Download or read book Frontiers of Complexity written by Peter Coveney and published by Ballantine Books. This book was released on 1996-08-27 with total page 492 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "SCIENCE JOURNALISM AT ITS BEST. . . An impeccably researched, amazingly up-to-date, crisply written and well-illustrated survey." --Nature At the cutting edge of the sciences, a dynamic new concept is emerging: complexity. In this groundbreaking new book, Peter Coveney and Roger Highfield explore how complexity in mathematics, physics, biology, chemistry, and even the social sciences is transforming not only the way we think about the universe, but also the very assumptions that underlie conventional science. Complexity is a watchword for a new way of thinking about the behavior of interacting units, whether they are atoms, ants in a colony, or neurons firing in a human brain. The rise of the electronic computer provided both the key and the catalyst to our exploration of complexity. A new generation of computers that runs on light and exploits the bizarre properties of quantum mechanics promises to deepen our understanding still further. The advances we have already witnessed are spectacular. The authors take us inside laboratories where scientists are evolving the genetic molecules that enabled life to emerge on earth and generating universes teeming with virtual creatures in cyber-space. We witness the utterly realistic behavior of a school of virtual fish--computer-generated replicas that have been trained to swim gracefully, hunt for food, and scatter at the approach of a leopard shark. Compelling in its clarity, far-reaching in its implications, vibrant with the excitement of new discovery, Frontiers of Complexity is an arresting account of how far science has come in the past fifty years and an essential guide to the rapidly approaching future. "[A] MARVELOUS AND COMPREHENSIVE WORK . . . Virtually any scientist or interested lay reader will find this book engrossing, edifying and inspiring." --Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Download or read book Boolean Function Complexity written by Stasys Jukna and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-01-06 with total page 618 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Boolean circuit complexity is the combinatorics of computer science and involves many intriguing problems that are easy to state and explain, even for the layman. This book is a comprehensive description of basic lower bound arguments, covering many of the gems of this “complexity Waterloo” that have been discovered over the past several decades, right up to results from the last year or two. Many open problems, marked as Research Problems, are mentioned along the way. The problems are mainly of combinatorial flavor but their solutions could have great consequences in circuit complexity and computer science. The book will be of interest to graduate students and researchers in the fields of computer science and discrete mathematics.
Download or read book Complexity Perspectives on Researching Language Learner and Teacher Psychology written by Richard J. Sampson and published by Multilingual Matters. This book was released on 2020-10-23 with total page 422 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This edited volume brings together both established and emerging researcher voices from around the world to illustrate how complexity perspectives might contribute to new ways of researching and understanding the psychology of language learners and teachers in situated educational contexts. Chapter authors discuss their own perspectives on researching within a complexity paradigm, exemplified by concrete and original examples from their research histories. Moreover, chapters explore research approaches to a variety of learner and teacher psychological foci of interest in SLA. Examples include: anxiety, classroom group dynamics and group-level motivation, cognition and metacognition, emotions and emotion regulation strategies, learner reticence and silence, motivation, self-concept and willingness to communicate.
Download or read book Complexity Economics written by W. Brian Arthur and published by . This book was released on 2020-12 with total page 382 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Santa Fe Institute scientists first started working on economics more than thirty years ago, many of their insights, approaches, and tools were considered beyond heterodox. These once-disparaged approaches included network economics, agents of limited rationality, and institutional evolution-all topics that are now increasingly considered mainstream. SFI continues to expand the boundary of our economic understanding by pioneering fields as diverse as collective intelligence and organizational scaling. This volume, edited by W. Brian Arthur, Eric D. Beinhocker, and Allison Stanger, includes panel and talk transcripts from SFI's 2019 Applied Complexity Network Symposium, with newly written introductions and reflections. Representing both scholarly and practitioner perspectives, this book explores the history and frontiers of complexity economics in a broad-ranging, accessible manner.
