Cross-Impact Gaming Applied to Global Resources

A number of efforts to deal with the problem of shrinking global resources have succeeded in alerting the public to the consequences of a continuing laissez-faire attitude in the face of currently observable population and industrial trends, but little has been done to provide positive as well as realistic plans for countering the threats of such disasters. A systematic move in the direction of constructive global planning will have to be based on a new kind of model which includes reactions to uncertain contingencies as they arise. The present paper is intended to provide a methodological approach to the design of planning models appropriate for this purpose. The illustration presented here, in contrast to traditional approaches has the form of an interactive simulation model. In addition to trends, such as population, pollution, or per capita food supply, it also includes events. The latter are of two kinds: stochastic occurrences, such as technological breakthroughs, which represent uncertain contingencies; and deliberate interventive reactions to these contingencies, such as legislative acts, treaties, or R+D efforts. A full-fledged attempt to apply such precepts to global planning would require a very substantial effort. The present paper represents a first methodological step toward the implementation of such an endeavor

The Utility of Long-Term Forecasting

Forecasts are an essential ingredient of the planning process. Although frequently of necessity inaccurate, they can nevertheless be of considerable utility; for they should not be judged by the degree of uncertainty they convey but by the degree to which they permit differentiation between genuine and avoidable uncertainty

A Cross-Impact Gaming Approach to Global Modeling

An approach to simulation gaming is presented, with particular reference to global modeling. The approach is generic in character and can, in principle, be applied to any long-range planning area. In contrast to system-dynamics and to customary econometric models, the proposed "cross impact" gaming permits consideration of events (such as technological breakthroughs, natural catastrophes, and acts of legislation) in addition to trends (such as population growth and energy consumption), and it does so in a probabilistic setting that provides appropriate emphasis for the uncertainties of the future. The so-called cross impacts refer to the effects of events on the probability of other event occurrences and on deviations of trends from their anticipated courses, and similarly to the effects of trend changes on other trends and on probabilities of event occurrences. By including, in particular, actions (i.e., moves by participating players) among the events, it becomes possible to explore both the direct impact and the long-term consequences of alternative policies. In light of this, cross-impact gaming may be considered a pre-analytical approach that may provide intuitive insights valuable for a full-fledged systems-analytical investigation

An Interactive Simulation Model of the Global Economy

Interactive simulation, also known as operational gaming, is a preanalytical tool intended to provide a better intuitive understanding of a given problem situation and to lead through successive approximation to the construction of a realistic analytical model. There are two essential features that distinguish interactive simulation from ordinary simulation modeling: Interactive simulation includes the relevant decisionmakers among the elements being simulated (by knowledgeable individuals acting as players); and it is dynamic in nature, in that it utilizes the expertise of these players to improve the structure and numerical parameters of the game between plays. This paper presents a description of a relatively sophisticated six-person game, called GEM, which attempts to simulate the economic planning and interaction of six world regions

Voter Satisfaction Maximization in Problems of Resource Allocation

This paper describes a group method of allocating a given resource budget over a set of n items. The method frequently satisfies considerably more than half of the votes cast by the members of the group, "satisfies" in the sense of allocating to an item at least the amount asked for by the voter

Consequences of wall stiffness for a beta-soft potential

Modifications of the infinite square well E(5) and X(5) descriptions of transitional nuclear structure are considered. The eigenproblem for a potential with linear sloped walls is solved. The consequences of the introduction of sloped walls and of a quadratic transition operator are investigated.Comment: RevTeX 4, 8 pages, as published in Phys. Rev.

The messy merger of a large satellite and a Milky Way-like galaxy

Aims. About 10 billion years ago the Milky Way merged with a massive satellite, Gaia-Enceladus. To gain insight into the properties of its debris we analyse in detail a suite of simulations that includes an experiment that produces a good match to the kinematics of nearby halo stars inferred from Gaia data. Methods. We compare the kinematic distributions of stellar particles in the simulations and study the distribution of debris in orbital angular momentum, eccentricity, and energy, and its relation to the mass loss history of the simulated satellite. Results. We confirm that Gaia-Enceladus probably fell in on a retrograde, 30° inclination orbit. We find that while 75% of the debris in our preferred simulation has high eccentricity (> 0.8), roughly 9% has eccentricity lower than 0.6. Star particles lost early have large retrograde motions, and a subset of these have low eccentricity. Such stars would be expected to have lower metallicities as they stem from the outskirts of the satellite, and hence naively they could be confused with debris associated with a separate system. These considerations seem to apply to some of the stars from the postulated Sequoia galaxy. Conclusions. When a massive disc galaxy undergoes a merger event, it leaves behind debris with a complex phase-space structure, a wide range of orbital properties, and a range of chemical abundances. Observationally, this results in substructures with very different properties, which can be misinterpreted as implying independent progeny. Detailed chemical abundances of large samples of stars and tailored hydrodynamical simulations are critical to resolving such conundrums