随笔：圣塔菲研究所2024暑期夏令营｜内附夏令营学者信息
导语
陶如意 | 作者
Week 1~2
Week 1~2
Week 3~4
Week 3~4
左图：观点极化Team一起hiking的合影。右图：我在厚着脸皮pre一个烂烂的结果的场景
网站截图，网址是这个，也是开放给大家可以上传新的东西的：https://maxjerdee.github.io/CSSS-arts/gallery.html
尾声
尾声
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Porter Swentzell (indigenous culture)
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Liz Bradley (Nonlinear dynamics)
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Jacob Foster (LLMs, NLP)
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Article: From Thin to Thick: Toward a Politics of Human-Compatible AI
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Article: Can AI and creativity coexist?
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Laurent Hébert-Dufresne (networks)
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Rajiv Sethi (fairness)
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Cris Moore (computation)
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Stephanie Forrest (biocomputation and security)
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Melanie Moses (robotics)
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Scaling Laws: Moses has contributed significantly to the study of scaling laws in biology, which describe how various characteristics of organisms (such as metabolic rate, lifespan, and growth patterns) change with size.
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Biological Inspiration for Computation: She explores how principles from biological systems, such as ant colony foraging behaviors and cellular networks, can be applied to improve algorithms and network designs in computer science.
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Public Health and Disease Dynamics: Her research also extends to modeling the spread of infectious diseases, providing insights into how disease outbreaks can be managed and mitigated.
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Dave Feldman (scaling)
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Andre de Roos (population structure)
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Size-Structured Population Dynamics: De Roos has extensively studied how differences in individual size within a population affect ecological interactions and population dynamics. He explores how growth, reproduction, and mortality rates vary with size and how these differences influence population stability and resilience.
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Ontogenetic Development: He examines how the developmental stages of organisms (ontogeny) impact population dynamics. For instance, how different life stages (e.g., juvenile vs. adult) compete for resources differently and how this affects population growth and structure.
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Individual-Based Models: De Roos often uses individual-based models (IBMs) to simulate the behavior and interactions of individual organisms within a population. These models help in understanding how individual variability and local interactions scale up to affect population-level patterns.
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Trophic Interactions and Food Webs: His work includes studying how size-structured populations interact within food webs, particularly predator-prey dynamics. He investigates how the size and stage structure of both predators and prey influence community composition and ecosystem stability.
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Evolutionary Ecology: De Roos also explores how evolutionary processes shape population structure. This includes examining how life history traits evolve in response to environmental pressures and how these evolutionary changes affect population dynamics.
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Melanie Mitchell (artificial intelligence)
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“Artificial Intelligence: A Guide for Thinking Humans” (2019):
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In this book for general audiences, Mitchell covers various AI methodologies, including machine learning, neural networks, and genetic algorithms, and discusses their applications and impacts on society. -
Mitchell emphasizes the importance of understanding what AI can and cannot do, debunking common myths and clarifying misconceptions about the field.
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Complexity and AI:
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Mitchell frequently explores the intersection of complexity science and AI. She examines how principles from complexity science, such as emergence and self-organization, can inform the development of more robust and flexible AI systems. -
Her research includes studying how AI systems can model and understand complex, dynamic environments and how they can exhibit adaptive behaviors.
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Challenges and Limitations of AI:
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Mitchell critically examines the limitations of current AI technologies, particularly in terms of generalization and understanding. She discusses issues such as the brittleness of AI systems, their lack of common sense, and their difficulty in transferring knowledge across different domains. -
She argues that achieving human-like intelligence in machines requires addressing these fundamental challenges and developing AI systems that can understand and interact with the world more like humans do.
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Ethics and Societal Impact:
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Mitchell also writes about the ethical and societal implications of AI. She highlights concerns about job displacement, privacy, bias in AI algorithms, and the potential for AI to be used in harmful ways. -
She advocates for responsible AI development and the need for interdisciplinary collaboration to address the ethical and societal challenges posed by AI technologies.
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Melanie Mitchell Presents “The Future of Artificial Intelligence”（YouTube）
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Hyejin Youn (innovation)
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Complex Systems: She investigates how complex systems, such as cities and economies, evolve and function. Her work often employs network theory and statistical physics to understand the underlying mechanisms driving these systems.
