Systems in 1997:
not just to present research, but to introduce new perspectives and foster collabo-
rations that would yield research in the future.
As more and more scientists began to realize the importance of exploring the
unifying principles that govern all complex systems, the 2018 ICCS attracted a
diverse group of participants representing a wide variety of disciplines. Topics
rangedfromeconomicstoecology,fromphysicstopsychology,andfrombusiness
to biology. Through pedagogical, breakout, workshop, and poster sessions, con-
ference attendees shared discoveries that were significant both to their particular
field of interest and to the general study of complex systems. These volumes
contain the proceedings from that conference.
Even with the ninth ICCS, the science of complex systems is still in develop-
ment. In order for complex systems science to fulfill its potential to provide a
unifying framework for various disciplines, it is essential to provide a standard set
ofconventionstofacilitatecommunication.Thisisanothervaluablefunctionofthe
conference: It allowed an opportunity to develop a common foundation and lan-
guage for the study of complex systems.
Theseeffortshaveproducedavarietyofnewanalyticandsimulationtechniques
that have proven invaluable in the study of physical, biological, and socioeco-
nomicalsystems.Newmethodsofstatisticalanalysisledtobetterunderstandingof
polymer formation and complex fluid dynamics; further development of these
methodshasdeepenedourunderstandingofpatternsandnetworks.Theapplication
ofsimulationtechniquessuchasagent-basedmodels,cellularautomata,andMonte
Carlo calculations to complex systems has increased our ability to understand and
even predict behavior of systems which once seemed completely unpredictable.
ix
x Introduction
The disruption of big data and machine intelligence enabled the observation of
patterns of human behavior at unprecedented scales and a deeper understanding
of the structure and dynamics of social and economical systems.
Theconceptsandtoolsofcomplexsystemsareofinterestnotonlytoscientists,
butalsotocorporatemanagers,doctors,politicalscientists,andpolicymakers.The
same rules that govern neural networks apply to social or corporate networks, and
professionals have started to realize how valuable these concepts are to their
individual fields. The International Conferences on Complex Systems have pro-
vided the opportunity for professionals to learn the basics of complex systems and
share their real-world experience in applying these concepts.
