Stuart Kaufmann, evolutionary biologist and an early recipient of a McArthur genius grant, was closely involved in the origins of the Sante Fe Institute – ground zero for many of today’s leading complexity theorists. Earlier this year he was interviewed by Joshua E Brown, and his thoughts make interesting reading for all those with an [...]
Archive for the ‘Economics’ Category
An Interview with leading complexity theorist Stuart Kauffman
Posted in Biology, Economics, Financial crisis, Innovation, Technology on November 4, 2010 | 1 Comment »
Benoit Mandelbrot – A True Philosopher Prophet
Posted in Benoit Mandelbrot, Chaos, Economics, Innovation, tagged Benoit Mandelbrot on October 19, 2010 | 1 Comment »
“Why is geometry often described as cold and dry? One reason lies in its inability to describe the shape of a cloud, a mountain, a coastline or a tree.” Benoit Mandelbrot, 1924-2010 Benoit Mandelbrot, one of the most influential and original mathematicians of the past century, died last Thursday aged 85. Mandelbrot’s contribution to [...]
From the Neoclassical Logic Piano to All That Jazz
Posted in Economics, Evolution, Financial crisis, Innovation, Public Policy, Resilience, tagged Agent-Based Modelling, Earthquakes on August 3, 2010 | 5 Comments »
Over on Rethinking Development Economics, a recent post highlights a provocative speech by Dr DeLisle Worrell, Governor of the Central Bank of Barbados. Worrell focused on the problems with economics today, with much of his talk given over to ‘complexity economics‘. To quote directly from Worrell: Our theories can’t deal with reality, so we ignore the real [...]
Bank of England Director uses complexity theory to explain global financial crisis
Posted in Economics, Financial crisis, Networks, Public Policy, Resilience, Strategy on December 16, 2009 | 5 Comments »
Andrew Haldane, Executive Director of Financial Stability at the Bank of England gave a speech earlier this year which focused on the idea of the global financial system as a complex adaptive system. In his speech, Haldane focuses on applying the lessons from other network disciplines – such as ecology, epidemiology, biology and engineering – to [...]
Technology and development: a symbiotic relationship?
Posted in Economics, Knowledge and learning, Reports and Studies, Technology on November 27, 2009 | 1 Comment »
In “The Nature of Technology: What It Is and How It Evolves,” W. Brian Arthur, a noted complexity economist who works at Santa Fe, has put forward a new theory of the relationship between science, economy and technology. McKinsey Principle Eric Beinhocker has described it as “The most important book on technology and the economy since [...]
Easterly team discovers power law in international trade – what are the implications?
Posted in Economics, Public Policy, Reports and Studies, Trade on November 1, 2009 | 2 Comments »
A new study by William Easterly and colleagues at NYU may be a significant breakthrough for the use of complexity science concepts in international development. In the growing community of complexity thinkers in the aid sector, those with a qualitative mindset have been rather more prominent than those taking a quantitative approach. Published papers on complexity and aid to date [...]