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Urban Studies: Youn’s research in urban studies focuses on the dynamics of cities, including their growth, development, and the interactions between different urban factors. She examines how cities innovate and how their economic and social networks evolve over time.
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Economic Geography: She explores the spatial distribution of economic activities and how this affects regional development. Her work often looks at the scaling laws that describe how different characteristics of cities, such as infrastructure and productivity, change with size.
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Innovation and Knowledge Networks: Youn studies how knowledge is generated and disseminated within and between organizations and regions. She analyzes the patterns of innovation and the factors that drive the success and diffusion of new ideas and technologies.
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Research on Urban Scaling: One of Youn’s significant contributions is her work on urban scaling laws, which describe how various characteristics of cities change predictably with their size. This includes factors like infrastructure, economic productivity, and social activity.
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Naeve O’Clery (economics)
Research Focus:
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Economic Complexity and Development:
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She explores how economic complexity—the diversity and sophistication of a region’s economic activities—affects economic growth and development. Her work often involves creating and analyzing economic complexity indices to understand the drivers of regional and national prosperity.
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Urban Dynamics and Spatial Analysis:
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O’Clery investigates the factors that influence urban growth, development, and the spatial distribution of economic activities within cities. She uses network theory and spatial analysis to model and understand these dynamics.
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Network Theory:
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She applies network theory to study various aspects of economic and urban systems, such as the flow of goods and services, innovation networks, and the structure of economic interactions.
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Data Science and Machine Learning:
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O’Clery integrates data science techniques and machine learning with traditional economic and urban theories to derive insights from large and complex datasets. Her interdisciplinary approach helps to reveal patterns and trends that are not immediately obvious through conventional methods.
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Economic Complexity Index (ECI): O’Clery has contributed to the development and refinement of the Economic Complexity Index, which measures the knowledge intensity of economies and helps to predict economic growth and development.
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Research on Urban Scaling Laws: Similar to Hyejin Youn, O’Clery has explored how urban characteristics scale with city size, providing insights into infrastructure needs, economic productivity, and social dynamics.
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Thalia Wheatley (collective emotions)
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Andreas Wagner (fitness)
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Fitness Landscapes:
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Wagner has explored the concept of fitness landscapes, which represent the relationship between genotypes (or phenotypes) and their reproductive success. In these landscapes, different genetic variations correspond to different levels of fitness, and evolution can be seen as a process of navigating this landscape to find higher fitness peaks.
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He examines how the structure of fitness landscapes influences evolutionary pathways and the potential for populations to reach optimal fitness configurations.
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Robustness and Evolvability:
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Wagner investigates how robustness (the ability of organisms to maintain function despite genetic mutations) and evolvability (the capacity of organisms to generate adaptive genetic variation) impact fitness.
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He discusses how robust genetic networks can facilitate evolvability by allowing organisms to explore new evolutionary pathways without losing their current adaptive functions.
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Genotype-Phenotype Mapping:
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Wagner’s work often delves into the mapping between genotypes and phenotypes and how this affects fitness. He explores how different genetic configurations can result in similar fitness outcomes and how this redundancy can promote evolutionary innovation.
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Evolutionary Innovation:
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In his book “Arrival of the Fittest: Solving Evolution’s Greatest Puzzle” (2014), Wagner discusses how novel traits and functions arise in biological systems. He argues that the ability of organisms to innovate is crucial for fitness and survival in changing environments.
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Wagner presents the idea that genetic networks and the vastness of genotype space provide the raw material for evolutionary innovation, allowing populations to discover new fitness peaks.
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Neutral Networks:
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Wagner introduces the concept of neutral networks, which are sets of genotypes that produce the same phenotype and have the same fitness. These networks allow populations to drift neutrally across genotype space, facilitating the discovery of new adaptive mutations without a loss in fitness.
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He emphasizes the importance of neutral networks in maintaining genetic diversity and enabling adaptive evolution.
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Sara Walker
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Origins of Life:
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Walker studies the fundamental processes that lead to the emergence of life. She explores how chemical systems transition from non-living to living states, focusing on the role of information and computation in this transition. -
Her work aims to identify universal principles underlying the origin of life, which could inform the search for life beyond Earth.
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Complex Systems and Information Theory:
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She investigates how complex systems, such as biological organisms and ecosystems, process and store information. Walker examines how these systems maintain organization and adapt to changing environments. -
Her research often uses concepts from information theory to understand the flow and transformation of information in biological systems.
