Embedded Files
Spring 2015:
Spring2015LectureSeriesFlyer.pdfFebruary 5, 2015: Dr. Daniel Kammen, Director of the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory. UC Berkeley. The System is the Solution: Energy Options for the 21st Century
February 6, 2015: Dr. Daniel Kammen, Director of the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory. UC Berkeley. A Systems Science for Sustainable Energy
February 13, 2015: Dr. Sarah Wandersee, Biology Department, UAA / Anderson Geographics & Consulting. Landscape values mapping from start to finish: An applied perspective from an Alaska EPSCoR test case on the Kenai Peninsula
February 20, 2015: Dr. Meagan B. Krupa, Biology Department, UAA / APU. Stakeholder Analysis of the Kenai River Fishery: who's who in the race for fish.
February 27, 2015: Dr. Donald M. “Matt” Reeves, Department of Geological Sciences, UAA. Assessment of Potential Climate Change Impacts on Basin-Scale Water Resources:A Case Study from Martis Valley, CA
March 27, 2015: Dr. Mark Faller, APU Philosophy. The Four Demons of Causal Memory and the Taming of the Second Law.
April 2, 2015: Dr. Raissa D’Souza, Complexity Sciences Center, UC-Davis. The Science of Networks: Modeling our complex, interdependent world
April 3, 2015: Dr. Raissa D’Souza, Complexity Sciences Center, UC-Davis. Percolation, cascades and control of interdependent networks
April 10, 2015: Dr. Martin Cenek & Spencer Dahl, Computer Science and Engineering, UAA. Making sense of our lives: A computational approach to understanding multiagent simulations.
April 16, 2015: Dr. Paul Kockelman, Professor of Linguistic Anthropology, Yale University. The Work of Interpretation in the Age of Computation
April 17, 2015: Dr. Paul Kockelman, Professor of Linguistic Anthropology, Yale University. Entropy & Ontology: Two Encounters with Time, Media, and Materiality
April 18, 2015: Dr. Paul Kockelman, Professor of Linguistic Anthropology, Yale University. Embedding Agents in Linguistic and Cultural Contexts
February 5, 2015.
Dr. Daniel Kammen, Director of the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory. UC Berkeley.
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 5
7 p.m. RASMUSON HALL 101
Abstract:
The System is the Solution: Energy Options for the 21st Century
Energy reliability, energy access, climate change, and local and global environmental sustainability are interlinked challenges. Many ‘solutions’ are posed to these challenges, and many powerful ideas have emerged. However, these individually beautiful proposals have failed to launch the transformative change needed to improve the quality of life and the ecological health of the planet. In this talk we examine a set of examples and propose principles of ‘sustainability science’, where efforts to build resilient approaches to the energy and environmental needs of families and regions have shown real promise in creating a a thriving, clean energy economy.
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 6
Noon, ADMINISTRATION BUILDING 143A
Abstract:
A Systems Science for Sustainable Energy
An evolution is taking place linking the basic science, technology platforms, and policy tools needed to decarbonize energy systems at the household to global scale. In this talk we detail a number of analytic and data-intensive tools used to create platforms to model energy use and energy services delivered across scales. These analytic tools provide open-source mechanisms for data-driven debate and planning of energy R&D agendas, critically needed pilot programs, and the ultimate goals of full-scale dialog and deployment of energy and climate management strategies.
Dr. Daniel Kammen is the Class of 1935 Distinguished Professor of Energy at the University of California, Berkeley, with appointments in the Energy and Resources Group, the Goldman School of Public Policy, and the department of Nuclear Engineering. He is the founding director of the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory (RAEL), co-director of the Berkeley Institute of the Environment, and director of the Transportation Sustainability Research Center. Dr. Kammen has served as a contributing or coordinating lead author on various reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) since 1999. The IPCC shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. Dr. Kammen was educated in physics at Cornell and Harvard, and held postdoctoral positions at the California Institute of Technology and Harvard.
ComplexSystemsKammenEvent.pdfFebruary 13, 2015.
Dr. Sarah Wandersee, Biology Department, UAA / Anderson Geographics & Consulting.
Landscape values mapping from start to finish: An applied perspective from an Alaska EPSCoR test case on the Kenai Peninsula
Abstract:
The link between landscape and culture has been highlighted as research focus needed to better understand how humans values in certain areas may shape and be shaped by their environment. Although connections between values, action and landscape change may make sense intuitively, establishing those links has been a challenge. Landscape values mapping is one method used to approach human-environment relationships. In this talk, I explore the background of landscape values mapping approaches, discuss various ways of collecting values data, address methodological considerations, and highlight applications and presentation of results. Throughout the talk, I draw from a recent study on the Kenai Peninsula to provide an applied example of concepts and challenges and to illuminate the background behind the decisions we made in our approach. Part of a larger project (the Southcentral Test Case in Alaska EPSCoR), the study incorporates information from a 2014 survey of Kenai Peninsula residents and focuses on investigating how landscape values may be related to landscape change. Results may contribute to improved understanding of community-environment relationships and adaptive capacity.
