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Historical dynamics broadly includes the scientific modeling of history. This might also be termed computer modeling of history, historical simulation, or simulation of history - allowing for an extensive range of techniques in simulation and estimation. Historical dynamics does not exist as a separate science, but there are individual efforts such as long range planning, population modeling, economic forecasting, demographics, global modeling, country modeling, regional planning, urban planning and many others in the general categories of computer modeling, planning, forecasting, and simulations.
Some examples of "large" history where historical dynamics simulations would be helpful include; global history, large structures, histories of empires, long duration history, philosophy of history, Eurasian history, comparative history, long-range environmental history, world systems theory, non-Western political and economic development, and historical demography.
With the rise of technologies like wikis, and internet-wide search engines, some historical and social data can be mined to constrain models of history and society. Data from social media sites, and busy sites, can be mined for human patterns of action. These can provide more and more realistic behavioral models for individuals and groups of any size. Agent-based models and microsimulations of human behavior can be embedded in larger historical simulations. Related subfields are behavioral economics and human behavioral ecology.
In every sector of human activity, there are extensive databases for transportation data, urban development, health statistics, education data, social data, economic data—along with many projections. See Category:economic databases, Category:statistical data sets, Category:social statistics data, Category:social statistics and Category:statistics.
Some examples of database activity include Asian Development Bank statistics, [2] World Bank data, [3] and the International Monetary Fund data. [4]
Time series analysis and econometrics are well established fields for the analysis of trends and forecasting; but, survey data and microdatasets can also be used in forecasts and simulations.
The United Nations [5] and other organizations routinely project the population of individual countries and regions of the world decades into the future. These demographic models are used by other organizations for projecting demand for services in all sectors of each economy.
Each country often has their corresponding modeling groups for each of these major sectors. These can be grouped in separate articles according to sector. Groups include government departments, international aid agencies, as well as nonprofit and non-governmental organizations.
A broad class of models used for economic and social modeling of countries and sectors are the Computable general equilibrium (CGE) model - also called applied general equilibrium models. In the context of time based simulations and policy analysis, see dynamic stochastic general equilibrium models.
Partly because of the controversy over global climate change, there is an extensive network of global climate models, [8] [9] and related social and economic models. These seek to estimate, not only the change in climate and its physical effects, but also the impact on human society and the natural environment. See global economic models, social model, microsimulation, climate model, global climate models, and general circulation model.
The relationship between the environment and society is examined through environmental social science. human ecology, political ecology, and ecology, in general, can be areas where computer and mathematical modeling over time can be relevant to historical simulation.
Web-based historical simulations, simulations of history, interactive historical simulations, are increasingly popular for entertainment and educational purposes. [10] The field is expanding rapidly and no central index seems to be available. Another example is [11]
Several computer games allow players to interact with the game to model societies over time. The Civilization (series) is one example. Others include Age of Empires, Rise of Nations, Spore, Colonization, Alpha Centauri, Call to Power, and CivCity: Rome. A longer list of games in historical context, which might include degrees of simulation, are found at Category:Video games with historical settings.
Military simulation is a well-developed field and increasingly accessible on the internet.
Computer models for simulating society fall under artificial society, social simulation, computational sociology, computational social science, and mathematical sociology. There is an interdisciplinary Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation for computer simulation of social processes. [12] The European Social Simulation Association promotes social simulation research in Europe; it is the publisher of JASSS. [13] There is a corresponding Computational Social Science Society of the Americas., [14] and a Pan-Asian Association for Agent-based Approach in Social Systems Sciences. [15] PAAA lists some related Japanese associations. [16]
The SimSoc (Simulated Society tool) is in its fifth edition.
There has been extensive research in urban planning, environmental planning and related fields: regional planning, land-use planning, transportation planning, urban studies, and regional science. Journals for these fields are listed at List of planning journals.
SimCity is a game for simulations of artificial cities. It has spawned a range of "sim" games. The planning groups try to simulate changes in real cities. The game groups allow experiments with artificial cities. And the two are merging in such efforts as Vizicities [17]
The profiling of industries is well developed, and most industries make forecasts and plans. See industrial history, history of steel, history of mining, history of construction, history of the petroleum industry, and many other histories of specific industries. See cyclical industrial dynamics for modeling of industries in the sense of "historical dynamics of industries". Some related terms are industrial planning, history of industry, industrial evolution, technology change, and technology forecasting. An example of "history friendly" industrial models. [18] from the journal, Industrial and Corporate Change. [19]
Economy-wide models must take into account the interactions between industry and the rest of the economy. See Input–output model, economic planning, and social accounting matrix for some relevant techniques.