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Astrobiology:
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Walker is involved in the search for extraterrestrial life, using her understanding of life’s origins and complexity to guide the search for biosignatures (indicators of life) on other planets. -
She explores how the principles of life on Earth can be applied to the search for life in the universe, considering both biochemical and alternative forms of life.
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Fundamental Physics and Life:
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She looks at the intersection of physics and biology, exploring how the laws of physics underpin the properties and behaviors of living systems.
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Her research addresses fundamental questions about the nature of life, including how physical laws can give rise to biological complexity.
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Fernanda Valdovinos (ecological networks)
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Importance of Network Structure:
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Nestedness and Modularity: Valdovinos has concluded that the structure of ecological networks, particularly their nested and modular organization, plays a crucial role in their stability and resilience. Nested networks, where specialist species interact with a subset of the species that generalists interact with, tend to be more stable. Modularity, where networks are divided into relatively independent sub-networks, can also enhance resilience by containing perturbations within modules.
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Mutualistic Interactions and Ecosystem Stability:
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Stability and Biodiversity: Her research indicates that mutualistic interactions, such as those between pollinators and plants, contribute significantly to ecosystem stability. These interactions enhance biodiversity and the resilience of ecosystems to environmental changes and disturbances.
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Adaptive Foraging: Valdovinos has shown that adaptive foraging behavior of pollinators, where they switch between flower species based on availability, can stabilize pollination networks. This behavior helps buffer the network against fluctuations in the abundance of individual species.
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Impacts of Environmental Changes:
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Human Activities: She has studied how human activities, such as habitat destruction, climate change, and the introduction of invasive species, disrupt ecological networks. These disruptions can lead to declines in biodiversity and ecosystem services. -
Network Responses to Disturbances: Valdovinos’s models predict how ecological networks respond to various disturbances. She has found that networks with greater biodiversity and more complex interaction patterns are generally more resilient to changes.
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Predictive Modeling:
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Dynamic Models: Valdovinos has developed dynamic models of pollination networks that incorporate the behavior of individual species and their interactions. These models help predict how changes in one part of the network can affect the entire system, providing valuable tools for conservation and management.
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Conservation Strategies: Her work emphasizes the importance of preserving both species and their interactions to maintain ecosystem functions. Effective conservation strategies should focus on protecting the network structure and the critical species that maintain network integrity.
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Role of Keystone Species:
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Critical Species: Valdovinos has identified the role of keystone species—those that have a disproportionately large impact on their environment relative to their abundance. In mutualistic networks, certain pollinators and plants act as keystone species whose presence is crucial for the stability and functioning of the network.
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Chris Kempes (origins of life)
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Universal Principles of Life:
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Kempes seeks to identify universal principles that govern the emergence and organization of life. This involves understanding the fundamental physical and chemical constraints that all living systems must obey, regardless of their specific biology. -
He explores how these principles can apply not only to life on Earth but also to potential life forms elsewhere in the universe.
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Complexity and Life’s Emergence:
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Kempes investigates how complexity arises in biological systems and the role it plays in the origins of life. He examines how simple chemical and physical interactions can lead to the complex structures and behaviors characteristic of living organisms.
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His research often focuses on the transition from non-living to living matter, exploring how complexity and organization emerge spontaneously under certain conditions.
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Metabolic Scaling Laws:
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One of Kempes’s key contributions is the study of metabolic scaling laws, which describe how metabolic rates change with the size of an organism. He explores how these scaling laws can be applied to understand the constraints on the size and structure of early life forms.
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This work helps to explain how metabolic processes scale from single cells to larger, multicellular organisms, providing insights into the evolution of complex life.=
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Thermodynamics and Life:
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Kempes examines the thermodynamic principles that underlie life, particularly how living systems maintain organization and complexity despite the second law of thermodynamics, which dictates an increase in entropy.
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He investigates how energy flow and thermodynamic efficiency are critical to the emergence and sustainability of life.
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Prebiotic Chemistry:
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His research includes exploring the chemical pathways that could lead to the formation of life, focusing on the prebiotic chemistry that precedes biological organization.
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Kempes looks at how simple molecules could assemble into more complex structures capable of metabolism and replication, essential steps in the origin of life.
