The aim of the school is to provide in-depth reference lecture courses to a multi-disciplinary audience of researchers as well as advanced students. The lectures should thus be "introductory-yet- advanced" since prospective students are not expected to be familiar with all the fields covered. They should thus treat of specific classes of complex systems or, transversally, of theoretical tools and methods.

The lectures will be recorded and made available online via the web site of the Open University of Complex Systems (to be created in January 2007). The main objective of this Open University is to offer courses under the "Creative Commons" agreement
Organizing committee Hugues Chate Khashayar Pakdaman Paul Bourgine Annick Lesne Nadine Peyrieras

International School on Complexity: Course on Statistical Physics of Social Dynamics: Opinions, Semiotic Dynamics, and Language. Directors: Vittorio Loreto and Luc Steels. Ettore Majorana Foundation and Center For Scientific Culture Erice, Sicily, 14-19 July 2007. Satellite Workshop of STATPHYS 2007.
Application: Academic qualifications, present position and affiliation: External faculty, SFI, prof IX off scale, Institute of Mathematical Behavioral Sciences, UCI, Chair, Social Dynamics and Complexity focused research group, IMBS, Scientific Council, French National Network of Complex Systems 2007-2010, Council Member, Complexity Science Society, 2005-2009 (formerly European CSS), Steering Committee, Complexity Science Conferences, 2005-2009 (formerly European CSC)
A brief description of your work and your motivation to participate to the school (i.e. why you believe that you might contribute to the school): Applications of q-exponential models to simulations, empirical network studies, and the historical dynamics of urban systems and trade networks, connected to MLE fitting of longitudinal and generative datasets suggests some connections of 1-to-1 mean value parameterizations theorem to studying the relation between generative (elementary probalistic and simulation models) to a range of problems in social network analysis and dynamics.
Tentative date and time of arrival and departure (morning or afternoon), possibly specifying your flight numbers: July 12-19
If you plan to present a poster or a demonstration, please provide an abstract or a description of your work: I would like to give one of three papers, each has co-authors:
'Oscillatory dynamics of city-size distributions in world historical systems'
'Generative Model of Feedback Networks'
'MLE, the Feedback Networks Model, and Fitting Generative Networks to Real-World Networks’
I think any of these could relate closely to the themes of the conference, but to link more directly to the themes of Social Dynamics and Opinions I could treat within the theme of the third of the proposed talks our analysis of the contents of seven opinion questions within the context of network interviews of five groups of circa 100 members for groups of Chinese rural-urban migrants and studies of their social networks, one of the largest network and opinion studies ever done in China (with the Stanford and Xi'an Institutes of Demography scientists

NSF/ESRC Sponsored Special Activity:
Agenda-setting Workshop to explore Anthropological Applications and Development of e-Science/CyberInfrastructure
Prof. Michael Fischer, Prof. David Zeitlyn, University of Kent at Canterbury
We invite you to participate, expenses paid, in a small agenda- setting workshop (about 15 people) hosted by the Centre for Social Anthropology and Computing (CSAC) at the University of Kent at Canterbury (UK), with proposed dates of June 15th-19th 2007 (see note). The aim of the workshop is to explore the implications and applications of shared computer resources to anthropological research, and to advise on the future development and expansion of AnthroGrid, a network recently initiated by CSAC to facilitate development of a more cumulative anthropology by sharing computational and other resources. You do not need to prepare a paper prior to the workshop. We expect to develop a future edited book from the workshop.
Am participating through a video connection

"Rethinking Social Complexity and Resilience: Human Survival and Complex Network Dynamics at Continental Scales" 4 Campus UC Videoconference on Human Social Complexity, April 20, 2007. Pdf at the website. here is the ppt

