Physics of Life, Ep 4: The physics of collectives
How do groups solve problems? Are there conditions that create a pathway to innovation and groundbreaking inventions? In today’s episode, we look at the science of collectives to learn about the patterns that emerge as human societies grow, the importance of a collective structure to foster ideas and create impact, and – from collectives like ants and immune systems – the importance of veering off the beaten path to become better at exploring and discovering.
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Show Notes
Guests:
- Melanie Moses, External Professor at the Santa Fe Institute, Professor of Computer Science and Associate Professor of Biology at University of New Mexico
- Hyejin Youn, External Professor at the Santa Fe Institute, Associate Professor at Institute of Northwestern University
Hosts: Abha Eli Phoboo & Chris Kempes
Producer: Katherine Moncure
Podcast theme music by: Mitch Mignano
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More info:
SFI programs: Education
Complexity Explorer:
Fractals and Scaling: Toward a Theory of Urban Scaling
Introduction to Complexity: Ant Foraging and Task Allocation
- Books:
- Scale by Geoffrey West
- Complexity: a Guided Tour by Melanie Mitchell
Talks:
- Toward a Scientific Theory of Cities by Hyejin Youn
Papers & Articles:
- “Synergy in ant foraging strategies: memory and communication alone and in combination,” in GECCO’13: Proceedings of the 15th annual conference on Genetic and evolutionary computation (July 6, 2013), doi.org/10.1145/2463372.2463389
- “In vivo, in silico, in machina: Ants and Robots balance memory and communication to collectively exploit information,” in Proceedings of the European Conference on Complex Systems 2012
- “What makes individual I’s a Collective We; coordination mechanisms & costs” in arXiv (November 20, 2023), doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2306.02113
- “How does innovation push its boundaries?” in 43 Visions for Complexity, Exploring Complexity: Volume 3 (January 2017), doi.org/10.1142/9789813206854_0043