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Marcus Hamilton (evolutionary anthropology)
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Geoffrey West (singularities)
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Scaling Laws:
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West’s research reveals that many complex systems, including biological organisms, cities, and companies, follow specific scaling laws. These laws describe how various properties of these systems (such as metabolic rate, infrastructure, or innovation) change predictably with size. -
For example, West has shown that larger organisms and cities tend to be more efficient in their resource use per unit of size, a concept known as “economies of scale.”
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Superlinear Scaling in Cities:
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Unlike biological organisms, cities exhibit superlinear scaling for certain socioeconomic properties, such as innovation and economic productivity. This means that as cities grow, these properties increase at a rate faster than the city’s population size. -
However, this superlinear growth also leads to accelerated resource consumption, pollution, and social challenges, contributing to potential singularities.
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Finite Time Singularities:
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West introduces the idea of finite time singularities, where the exponential growth of a system leads to a crisis point or collapse. This concept is particularly relevant for cities and economies, where continuous growth can result in unsustainable pressure on resources and infrastructure. -
A finite time singularity occurs when a system reaches a point where its current growth model can no longer be sustained, necessitating a significant shift or innovation to avoid collapse.
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Innovation and Resetting the Clock:
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To avoid singularities, West argues that systems must innovate to reset the growth trajectory. In the context of cities, this means adopting new technologies, infrastructure, and policies that can support further growth without leading to collapse. -
This idea parallels biological organisms, where evolutionary innovations allow species to adapt to new environments and challenges, effectively resetting their growth clocks.
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Implications for Sustainability:
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West’s insights have profound implications for sustainability. By understanding the scaling laws and potential singularities, policymakers and planners can design interventions that promote sustainable growth. -
His work emphasizes the need for continuous innovation and adaptation to maintain the balance between growth and resource consumption.
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Michael Ralph (economics of slavery)
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Economic Impact of Slavery:
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Ralph examines how slavery contributed to the economic development of nations, particularly focusing on how the exploitation of enslaved people generated wealth for slaveholding societies.
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He explores the ways in which the labor of enslaved individuals was integral to the profitability of industries such as agriculture, particularly in the production of cash crops like cotton, sugar, and tobacco.
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Financial Instruments and Slavery:
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Ralph investigates the financial mechanisms that supported and were supported by the institution of slavery. This includes the use of enslaved people as collateral for loans, the trading of insurance policies on enslaved individuals, and the broader financial markets that developed around the slave trade.
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He highlights how the commodification of human lives was embedded in financial practices and institutions, influencing modern economic systems.
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Insurance and Risk Management:
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One of Ralph’s significant contributions is his exploration of how insurance companies engaged with the economics of slavery. He delves into how enslaved people were insured as property, with policies covering risks like death and injury, thereby integrating human lives into financial risk management practices.
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His work sheds light on how these practices not only provided economic security for slaveholders but also reinforced the commodification of enslaved people.
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Legacy of Slavery in Modern Economics:
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Ralph explores the enduring economic and social legacies of slavery, arguing that contemporary economic disparities and racial inequalities can be traced back to the historical institution of slavery.
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He discusses how the wealth generated from slavery has been passed down through generations, contributing to persistent racial wealth gaps and influencing modern economic relations.
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Quantitative and Qualitative Analysis:
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Ralph employs both quantitative data and qualitative narratives to illustrate the economic dimensions of slavery. He uses economic data, historical records, and personal accounts to provide a comprehensive view of how slavery functioned as an economic system.
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This approach allows him to demonstrate the human impact of economic practices and policies related to slavery.
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Article: The Price of Life: From Slavery to Corporate Life Insurance
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Sam Scarpino (data and epidemiology)
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Samuel V. Scarpino
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Article: New approach to epidemics
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Article: Wastewater pathogens can inform public health
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Amy Wesolowski (epidemiology)
Research Focus
Wesolowski’s research primarily revolves around several key areas:
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Human Mobility and Disease Transmission:
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She studies how human movement patterns influence the spread of infectious diseases. By analyzing mobility data, Wesolowski aims to understand how people’s movements contribute to the geographic spread of pathogens.
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Her research often utilizes mobile phone data, travel surveys, and other digital data sources to map and model human mobility.
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Mobile Phone Data in Public Health:
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Wesolowski is a pioneer in using mobile phone data to track population movements. This innovative approach provides real-time insights into how diseases might spread based on human behavior and movement.