Possible video participation:
The working group "Boundaries" of the Young Academy plans a workshop on comparative methods on June 30th, 2007 in Gottingen. This meeting is going to focus on "Comparative Methods and Interdependence," the problems that the interdependence of cases poses for the comparative method. To have a fruitful and inspiring discussion we attempt to convene practitioners of various forms of the comparative method from different disciplines, amongst others from sociology (Charles Ragin, Benoit Rihoux, Michel Lamont), from Anthropology (Charles Barnard), from history (Benedicte Zimmermann, Michael Werner) and from political science (Detlef Jahn, Bernhard Ebbinghaus). The complete schedule for the workshop will be specified during the upcoming weeks. We would also like to invite you to this workshop and would be pleased if you would participate with a presentation of your work on comparative methods. (Invitation from Joerg Roessel )

Columbia University, Sociology Department Conference on Economic Networks, "Dynamics of City System Rise and Fall: Mid-Asia, China, and Europe over 25 periods in the last millenium of globalization" PDF March 26, 2007.

Abstract: A 25 period historical scaling of city sizes in regions of Eurasia (900 CE-1970, mostly in 50 year intervals) shows both rises and falls of what are unstable city systems, and the time-lagged effects of urban-system rise and fall in Mid-Asia on China and of China on Europe. These are indicative of some of the effects of trade networks on the robustness of regional economies. Elements of a general theory of complex network dynamics connect to these oscillatory "structural demographic" instabilities.

The measurements of instability use maximum likelihood estimates (MLE) of Pareto II curvature for city size distributions and of Pareto power-laws for the larger cities. Collapse in the q-exponential curve is observed in periods of urban system crisis. Pareto II is equivalent under reparameterization to the q-exponential distribution. Further interpretation of the meaning of changes in q-exponential shape and scale parameters has been explored in a generative network model of feedback processes that mimics, in the degree distributions of inter-city trading links, the shapes of city size distributions observed empirically.

The MLE parameter estimates of size distributions are unbiased even for estimates from relatively few cities in a given period, They are sufficiently robust to support further research on historical urban system changes, such as on the dynamical linkage between trading networks and regional city-size distributions. The q-exponential results also allow the reconstruction of total urban population at different city sizes in successive historical periods.
Papers by other faculty:
Harald Katzmair (www.fas-research.com): The Robustness of Economic Power. Director Interlock Networks in the United States
David Stark and Balazs Vedres: Politicized Business Ties. Business Networks and Political Parties in Hungary

March 15, The UCI Network Research Group Meeting (3/15). Irvine. "The Social Circles (Feedback) Generative Network Model and Its MLE." See Natasa Kejzar presentation, Applied Statistics conference, 2005 Discussion paper

SASci Meeting, February 21-24, 2007, San Antonio, TX. Main Theme: Four-Field Anthropology and Science.

SASci Workshop. short course. Tutorial in public domain instructional and research materials for Cross-Cultural Research.

Description: SASci instructors can now download all the materials needed to teach a cross-cultural research course in a computer lab equipped with Spss for the students. This can also be a 3-week module or an even shorter problem-oriented module within a seminar. All the materials for such courses have been contributed to the public domain. The url for downloading these materials is given above. THIS WORKSHOP will offer prospective instructors or researchers a short course in cross-cultural research using an effective tutorial for mapping cross-cultural variables, doing single factor and principal components analysis, multiple regression analysis with solutions to Galton's problem of historical nonindependence among the cases, and cross-tabs with simple rules for interpreting statistics. The instructional materials are suited for and tested for upper division and for graduate seminars.

SASci Session on Historical Dynamics: Paper: The Indigenous Australian Marriage Paradox: Small-World Dynamics on a Continental Scale ppt

Douglas R. White and Woodrow W. Denham. SASci Session on Formalization as a Tool for Empirical Research. What it Buys us and What it Doesn't. Organized by David Kronenfeld.
ABSTRACT Ethnographies of Indigenous Australian language groups suggest that their populations were consistently small, averaging perhaps 500 people each, while classical models of their kinship systems consistently embody endogamous marriage as both a norm and a logical requirement. However, paleodemographers argue that reproductively closed small human populations are doomed due to stochastic variations in birth rates and sex ratios. How did these societies avoid extinction and indeed persist in Australia for 40,000 years and more? We introduce a mathematical model of Aboriginal descent, marriage and kinship that is reproductively open rather than closed, show how the openness articulates with traditional closed models, and demonstrate how the resulting system might maintain dynamic population stability despite internal and external stresses that might otherwise lead to extinction. Our proposed resolution of the Australian Paradox shows some of the possible advantages of mathematical and network modeling.