February 20, 2015.
Dr. Meagan Krupa. UAA/APU. Biological Sciences.
Stakeholder Analysis of the Kenai River Fishery: who's who in the race for fish
Abstract:
The Kenai River fishery is a unique system with nearly fifty federal, state, local, and nonprofit groups influencing its political, ecological, and social structure. While extensive ecological data exists for this fishery, the complexity of its stakeholder relationships has largely been ignored. This study identifies the key actors within the Kenai River fishery and assesses their interactions to improve the sustainable management of this social-ecological system.
February 27, 2015.
Dr. Donald M. “Matt” Reeves, Department of Geological Sciences, UAA.
Assessment of Potential Climate Change Impacts on Basin-Scale Water Resources:A Case Study from Martis Valley, CA
Abstract:
Assessment of Potential Climate Change Impacts on Basin-Scale Water Resources: A Case Study from Martis Valley, CA
Abstract: While climate change is a high priority topic that has garnered much attention in various aspects of the natural sciences, potential impacts of climate change on water resources is relatively unknown. This talk will focus on the development of an integrated numerical flow model of the Martis Valley Basin, California that simulates dominant hydrological processes from the land surface down to the deep subsurface. GSFLOW, the integrated surface-subsurface flow model, is first constructed and parameterized using a wide range of available DEM, GIS, surface and subsurface geology, well log, and climate datasets, and then calibrated to wetland locations, stream discharge, ground water head, and lake/reservoir stage measurements for a 30-year historical period. Model performance is assessed through comparisons of simulated versus MODIS snow-covered area (SCA) and SNOTEL soil-water equivalent (SWE). Once satisfactorily calibrated to historical conditions, the model is forced using five future climate scenarios computed from the CMIP3 Global Circulation Model (GCM) suite using a transient Hybrid-Delta ensemble method representing: drier, less warming; drier, more warming; wetter, less warming; and wetter, more warming scenarios. Results from these GCM-derived scenarios will be presented in the context of potential changes in individual components of the basin-scale water balance.
March 27, 2015.
Dr. Mark Faller, APU Philosophy.
The Four Demons of Causal Memory and the Taming of the Second Law.
Abstract:
The Second Law of Thermodynamics, the Entropy Law, has traditionally been known as the pessimist’s guaranteer that all will never end well. The world is certified by science to end in heat death and chaos. More recently theorists of complex and dynamic systems have begun to understand that the relationship between thermodynamics and self-organization is not so simple.
In this presentational summary of an assortment of papers I have written over the years I utilize the motif of “demonology” to more explicitly demonstrate how the various models of causal time can help us to understand just how the Second Law not only suffers self-organization, but is the sufficient and necessary cause of the same. I elaborate a call for a new, more dynamic theory of information that will better synthesize the classical understanding of order and chaos with the new fronts of organizational approaches to information. In this effort I will take up Maxwell’s Gauntlet to illustrate how the arrows of energy gradients and order are separable, yet complementary in such a fashion to insure that our cosmos is “the simplest in hypothesis and the richest in phenomena.” (Leibniz)
April 2, 2015.
Dr. Raissa D’Souza, Complexity Sciences Center, UC-Davis.
Interdependent networks and network failure
THURSDAY, APRIL 2
7 p.m. INTEGRATED SCIENCE BLDG, ROOM 120
Abstract:
The Science of Networks: Modeling our complex, interdependent world
Over the past decade a “science of networks” has emerged which blends ideas from statistical physics, applied math, computer science and social sciences. This new science provides insights into the structure and function of many diverse types of systems, such as protein-interactions in a cell, networks of scientists, and the World Wide Web.
This lecture will provide an overview of the field, highlighting how mathematical models of random graphs allow us to understand aspects of these real-world systems. One important aspect is predicting phase transitions on networks—when a small change in an environmental variable radically alters a network’s structure. Likewise, interactions between networks can lead to unanticipated consequences, such as cascading failures and novel phase transitions. This talk will also highlight how random graphs can be used to model the consequences of interdependence between distinct networked systems.
