Kevin Dunbar has been engaged in studying how people engage in complex reasoning, social interactions, and real-world problem solving for over 20 years. He will discuss the key set of processes that he has discovered which explain the nature of human insight and how humans create new knowledge. His findings provide an understanding of the mechanisms that make complex thinking possible, and suggest new ways that creative thought and discovery can be facilitated across a broad range of contexts.
Speaker: Robert Spekkens
John R. Clymer of California State University Fullerton (CSUF) describes the ExtendSim and OpEMCSS library toolsets as methods for designing models based on complex, context-sensitive interactions.
Leigh Tesfatsion of Iowa State University focuses on the potential use of agent-based test beds for the systematic exploration of proposed changes in institutional arrangements in advance of actual implementation. She uses an agent-based test bed designed for the study of restructured U.S. electricity markets for concrete illustration.
Part 1
Speaker: Mike Stone
Speaker: Victor Galaz
Mark Tovey, Michael Nielsen, and Hassan Masum explore how new information and communication technologies might allow for new types of political engagement, problem solving, and collective decision-making. They discuss issues such as collective intelligence and open source collaboration in this interactive seminar.
Dr. Jukka Pekka Onnela of Harvard University discusses how social networks are structured by and interact with cellphone communication patterns. He also outlines his research on how ‘apps’ used in social networking sites influence collective human behaviour and how community detection involves the identification of tightly connected groups of nodes in social networks.
Speakers: David Robinson, Ivan Filion, and Kirsten Robinson
A major restoration project for Georgian Bay calls for re-imagining the ecosystems management strategy and its relationship to the local economy. The problem is complicated, and the solutions are contested. Is it an opportunity to apply complexity theory? This issue will be explored in this exciting and interactive WICI seminar.
Speaker: Thomas Homer-Dixon, Stephen Bocking, and Robert Gibson
Category: Alternatives Magazine debate
On Tuesday, January 12, three of Canada’s foremost “ecollectuals” will burn up the podium with a fast-paced discussion that will challenge your eco-ideas and test your eco-vocabulary. Climate change may be heating up the planet, but it’s Thomas Homer-Dixon (UW), Robert Gibson (UW) and Stephen Bocking (Trent University) who will raise the thermostat on January 12.