Society for Cross-Cultural Research. February 21-24, 2007, San Antonio, TX.
SCCR Symposium: Historical Dynamics in Cross-Cultural Perspective Chair: Andrey Korotayev (Russian State University for the Humanities, Moscow) and Leonid Grinin, (Volgograd Center for Social Research, Volgograd)
Paper: Eurasian city system dynamics in the last millennium ppt
ABSTRACT A 25 period historical scaling of city sizes in regions of Eurasia (900 BCE-1970) shows both rises and falls of what are unstable city systems, and the time-lagged effects of the early urban rise in the Mid-Asia on China and of China on Europe. Other elements of historical population dynamics (structural demography and periods of scarcity with rising sociopolitical violence) figure into the observed city system dynamics. The paper focuses on MLE measurement of instability, and tests a theory of network dynamics at they affect city system instabilities.

Workshop on aspects of Social and Socio-Environmental Dynamics. School of Human Evolution and Social Change. Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ.
Jan 22-23, 2007..D.R. White

paper: Urban and ecosystem dynamics: past, present, future. ppt pdf
ABSTRACT Analysis of city system hierarchies in the last millennium makes clear that city sizes, for individual cities, and for systems of cities, are dynamically unstable, although models of the near equilibrium dynamics of historical dynamics can account for most some of the potentials for structural stability through recovery or replacement much of which takes place through economic and political competition. Competition changes the shifting centers of the world political economic system. The work of Geoffrey West and colleagues shows that the competitive components of city systems are energy inefficient with scale. They are faster in pace and their energy metabolism grows higher with scale, contrary to biological systems. Both the instability of city systems and the global warming of the industrial period are a consequence of this energetic inefficiency. Thus, after reviewing the historical data, I focus here on the future of cities in the age of global warming. This requires a rethinking of the planetary ecology of cities and their eco-zones in the next century when global warming of 3 degrees centigrade will more than double CO2. There are huge runaway feedback effects as well in the degradation of carbon sinks and plus the bubbling of methane seas in the now open tundras of Siberia. Even without further feedback effects, sea level is predicted to rise 45 feet or more in the next century. Simply put, we have to think about the redesign of new forms of cities in their eco-zones and watersheds, as to how they can meet requirements of local sustainability. In other words, given the 10% or more of humanity that will be displaced on coastline cities, how can new ecologically efficient cities at smaller scales support populations that will take on the attributes of cities and the attractions of populations to cities of smaller scales.

See also City instability and Batty, Michael. 2006. Rank Clocks. Nature (Letters) 444:592-596.

Conference Programme Committee, Review Papers 8ce5cf European Conference on Complex Systems 2006 (ECCS '06), Said Business School, University of Oxford, 25-29 September 2006

JSM (the Joint Statistical Meetings) Invited Lecture,August 6-10, 2006, Seattle, Washington. Session chaired by Cosma Shalizi. Seattle Convention Center. 7 August 10:30am-12:20pm. Tom Nakano and Doug White "Depth Partitions and Hierarchical Network Structure in a Tokyo Industrial District." Abstract. We explore the implications of the theory of Harrison White, Markets from Networks: Socioeconomic Models of Production, using a network statistics analysis of an industrial district of 8500 firms in Ohta District, Toyko.

INVITED TALKS, PLENARY AND KEYNOTE ADDRESSES, Workshops given

Thursday June 22, 2006, 1:30-3:00 - VidCon S06#6 Human Science and Complexity (Video Recorded)
Doug White and Laurent Tambayong (IMBS, UCI), "The Five Alternations Between Global Economy and Regional Economies in Eurasia in the Last Millennium: Definitive Evidence of Macro Civilizational Dynamics." Abstract: Studies of macrosocial system dynamics over the past two year have suggested large scale ?cityquakes? that radically altered the shape of urban city distributions worldwide, especially in Eurasia, alternating between more global economies and more regionalized economies. We present the first definitive evidence and explanation for what these cityquakes entail and argue that we are on the cusp between a continuation of the dynamics of the past, which if continued would entail globalization, and a precipitous and early collapse into divisive regional economies, a transition which is preceded by interregional wars and the breakdown of interregional trade.