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This data helps in identifying high-risk areas and times, enabling targeted interventions and efficient allocation of public health resources.
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Epidemiological Modeling:
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She develops and applies computational models to simulate the dynamics of infectious diseases. These models incorporate mobility data to predict how diseases will spread and to assess the potential impact of different intervention strategies.
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Her work covers a range of infectious diseases, including malaria, dengue, influenza, and more recently, COVID-19.
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Impact of Interventions:
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Wesolowski’s research also examines the effectiveness of public health interventions, such as vaccination campaigns, travel restrictions, and social distancing measures.
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By modeling various scenarios, she provides evidence-based recommendations for optimizing disease control measures and improving public health outcomes.
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Article: Nature: Multinational patterns of seasonal asymmetry
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Jean-Paul Faguet (developing economies and societies)
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Decentralization and Economic Development:
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Faguet has extensively studied the impact of decentralization on economic development. He examines how the transfer of power and resources from central to local governments affects economic outcomes and public service delivery.
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His research indicates that decentralization can lead to more responsive and accountable governance, which in turn can improve public services and economic development. However, the success of decentralization depends on the political and institutional context.
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Case Studies and Comparative Analysis:
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Faguet uses detailed case studies and comparative analysis to understand the effects of decentralization. His work often involves in-depth analysis of specific countries or regions to draw broader conclusions about the economic and political impacts of decentralization.
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For example, his research on Bolivia’s decentralization reforms provides insights into how local governance can improve public investment and service delivery, especially in marginalized areas.
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Political Economy of Decentralization:
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He explores the political economy aspects of decentralization, including how political incentives and institutional structures shape the outcomes of decentralization reforms.
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Faguet’s work highlights the importance of political will, local capacity, and institutional frameworks in determining whether decentralization leads to positive economic outcomes.
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Governance and Public Services:
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His research also focuses on the relationship between governance and the provision of public services. Faguet examines how decentralized governance can lead to better-targeted and more efficient public services, particularly in health, education, and infrastructure.
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He argues that local governments are often better positioned to understand and respond to the needs of their communities, leading to improved service delivery and economic benefits.
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Orit Peleg (biological communication signals)
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Collective Behavior in Animal Groups:
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Peleg studies how animals in groups communicate and coordinate their behaviors to achieve collective goals such as foraging, navigation, and predator avoidance. Her research often involves observing and modeling the interactions between individual animals within groups. -
By understanding the mechanisms of collective behavior, Peleg seeks to apply these principles to the design of robotic systems capable of coordinating their actions in complex environments.
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Emergent Communication:
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She investigates how communication signals emerge spontaneously within animal groups without the need for explicit signaling mechanisms. This includes studying how simple interactions between individuals give rise to complex patterns of behavior and information transfer.
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Peleg’s research aims to uncover the underlying principles of emergent communication in biological systems and apply them to the design of decentralized communication protocols for robotic swarms.
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Biologically-Inspired Algorithms for Robotics:
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Peleg develops algorithms inspired by the collective behaviors observed in nature, including communication strategies used by social animals. These algorithms enable robotic systems to interact with each other and with their environment in ways that mimic the capabilities of biological organisms.
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Her work contributes to the field of swarm robotics, where groups of robots cooperate and coordinate their actions to achieve tasks that are difficult or impossible for individual robots to accomplish alone.
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CU Boulder BioFrontiers Bio
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Tom McCarthy (novelist)
本文首发于作者知乎：https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/707556439
《复杂》：集智团队全新译作
书中以群像传记的形式，生动记录了复杂科学圣地圣塔菲研究所的诞生时刻。它不仅是一个独树一帜的研究所的故事，更是系统思维的启示录：从对古典主义经济学的颠覆到重新思考达尔文的进化论，从凝聚态物理到迭代囚徒困境，从亚马孙雨林的经济决策到地震的分布规律，从人工智能到遗传算法……本书借众多人物之口描绘了如何跨领域地系统思考，并启示我们：这个世界并非现成地存在着，而是无时无刻不在动态变化，我们唯一要做的就是理解并直面这真实世界中的复杂性。
《复杂：诞生于秩序与混沌边缘的科学》，作者：M.米切尔·沃尔德罗普，译者：集智俱乐部，中信出版集团 2024年2月。
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