Nick writes: > So then the question would be, under what conditions do we > accept that when the simple agents that we send forth to do > battle in our models product the same collective behavior as > the apparently real agents we see around us, that the real > agents actually behave by the same underlying rules as the > our created ones?
I think a good modeling team will have two parallel tracks going when constructing/validating the model: The first would be qualitative research at the micro level. Observing agent behaviors in the real world. While there is the challenge of many-to-many relationship between micro rules and macro behavior, grounding your model in qualitative research at the micro level can help reduce the ensemble of possible micro rules. The second parallel track would be at the macro level where the observer may rely more on Pierce's abductive logic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abductive_reasoning) than inductive/deductive reasoning to generate hyptotheses about the micro rules that may generate the macro dynamics. To me, the generative character of abductive logic is where the creative bit is that resists reduction to methodology in the practice in ABM... -Steve ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