"Innovation, Networks and Dynamics," Presentation to the final ISCOM meeting, 20-24 May, 2006, in Venice

Santa Fe Institute, Monday May 15, 2006
"A relational law of city networks, network biconnectivity, trade, and the Q-dynamics of historical city size distributions"
by Laurent Tambayong and Douglas White, Institute for Mathematical Behavioral Sciences, UCI.
Abstract: This will be an informal researcher discussion of results and theory for historical scaling laws and dynamics in the period of economic markets, 900 CE to the present, focusing on the 73 largest cities in 23 time periods for Eurasian trade. It is also a broader follow-up to the ppt presentation from the Friday symposium.

"Network Dynamics of City Sizes, Trade Networks, and Conflict" Santa Fe Institute, Annual Science Board Symposium, May 12-13, 2006. (In collaboration with Laurent Tambayong)

Friday April, 2006, 21 1:30-3:00 - VidCon S06#2. Tsutomu (Tom) Nakano, Kwansei Gakuin University and External Affiliated Faculty, Center on Organizational Innovation, Columbia University, and Doug White (IMBS, UCI) Powerpoint pdf "Networks-Affect-Pricing Theory in Modern Production Industry: Three Network Studies of the Giant Industrial District of Tokyo" Abstract. We analyze six questions about production-chain markets that emerge from three empirical studies of trade relationships among over 8,000 firms in a large-scale industrial district in Tokyo. Are they Small-World? Scale-free? Hierarchical? Etc. Analyzing predictive cohesion structures and substructures in the network we find support for network-affects-pricing theory that differs from H. White's model. Supplier-buyer relations are hierarchical (a directed acyclic graph), with no exchange cycles that would promote price equilibrium. We find linked network configurations likely to affect pricing. Multi-connectivity is a critical seeding mechanism where quasi-optimal exchange pricing can be achieved. But a core of elite firms was also detected that organizes status differences among firms and serves to institutionalize role structures in the production markets. In addition, structural advantages in pricing accrue to core firms because suppliers upstream in the hierarchy operate through a preponderance of multiple-supplier triads, which enforces competition among suppliers and transmits pricing benefits to elite firms downstream. Elites exert power over the hierarchy from the top down, share elite suppliers with other elite end-producers, and can dominate price-setting from the top.

"Discovery of oscillatory dynamics of city-size distributions in world historical systems," D. White and N. Kejzar ppt as pdf full paper: This will become a shorter paper addressed to the specific themes of globalization and evolution in interpreting our findings would be the most appropriate, and we would publish the more technical aspects elsewhere. Summer would be a good ETA for such a revision.
Globalization as Evolutionary Process Modeling, Simulation, and Forecasting Global Change, sponsored by the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, meeting at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), Laxenburg , Austria , April 6-8, 2006,

Causality of Network Configurations in Historical Dynamics: Some Hypotheses and Evidence. March 23, 2006 International Studies Association San Diego 47th Annual ISA Convention. Town & Country Resort and Convention Center. UPLOAD PAPER HERE powerpoint: Rethinking World Historical Systems from Network Theory Perspectives: Medieval Historical Dynamics 1175-150 paper - ISA2006March23.pdf

Monday, March 20, 2006. Workshop participant. Measuring and modeling state formation since the iron age. With Chris Chase-Dunn and Peter Turchin. The workshop will focus on defining the scope and methods of our empirical and modeling project. Participants will be asked make short presentations on particular topics and we will have group discussion of each topic for the purpose of producing a feasible project plan that improves upon the proposal that was submitted to the NSF.

Keynote speaker European Conference on Complex Systems Paris, 14-18 November 2005. powerpoint: Civilizations as Dynamic Networks Alternate Title: Abstract: Networks, Hierarchy and Complexity, Multi-net analysis and nonlinear dynamics, with some methods and results in complexity science. Wednesday: Nov 16, 9:50-10:40.

