SODAS Talk

Co-evolution of social and natural dynamics in human-environment systems and the copan:CORE World-Earth modeling framework

 
Jobst Heitzig from Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research will be presenting at a SODAS Talk Wednesday the 23rd of January 2019.

Abstract

Earth's future in the Anthropocene depends on interactions between natural and social dynamics, including opinion dynamics, social norms, behavioural change and coalition formation among heterogeneous agents on social networks. I will present examples of corresponding models and results from PIK's copan project and a general software framework for the modeling of such interactions. The latter, copan:CORE, allows the development, composition and running of so-called World-Earth models, i.e., models of social-ecological co-evolution up to planetary scales. It is an object-oriented software package written in Python designed for different user roles. Model composers are enabled to easily implement new models by plugging together existing model components, such as opinion formation on social networks, generic carbon cycle dynamics, or simple vegetation growth. For the sake of a modular structure, each provided component specifies a meaningful yet minimal collection of closely related processes. These processes can be formulated in terms of various process types, such as ordinary differential equations, explicit or implicit functions, as well as steps or events of deterministic or stochastic fashion. The framework provides elementary entity types such as grid cells, individuals and social systems and fundamental process taxa such as environment, social metabolism, and culture.

 

Ref.:

Heitzig*, J, Donges*, JF, Barfuss, W, Kassel, JA, Kittel, T, Kolb, JJ, Kolster, T, Müller-Hansen, F, Otto, IM, Wiedermann, M, Zimmerer, KB, Lucht, W (2018),

Earth system modelling with complex dynamic human societies: the copan:CORE World-Earth modeling framework,

Earth System Dynamics Discussions, in review (2018), doi:10.5194/esd-2017-126. * The first two authors share the lead authorship.

 
The SODAS Talk will take place at SODAS' new location in building 1, 2nd floor, room 26 (1.2.26) of the CSS Campus, University of Copenhagen, from 2.00 pm- 3.00 pm (notice that we have changed the time to later the same day).

If you have questions or want to know more, please write Agnete Vienberg Hansen at avh@econ.ku.dk.