FRIDAY, APRIL 3
11:30 p.m. ADMINISTRATION BLDG, ROOM 143A
Abstract:
Percolation, cascades and control of interdependent networks
Each individual network in isolation is typically a complex system, shaped by the collective action of individual agents. Ideas of controlling individual networks into collections of networks have begun to emerge. Recent work, using the framework of random graphs, allows us to manipulate the size of cascades on networks as well as the nature and location of percolation phase transitions. Finally we discuss attempts to exploit interdependence between systems for the purposes of control.
DR. RAISSA D’SOUZA is Professor of Computer Science and of Mechanical Engineering at the University of California, Davis, and an External Professor at the Santa Fe Institute. She received a PhD in Statistical Physics from MIT in 1999, and was a postdoctoral fellow in Fundamental Mathematics and Theoretical Physics at Bell Laboratories, and in the Theory Group at Microsoft Research. Dr. D’Souza is a member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Complex Systems. Her interdisciplinary work on network theory spans the fields of statistical physics, theoretical computer science and applied math.
ComplexSystemsDSouzaEvent.pdfApril 10, 2015.
Dr. Martin Cenek & Spencer Dahl, Computer Science and Engineering, UAA.
Making sense of our lives: A computational approach to understanding multiagent simulations.
Abstract:
A study of couple dynamics between two or more seemingly chaotic systems is frequently done using Agent Based Modeling (ABM). A resulting ABM model often has random behavior with emergent properties that cannot be explained by analysis of the system's constituent (discrete) agents, yet these properties are often needed for the system to function and to solve a problem. However, there is no known method for statistically analyzing these computer models in order to find these emergent behaviors. We present a new approach to analyze the behavior of agents that groups the agents into behavioral trends. This allows for rigorous analysis of a wide variety of models with complex and interdependent behavior. The traditional statistical methods describe how random behavior functions while we focus on how to harness and analyze these emergent behaviors automatically. We describe a series of techniques to analyze a model behavior with increasingly emergent behavior in order to illustrate the 'explanative' properties of the developed statistical toolbox. Further extensions of proposed approach aim to increase the utility of agent based models by rapidly analyzing their behavior in a quantitative and qualitative fashion.
April 16, 2015.
Dr. Paul Kockelman, Professor of Linguistic Anthropology, Yale University.
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 15
6 p.m. UAA/APU CONSORTIUM LIBRARY, ROOM 307
Abstract:
The Work of Interpretation in the Age of Computation
This talk is about the relation between ontology and inference. My goal is to illuminate some of the complex temporal dynamics of cultural systems, as seen through the empirical and theoretical concerns of a linguistic anthropologist. To do this, I focus on a variety of sieving devices (such as spam-filters, censors, and superegos) that stand between computational processes and interpretive practices.
THURSDAY, APRIL 16
7 p.m. RASMUSON HALL, ROOM 101
Abstract:
Entropy & Ontology: Two Encounters with Time, Media, and Materiality
Among speakers of Q’eqchi’-Maya, replacement (eeqaj) refers to activities as disparate as house-building, civil-religious elections, vengeance, loans, illness cures, adultery, and namesakes. Such practices involve the substitution of one entity for another entity, insofar as these entities have shared properties, and insofar as they hold a role in an obligatory position. For example, one man may substitute his labor for another man’s labor insofar as men have similar degrees of strength and skill. In the first part of this talk, I use the practices surrounding replacement to introduce five ways of thinking about time and action. In the second part of this talk, I tack between temporality as irreversibility and worldview to examine the relation between archaeology and durability.
FRIDAY, APRIL 17
11:30 a.m. ADMINISTRATION BLDG, ROOM 143A
Abstract:
Embedding Agents in Linguistic and Cultural Contexts
Using a range of grammatical categories, discourse patterns, and cultural values, I hypothesize five kinds of distributed agencies that underly linguistic practices and social processes. My goal is to define these agents in such a way that they are simultaneously portable (and thus applicable across a wide-range of situations and societies) and contextual (and thus sensitive to the details of particular cultures and histories). I show the ways such agents embed and enchain to constitute the infrastructure for a variety of complex systems.
DR. PAUL KOCKELMAN, professor of Linguistic Anthropology at Yale University, earned his M.S. in Physics and his Ph.D. in Anthropology from the University of Chicago. Dr. Kockelman is working on a range of topics, including affect, grammatical categories, parasites, spam filters, infrastructure, time, value, and poultry husbandry. He is working on the relation between computation and interpretation, focusing on the interaction of sieving and serendipity. He is the author of Agent, Person, Subject Self: A Theory on Ontology, Interaction and Infrastructure, and Language, Culture, and Mind: Natural Constructions and Social Kinds. One of his most recent publications offers useful advice about how to survive your first night in Minecraft.
ComplexSystemsKockelmanEvent.pdfGoogle Sites
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