Abstract. Although the talk will focus only on civilizational networks as an example, many complex systems are composed by multi-nets, i.e., multiple networks undergoing change in time series. Understanding the behavior of multi-net systems poses some basic questions:
1) how should we represent and model multiply layered and evolving networks (multi-nets) so as to discover their instabilities and nonlinear dynamics?
2) what are some of the common properties induced by dependence on co-evolution with network topologies?
3) does a generalized Boltzmann-Gibbs entropy, that takes into account network dependencies and hence long-range correlations, have applicability to modeling complexity in social systems?
4) what is the contribution of a combination of multiply layered networks, time series, methods of study for nonlinear dynamic interactions (identifying oscillations and instabilities), simulation, nonextensive BG entropy, and tracking co-evolution of network topology?
The examples illustrated are city attributes and networks, industrial networks, agent search behavior, and marriage choice; each includes issues of the co-evolution of network topology and micro-macro linkages. Five sets of results are discussed:
1. A simulation that shows how modeling of results with generalized Boltzmann-Gibbs (q-) entropy takes long range correlations into account in known network dynamics relating to agent search behavior. http://arxiv.org/abs/cond-mat/0508028 SFI working paper (incoming comment: you might find interesting the paper about measuring growing mechanisms in networks (interaction behavior, or preferential attachment (PA)), especially regarding your neat recent arXiv paper, where perhaps it may be relevant in the particular case of PA related to degree (alpha), social distance (beta & gamma)
2. A q-entropy worldwide scaling of the 28 historically estimated city-size distributions is investigated for nonlinear instabilities in urban systems. pdf
3. Investigation of a multi-net coding and longitudinal analysis of agrarian civilizations as dynamical networks (Medieval European and Eurasian datasets) showing nonlinear dynamic interactions.
4. Analysis of collaborative multi-nets in the world biotech industry shows an interactive dynamics of recruitment for innovation and organizational consolidation. AJS 210(4): 1132-1205.
5. Multi-net construction of social structure through mate choice and co-evolution of social network topologies. Complexity 8(1):72-81.

Founding Lecture, Sept 30, 2005, Four-Campus UC Human Sciences and Complexity VideoColloqium. powerpoint: Civilizations as Dynamic Networks Alternate Title: "Networks, Hierarchy and Complexity, Historical Modeling and Simulation: What do Network Interdependencies have to do with Civilizational Dynamics?" To play this vidcon talk off the web, you will need Real Player, which is a free download. Then open "real player", play something, and in the url window you can cut and past the url below into the real player address bar or just click here.

streaming video #1: rtsp://media.nacs.uci.edu:554/ITC/SocialScience/White/Anthro-093005.rm

Transforming Ethnographic Data and Analytical Problems into Network Data Suitable for Complementary Analysis and Theory Halle Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology June 27 2005 Powerpoint examples

Invited discussant, ISCOM conference, Santa Fe Institute, August 2005

Invited speaker, Civilizations as Dynamic Networks, Institute of Ethnology, University of Cologne. June 28, 2005

Invited speaker, Theory and Analysis of Kinship Networks, Anthropology Department, University of Hamburg, June 20, 2005

Invited speaker, Civilizations as Dynamic Networks, Anthropology and Sociology, Central European University. June 2, 2005

Faculty of Economics and School of Social Science, jointly sponsored seminar, University of Ljubljana. Title: Network Dynamics of Inter-Organization Collaborations in Biotechnology, 1988-1999, Douglas R. White, in collaboration with W. W. Powell and J. Owen-Smith. May 24, 2005.
Abstract of the discussion. The growth regimes of complex networks account for many of their structural features and behavioral effects. In the case of collaborative alliances among organizations in the biotech industry, the dynamics of inter-connection helps forge cohesive clusters of prominent nodes into an elite that can play gatekeeper and arbiter roles in an expanding network. The characteristics of such emergent elites, however, depend intimately upon the structural locations of the partners that form new ties (Powell et al., AJS 2005). Systems where cores deepen their internal connections conserve their position, but may calcify. Those that expand their reach by forming connections to newcomers and to the network's periphery increase responsiveness and innovation at the cost of incoherence. Analysis of twelve years of longitudinal network data from the biotech industry demonstrates that a mix of expansive and conserving ties account for that industry's particular combination of stability and responsiveness. A structural and dynamical view of network growth offers new insights into the distinctive features of social and economic networks, while linking models of network dynamics to debates in organizational theory and innovation studies. Analysis of dynamics shows interactive and periodic oscillation between consolidation within the multiconnected core of the industry and recruitment by core organizations of newcomers or peripheral partners in the network that have a high potential for innovation and complementarity.