Download or read book Frontiers in Ecology Evolution and Complexity written by Mariana Benítez and published by CopIt ArXives. This book was released on 2014-07-08 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Advances in molecular biology, remote sensing, systems biology, bioinformatics, non-linear science, the physics of complex systems and other fields have rendered a great amount of data that remain to be integrated into models and theories that are capable of accounting for the complexity of ecological systems and the evolutionary dynamics of life. It is thus necessary to provide a solid basis to discuss and reflect on these and other challenges both at the local and global scales. This volume aims to delineate an integrative and interdisciplinary view that suggests new avenues in research and teaching, critically discusses the scope of the diverse methods in the study of complex systems, and points at key open questions. Finally, this book will provide students and specialists with a collection of high quality open access essays that will contribute to integrate Ecology, Evolution and Complexity in the context of basic research and in the field of Sustainability Sciences.
Download or read book Global Challenges Governance and Complexity written by Victor Galaz and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 2019-12-27 with total page 333 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There is an increased interest in integrating insights from the complexity sciences to studies of governance and policy. While the issue has been debated, and the term of ‘complexity’ has multiple and sometimes contested interpretations, it is also clear the field has spurred a number of interesting theoretical and empirical efforts. The book includes key thinkers in the field, elaborates on different analytical approaches in studying governance, institutions and policy in the face of complexity, and showcases empirical applications and insights.
Download or read book Chemical Complexity written by Alexander S. Mikhailov and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-08-10 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides an outline of theoretical concepts and their experimental verification in studies of self-organization phenomena in chemical systems, as they emerged in the mid-20th century and have evolved since. Presenting essays on selected topics, it was prepared by authors who have made profound contributions to the field. Traditionally, physical chemistry has been concerned with interactions between atoms and molecules that produce a variety of equilibrium structures - or the 'dead' order - in a stationary state. But biological cells exhibit a different 'living' kind of order, prompting E. Schrödinger to pose his famous question “What is life?” in 1943. Through an unprecedented theoretical and experimental development, it was later revealed that biological self-organization phenomena are in complete agreement with the laws of physics, once they are applied to a special class of thermodynamically open systems and non-equilibrium states. This knowledge has in turn led to the design and synthesis of simple inorganic systems capable of self-organization effects. These artificial 'living organisms' are able to operate on macroscopic to microscopic scales, even down to single-molecule machines. In the future, such research could provide a basis for a technological breakthrough, comparable in its impact with the invention of lasers and semiconductors. Its results can be used to control natural chemical processes, and to design artificial complex chemical processes with various functionalities. The book offers an extensive discussion of the history of research on complex chemical systems and its future prospects.
Download or read book Complexity and the Arrow of Time written by Charles H. Lineweaver and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2013-08-08 with total page 371 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written by a wide range of experts, this work presents cosmological, biological and philosophical perspectives on complexity in our universe.
Download or read book Historical Dynamics written by Peter Turchin and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2018-05-08 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Many historical processes are dynamic. Populations grow and decline. Empires expand and collapse. Religions spread and wither. Natural scientists have made great strides in understanding dynamical processes in the physical and biological worlds using a synthetic approach that combines mathematical modeling with statistical analyses. Taking up the problem of territorial dynamics--why some polities at certain times expand and at other times contract--this book shows that a similar research program can advance our understanding of dynamical processes in history. Peter Turchin develops hypotheses from a wide range of social, political, economic, and demographic factors: geopolitics, factors affecting collective solidarity, dynamics of ethnic assimilation/religious conversion, and the interaction between population dynamics and sociopolitical stability. He then translates these into a spectrum of mathematical models, investigates the dynamics predicted by the models, and contrasts model predictions with empirical patterns. Turchin's highly instructive empirical tests demonstrate that certain models predict empirical patterns with a very high degree of accuracy. For instance, one model accounts for the recurrent waves of state breakdown in medieval and early modern Europe. And historical data confirm that ethno-nationalist solidarity produces an aggressively expansive state under certain conditions (such as in locations where imperial frontiers coincide with religious divides). The strength of Turchin's results suggests that the synthetic approach he advocates can significantly improve our understanding of historical dynamics.
Download or read book Sacred Geographies of Ancient Amazonia written by Denise P Schaan and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-06-16 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Scholars have long insisted that the Amazonian ecosystem placed severe limits on the size and complexity of its ancient cultures, but leading researcher Denise Schaan reverses that view, revealing a major civilization in ancient Amazonia that was more complex than anyone previously dreamed.
