Homo Socionicus: a Case Study of Simulation Models of Norms

This paper describes a survey of normative agent-based social simulation models. These models are examined from the perspective of the foundations of social theory. Agent-based modelling contributes to the research program of methodological individualism. Norms are a central concept in the role theoretic concept of action in the tradition of Durkheim and Parsons. This paper investigates to what extend normative agent-based models are able to capture the role theoretic concept of norms. Three methodological core problems are identified: the question of norm transmission, normative transformation of agents and what kind of analysis the models contribute. It can be shown that initially the models appeared only to address some of these problems rather than all of them simultaneously. More recent developments, however, show progress in that direction. However, the degree of resolution of intra agent processes remains too low for a comprehensive understanding of normative behaviour regulation.Norms, Normative Agent-Based Social Simulation, Role Theory, Methodological Individualism

EMERGING THE EMERGENCE SOCIOLOGY: The Philosophical Framework of Agent-Based Social Studies

The structuration theory originally provided by Anthony Giddens and the advance improvement of the theory has been trying to solve the dilemma came up in the epistemological aspects of the social sciences and humanity. Social scientists apparently have to choose whether they are too sociological or too psychological. Nonetheless, in the works of the classical sociologist, Emile Durkheim, this thing has been stated long time ago. The usage of some models to construct the bottom-up theories has followed the vast of computational technology. This model is well known as the agent based modeling. This paper is giving a philosophical perspective of the agent-based social sciences, as the sociology to cope the emergent factors coming up in the sociological analysis. The framework is made by using the artificial neural network model to show how the emergent phenomena came from the complex system. Understanding the society has self-organizing (autopoietic) properties, the Kohonen’s self-organizing map is used in the paper. By the simulation examples, it can be seen obviously that the emergent phenomena in social system are seen by the sociologist apart from the qualitative framework on the atomistic sociology. In the end of the paper, it is clear that the emergence sociology is needed for sharpening the sociological analysis in the emergence sociology

Emergence and Collapse of Peace with Friend Selection Strategies

A society consisting of agents who can freely choose to attack or not to attack others inevitably evolves into a battling society (a \'war of all against all\'). We investigated whether strategies based on C. Schmitt\'s concept of the political, the distinction of a friend and an enemy, lead to the emergence and collapse of social order. Especially, we propose \'friend selection strategies\' (FSSs), one of which we called the \'us-TFT\' (tit for tat) strategy, which requires an agent to regard one who did not attack him or his \'friends\' as a \'friend\'. We carried out evolutionary simulations on an artificial society consisting of FSS agents. As a result, we found that the us-TFT results in a peaceful society with the emergence of an us-TFT community. In addition, we found that the collapse of a peaceful society is triggered by another FSS strategy called a \'coward\'.Community, Carl Schmitt, a Friend and an Enemy, Tit for Tat, Coward, Evolutionary Simulation

How groups can foster consensus: The case of local cultures

A local culture denotes a commonly shared behaviour within a cluster of firms. Similar to social norms or conventions, it is an emergent feature resulting from the firms' interaction in an economic network. To model these dynamics, we consider a distributed agent population, representing e.g. firms or individuals. Further, we build on a continuous opinion dynamics model with bounded confidence ($\epsilon$), which assumes that two agents only interact if differences in their behaviour are less than $\epsilon$. Interaction results in more similarity of behaviour, i.e. convergence towards a common mean. This framework is extended by two major concepts: (i) The agent's in-group consisting of acquainted interaction partners is explicitly taken into account. This leads to an effective agent behaviour reflecting that agents try to continue to interact with past partners and thus to keep sufficiently close to them. (ii) The in-group network structure changes over time, as agents can form new links to other agents with sufficiently close effective behaviour or delete links to agents no longer close in behaviour. Thus, our model provides a feedback mechanism between the agents' behaviour and their in-group structure. Studying its consequences by means of agent-based computer simulations, we find that for narrow-minded agents (low $\epsilon$) the additional feedback helps to find consensus more often, whereas for open-minded agents (high $\epsilon$) this does not hold. This counterintuitive result is explained by simulations of the network evolution

Exploring the resource recovery potentials of municipal solid waste: a review of solid wastes composting in developing countries

Population explosion, high urbanization and improved living standards have induced rapid changes in quantities and materiacompositions of solid waste generation globally. Until recently solid waste disposal in landfills and open dump sites waconsidered more economical and it is the most widely used methods in developing countries. Hence the potentials in the othealternative methods such as the resource recovery and recycling and their integration into waste management have been scarcelassessed. However, the ever growing challenges posed by the rapidly increasing quantities and compositions of solid wastes ideveloping countries led to the searching for alternative waste disposal methods. In this regard the paper presented an assessmenof the resource potentials of municipal solid waste materials arising from cities in developing countries as a strategy fosustainable solid waste management. Using published data on solid waste composition the paper has identified that there is higpotentials of composting in the solid waste stream from cities in developing countries. In conclusion, it recommended the recoverof organic waste material and papers for composting and the recycling of plastic, metals, textiles and others to explore their resource recovery potentials. This will largely reduce the ultimate quantities of solid waste for disposal and lower the operatincosts. This strategy will achieve sustainable waste management in developing countries. It is hoped that the paper has provided useful guide for wastes management policy decisions in developing countries

The Contribution of Society to the Construction of Individual Intelligence

It is argued that society is a crucial factor in the construction of individual intelligence. In other words that it is important that intelligence is socially situated in an analogous way to the physical situation of robots. Evidence that this may be the case is taken from developmental linguistics, the social intelligence hypothesis, the complexity of society, the need for self-reflection and autism. The consequences for the development of artificial social agents is briefly considered. Finally some challenges for research into socially situated intelligence are highlighted

Constraint rule-based programming of norms for electronic institutions

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Online Automated Synthesis of Compact Normative Systems

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The Explanatory Potential of Artificial Societies

It is often claimed that artificial society simulations contribute to the explanation of social phenomena. At the hand of a particular example, this paper argues that artificial societies often cannot provide full explanations, because their models are not or cannot be validated. Instead, artificial societies may sometimes provide potential explanations. It is shown that these potential explanations, if they contribute to our understanding, considerably differ from the standard kind of potential causal explanations. Instead of possible causal histories, simulations offer possible functional analyses of the explanandum. The paper discusses how these two kinds of potential explanations differ, and how possible functional analyses can be appraised