Anthropological Science invited seminar, University of Ljubljana, Title: Anthropology and Structural Cohesion: Theory and Four Ethnographic Examples, May 27, 2005.

Network Dynamics and Scaling (with links to pdfs and with powerpoint) Information Society as a Complex System (ISCOM) Third Annual Meeting, Reggio-Modena, Italy. April 4 2005

Genealogy and Social Cohesion invitation from 17th Entretiens du Centre Jacques Cartier. Montreal. October, 2004, to speak on "The uses and practices of genealogy in the human, social and biological sciences," Meetings cover a wide spectrum of scientific, societal or cultural themes bringing together a variety researchers, artists, politicians, etc from Europe and North America.

International SFI Collaboration on Network Analysis using Pajek: Powerpoint slides Civilizations as Complex Networks. Aug 23, 2004. Abstract. General scientific strategies for complex evolutionary processes emergent out of network interaction might require capturing long term dynamics first, in this case the interaction between relatively slow processes of population growth pressing on resources building pressures for sociopolitical violence, and how these affect stacks of processes that operate at faster time scales. Turchin's work shows oscillatory dynamics in multiple civilizational contexts at a secular (2-3 century) scale in which organizational innovation leaves lasting organizational changes that generate millennial trends. Micro dynamics resulting from demographic-violence crises in the period and region examined (1175-1500 CE Europe and peri-European region beginning with a largely demonetized economy) drive monetization at the macro-level and differential growth of commercial production regions that is mediated by network variables (placement in the geographic and trade network). Entailment relationships among commodities and urban or trade-node variables change over generational time scales - the current research problem involving how these coevolve with demographic-violence phases and regional network positional effects. Strong statistical tests are used for identifying empirical dynamics, changing entailment relationships, new graph theoretic measures and statistical techniques (ring cohesion) are used for measuring cohesion and its effects, and new network measures of flow centralities contribute to time-lagged predictions of changes in the relative prominence of cities and states within the evolving world economy.

Seminaire Pajek: Workshop on Genealogical Analysis in History and Ethnography. Centre Roland Mousnier. Universite de Sorbonne, Paris. June, 2004. Ring Cohesion in Marriage Networks

Modeling the Dynamics of Network Formation and Evolution. Workshop on Dynamics of groups and institutions: Their emergence, co-evolution and environment. Santa Fe Institute and the Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences, from June 7 to June 11, 2004. Vlado's photos (self-exploding file)

Santa Fe Institute working group paper on Civilizations as Dynamic Networks (Macrosocial systems), April-May, 2004

Quantitative Network Analysis, with Bob Hanneman at Time-mapping Globalization in the World-System Saturday February 7 and Sunday February 8, 2004, UC Riverside

Network Processes in Evolving Systems. Opening research focus group discussion, MBS program in Social Dynamics and Evolution. January, 2004, UCI.

December 2003 POWERPOINT Network dynamics, cohesion and scaling Second ISCOM Workshop Conference on the Information Society as a Complex System Chateau de Champs-sur-Marne, France.

First ISCOM Workshop Santa Fe Institute, August 2003

Nov 2003 POWERPOINT Networks and Demography Douglas R. White and James Moody. Stanford, Anthropological Sciences. Networks from Genealogies and Linked Censuses: Why do they matter?

Aug 2003 Network Dynamics and Field Evolution: The Growth of Interorganizational Collaboration in the Life Sciences Walter W. Powell, Douglas R White, Kenneth W Koput, Jason D. Owen-Smith (Presenter). Annual Meeting, American Sociological Assocation. Session: Social Networks as Resources. Monday, 8/18/2003 at 4:30 p.m.