Download or read book The Dreams of Reason written by Heinz R. Pagels and published by Simon & Schuster. This book was released on 1988 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Explains the new developments and the scientific impact of the computer as an instrument of the new sciences of complexity.
Download or read book Big History and the Future of Humanity written by Fred Spier and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2015-05-06 with total page 371 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: big history and the future of humanity “This remains the best single attempt to theorize big history as a discipline that can link core concepts and paradigms across all historical disciplines, from cosmology to geology, from biology to human history. With additional and updated material, the Second Edition also offers a fine introduction to the history of big history and a superb introductory survey to the big history story. Essential reading for anyone interested in a rapidly evolving new field of scholarship that links the sciences and the humanities into a modern, science-based origin story.” David Christian, Macquarie University “Notable for its theoretic approach, this new Second Edition is both an indispensable contribution to the emerging big history narrative and a powerful university textbook. Spier defines words carefully and recognizes the limits of current knowledge, aspects of his own clear thinking.” Cynthia Brown, Emerita, Dominican University of California Reflecting the latest theories in the sciences and humanities, this new edition of Big History and the Future of Humanity presents an accessible and original overview of the entire sweep of history from the origins of the universe and life on Earth up to the present day. Placing the relatively brief period of human history within a much broader framework – one that considers everything from vast galaxy clusters to the tiniest sub-atomic particles – big history is an innovative theoretical approach that opens up entirely new multidisciplinary research agendas. Noted historian Fred Spier reveals how a thorough examination of patterns of complexity can offer richer insights into what the future may have in store for humanity. The second edition includes new learning features, such as highlighted scientific concepts, an illustrative timeline and comprehensive glossary. By exploring the cumulative history from the Big Bang to the modern day, Big History and the Future of Humanity, Second Edition, sheds important historical light on where we have been – and offers a tantalizing glimpse of what lies ahead.
Download or read book Would Be Worlds written by John Casti and published by Perseus Books Group. This book was released on 1997 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There is a new breed of computer simulations, known as 'artificial worlds' or 'would-be worlds', that allows scientists to create artificial versions of real-life phenomena inside their computers. Casti explores how these are being used.
Download or read book Introduction to Circuit Complexity written by Heribert Vollmer and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-04-17 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An advanced textbook giving a broad, modern view of the computational complexity theory of boolean circuits, with extensive references, for theoretical computer scientists and mathematicians.
Download or read book Complexity and the Economy written by W. Brian Arthur and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2015 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A collection of previous published papers by the author on the subject of complexity economics, appearing from the 1980s to the present.
Download or read book A Colonial Complex written by Steven J. Oatis and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2004-01-01 with total page 414 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1715 the upstart British colony of South Carolina was nearly destroyed in an unexpected conflict with many of its Indian neighbors, most notably the Yamasees, a group whose sovereignty had become increasingly threatened. The South Carolina militia retaliated repeatedly until, by 1717, the Yamasees were nearly annihilated, and their survivors fled to Spanish Florida. The war not only sent shock waves throughout South Carolina's government, economy, and society, but also had a profound impact on colonial and Indian cultures from the Atlantic Coast to the Mississippi River. Drawing on a diverse range of colonial records, A Colonial Complex builds on recent developments in frontier history and depicts the Yamasee War as part of a colonial complex: a broad pattern of exchange that linked the Southeast?s Indian, African, and European cultures throughout the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. In the first detailed study of this crucial conflict, Steven J. Oatis shows the effects of South Carolina?s aggressive imperial expansion on the issues of frontier trade, combat, and diplomacy, viewing them not only from the perspective of English South Carolinians but also from that of the societies that dealt with the South Carolinians both directly and indirectly. Readers will find new information on the deerskin trade, the Indian slave trade, imperial rivalry, frontier military strategy, and the major transformations in the cultural landscape of the early colonial Southeast.
Download or read book Chaos and Complexity in Astrophysics written by O. Regev and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2006-03-23 with total page 492 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A primer for researchers and graduate students; introduces and applies chaos techniques to specific astrophysical systems.
