Ressenyes

Obra resseyada: Nigel GILBERT; Klaus TROITZSCH, Simulation for the Social Scientist. Buckingham: Open University Press, 2005

Using Intelligent Agents to understand organisational behaviour

This paper introduces two ongoing research projects which seek to apply computer modelling techniques in order to simulate human behaviour within organisations. Previous research in other disciplines has suggested that complex social behaviours are governed by relatively simple rules which, when identified, can be used to accurately model such processes using computer technology. The broad objective of our research is to develop a similar capability within organisational psychology

A Formal Sociologic Study of Free Will

We make a formal sociologic study of the concept of free will. By using the language of mathematics and logic, we define what we call everlasting societies. Everlasting societies never age: persons never age, and the goods of the society are indestructible. The infinite history of an everlasting society unfolds by following deterministic and probabilistic laws that do their best to satisfy the free will of all the persons of the society. We define three possible kinds of histories for everlasting societies: primitive histories, good histories, and golden histories. In primitive histories, persons are inherently selfish, and they use their free will to obtain the personal ownerships of all the goods of the society. In good histories, persons are inherently good, and they use their free will to distribute the goods of the society. In good histories, a person is not only able to desire the personal ownership of goods, but is also able to desire that a good be owned by another person. In golden histories, free will is bound by the ethic of reciprocity, which states that "you should wish upon others as you would like others to wish upon yourself". In golden societies, the ethic of reciprocity becomes a law that partially binds free will, and that must be abided at all times. In other words, the verb "should" becomes the verb "must"

How Far Can We Go Through Social System?

The paper elaborates an endeavor on applying the algorithmic information-theoretic computational complexity to meta-social-sciences. It is motivated by the effort on seeking the impact of the well-known incompleteness theorem to the scientific methodology approaching social phenomena. The paper uses the binary string as the model of social phenomena to gain understanding on some problems faced in the philosophy of social sciences or some traps in sociological theories. The paper ends on showing the great opportunity in recent social researches and some boundaries that limit them