June 2003 Social cohesion in organizations IRESCO, Paris. Organisation : Emmanuel Lazega, Lise Mounier
Séminaire " Réseaux et régulation " powerpoint handout powerpoint

POWERPOINT Kinship Networks and Demography Douglas R. White and James Moody, Ohio State University. Minneapolis, May 1-3 2003: Population Association of America Networks from Genealogies and Linked Censuses: Why do they matter?

GENEVA: plenary and Kinship 2001

Cologne2000 incl Plenary

SFI2000 Working Group on Complex Interactive Networks ATTENDING

June 2003 Conférence Marc Bloch - 10 juin 2003 Le Sorbonne, Paris. Annual Meeting of the Professoriat, University of Paris

CONFERENCE PAPERS

"Power and Profit in Europe and the Near East: Network Dynamics in the Early Renaissance 1175-1500" March 2006 International Studies San Diego

Santa Fe Institute, Discussant, ISCOM Project, July, 2005

Santa Fe SASci meeting, Feb 2005, Title: Macromodels - Civilizations as Dynamic Networks

Abstract: Here we present, critique, and examine the empirical evidence for a model of population growth that is more complex than either of the models – power-law or hyperbolic. It involves two variables, a technologically induced carrying capacity K, and the literacy rate, in addition to population number P. Literacy rate L is seen as a critical nonlinear variable that has a sigmoidal pattern of change in relation to K, KL(1-L), while changes in K are affected by the product P times L and changes in P are affected by those in L times N but divided by L. Hence population growth slows as literacy increases, as in (a) the theory of demographic transition and (b) the periods of demographic transition over the past 12,000 years.
New Abstract: Civilizations as dynamic networks are examined for the Medieval period in the context of our larger macromodels. powerpoint

Santa Fe SASci meeting, Feb 2005, Title: Conceptual Ethnography

Abstract: Conceptual ethnography begins from the recognition that the compartments and conceptions of anthropology and ethnography are interlinked. Here I examine cognition and social networks in relation to the concept of culture, exemplified in the study of kinship. Concepts used in network analysis of the context and behaviors involved in kinship lead to new understandings of patterns of cohesion. Within cohesive groups, people in various communities are shown to use the network itself to compute categories of kinship in unexpected ways that do not require the kinds of assumptions anthropologists often make about the connection between kinship terminology and behavior. It is shown that this lends support to the view that cognition cannot be considered an internal mental process but involves the social environment itself as part of the cognition in the wild, as Ed Hutchins has aptly put the case. Hence culture cannot be considered in terms of models of internal states, and a definition of culture must deal with the many layers of interconnections between behavior, networks, cognition, and socially cohesive units such as community or organizations in which people interact. powerpoint

Redondo Beach INSNA meeting, Feb 2005, Title: World-System Network Dynamics in the Early Renaissance

Abstract: The European and surrounding region, 1175-1500, is examined as a portion of the larger world-systems interface, drawing on (1) Spufford's work on trade networks, urban industry, the dynamics of monetization and hyperinflationary processes and their effects and (2) Turchin's work on dynamics of population change and sociopolitical violence. Longitudinal analysis of generational time series for industries and trade routs in intercity networks integrates network analysis -- providing additional predictions about structural effects on change processes -- with statistical dynamics and the dynamics of change in interindustry implicational structures. Overlays of GIS and network data and images are used for visualization in addition to statistical analyses. powerpoint

March 2003 The Navigability of Strong Ties: Small Worlds, Complex Dynamics and Network Topologies Second Lake Arrowhead Conference on Human Complexity Systems
Douglas R. White and Michael Houseman

Sunbelt 2003 Proposal

AAA 2002 Sided with Omaha but no Twist: Three Logics of Alyawarra Kinship

EMCSR conference 2002, EMCSR society and paper

Lille Micro/Macro Relations: Advances in the Contribution of Structural Analysis 2002

Preliminary Paper AAA 2001 and final paper

UCLA Computational Models talk, ULCA Jan 2001