nan 陳樹衡

On the Relevance of Genetic Programming to Evolutionary Economics

In this chapter, we review the development of artificial adaptive economic agents in evolutionary economics. The review starts from a 1986 paper by Robert Lucas, a Nobel Prize laureate in economics. From there, we shall see how the idea of economic adaptive agents was enriched and implemented by Holland’s two books on genetic algorithms (Holland 1975) and on classifier systems (Holland et al. 1986). We then examine the impact of Holland’s artificial adaptive agents on two different groups of economists. One was led by Thomas Sargent, representing new classical economics, and the other by Brian Arthur, standing for Santa Fe Institute (SFI) economics. A moot point here is that the spirit of the genetic algorithm (GA) (John Holland’s legacy) is lost in mainstream economics, but is reserved in SFI economics. We then move to Koza’s genetic programming, and show how John Holland’s legacy was further expanded in evolutionary economics.

Agent-Based Computational Macro-economics: A Survey

While by all standards the macroeconomic system is qualified to be a complex adaptive system, mainstream macroeconomics is not capable of demonstrating this feature. Recent applications of agent-based modeling to macroeconomics define a new research direction, which demonstrates how the macroeconomic system can be modeled and studied as a complex adaptive system. This paper shall review the development of agent-based computational modeling in macroeconomics.

Social Interactions and Innovation: Simulation Based on an Agent-Based Modular Economy

Using an agent-based modular economic model, we study the effect of social interactions on product innovation and its further impact on competitiveness dynamics. Two firms with different intensities of social interactions are placed in a context of duopolistic competition. The macroscopic analysis based on various criteria, including the market share, profit rate, accumulated capital, waste ratio and consumers’ satisfaction level, indicates that high social interaction within the firm can lead to not only a healthy firm but also a healthy economy. However, this positive result is undermined by the catastrophic nature of the modular economy as shown in the microscopic analysis. Furthermore, the mesoscopic analysis shows that in the long run the duopoly market tends to become a monopolistic market, and there is a non-trivial probability that the low-interaction firm will drive out the high-interaction firm. The risk of innovation in this model may be greater than what the usual economic model may expect.

Advances in Computational Social Science

This volume is a post-conference publication of the 4th World Congress on Social Simulation (WCSS), with contents selected from among the 80 papers originally presented at the conference. WCSS is a biennial event, jointly organized by three scientific communities in computational social science, namely, the Pacific-Asian Association for Agent-Based Approach in Social Systems Sciences (PAAA), the European Social Simulation Association (ESSA), and the Computational Social Science Society of the Americas (CSSSA). It is, therefore, currently the most prominent conference in the area of agent-based social simulation. The papers selected for this volume give a holistic view of the current development of social simulation, indicating the directions for future research and creating an important archival document and milestone in the history of computational social science. Specifically, the papers included here cover substantial progress in artificial financial markets, macroeconomic forecasting, supply chain management, bank networks, social networks, urban planning, social norms and group formation, cross-cultural studies, political party competition, voting behavior, computational demography, computational anthropology, evolution of languages, public health and epidemics, AIDS, security and terrorism, methodological and epistemological issues, empirical-based agent-based modeling, modeling of experimental social science, gaming simulation, cognitive agents, and participatory simulation. Furthermore, pioneering studies in some new research areas, such as the theoretical foundations of social simulation and categorical social science, also are included in the volume.