Many of the techniques from futures studies are applicable to historical dynamics. Whether projecting forward from a point in the past to the present for validation studies, or projecting backwards from the present into the past - many of the techniques are useful. Likewise, simulations of the past, or alternative pasts, provide a groundwork of techniques for futures studies.
Operations research, often shortened to the initialism OR, is a discipline that deals with the development and application of analytical methods to improve decision-making. The term management science is occasionally used as a synonym.
The Limits to Growth is a 1972 report that discussed the possibility of exponential economic and population growth with finite supply of resources, studied by computer simulation. The study used the World3 computer model to simulate the consequence of interactions between the Earth and human systems. The model was based on the work of Jay Forrester of MIT, as described in his book World Dynamics.
Computer simulation is the process of mathematical modelling, performed on a computer, which is designed to predict the behaviour of, or the outcome of, a real-world or physical system. The reliability of some mathematical models can be determined by comparing their results to the real-world outcomes they aim to predict. Computer simulations have become a useful tool for the mathematical modeling of many natural systems in physics, astrophysics, climatology, chemistry, biology and manufacturing, as well as human systems in economics, psychology, social science, health care and engineering. Simulation of a system is represented as the running of the system's model. It can be used to explore and gain new insights into new technology and to estimate the performance of systems too complex for analytical solutions.
Social simulation is a research field that applies computational methods to study issues in the social sciences. The issues explored include problems in computational law, psychology, organizational behavior, sociology, political science, economics, anthropology, geography, engineering, archaeology and linguistics.
A multi-agent system is a computerized system composed of multiple interacting intelligent agents. Multi-agent systems can solve problems that are difficult or impossible for an individual agent or a monolithic system to solve. Intelligence may include methodic, functional, procedural approaches, algorithmic search or reinforcement learning.
Computational sociology is a branch of sociology that uses computationally intensive methods to analyze and model social phenomena. Using computer simulations, artificial intelligence, complex statistical methods, and analytic approaches like social network analysis, computational sociology develops and tests theories of complex social processes through bottom-up modeling of social interactions.
An agent-based model (ABM) is a computational model for simulating the actions and interactions of autonomous agents in order to understand the behavior of a system and what governs its outcomes. It combines elements of game theory, complex systems, emergence, computational sociology, multi-agent systems, and evolutionary programming. Monte Carlo methods are used to understand the stochasticity of these models. Particularly within ecology, ABMs are also called individual-based models (IBMs). A review of recent literature on individual-based models, agent-based models, and multiagent systems shows that ABMs are used in many scientific domains including biology, ecology and social science. Agent-based modeling is related to, but distinct from, the concept of multi-agent systems or multi-agent simulation in that the goal of ABM is to search for explanatory insight into the collective behavior of agents obeying simple rules, typically in natural systems, rather than in designing agents or solving specific practical or engineering problems.
Numerical weather prediction (NWP) uses mathematical models of the atmosphere and oceans to predict the weather based on current weather conditions. Though first attempted in the 1920s, it was not until the advent of computer simulation in the 1950s that numerical weather predictions produced realistic results. A number of global and regional forecast models are run in different countries worldwide, using current weather observations relayed from radiosondes, weather satellites and other observing systems as inputs.
Futures studies, futures research, futurism, or futurology is the systematic, interdisciplinary and holistic study of social/technological advancement, and other environmental trends; often for the purpose of exploring how people will live and work in the future. Predictive techniques, such as forecasting, can be applied, but contemporary futures studies scholars emphasize the importance of systematically exploring alternatives. In general, it can be considered as a branch of the social sciences and an extension to the field of history. Futures studies seeks to understand what is likely to continue and what could plausibly change. Part of the discipline thus seeks a systematic and pattern-based understanding of past and present, and to explore the possibility of future events and trends.
Articles in economics journals are usually classified according to JEL classification codes, which derive from the Journal of Economic Literature. The JEL is published quarterly by the American Economic Association (AEA) and contains survey articles and information on recently published books and dissertations. The AEA maintains EconLit, a searchable data base of citations for articles, books, reviews, dissertations, and working papers classified by JEL codes for the years from 1969. A recent addition to EconLit is indexing of economics journal articles from 1886 to 1968 parallel to the print series Index of Economic Articles.
Joseph Smagorinsky was an American meteorologist and the first director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)'s Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory (GFDL).
In atmospheric science, an atmospheric model is a mathematical model constructed around the full set of primitive, dynamical equations which govern atmospheric motions. It can supplement these equations with parameterizations for turbulent diffusion, radiation, moist processes, heat exchange, soil, vegetation, surface water, the kinematic effects of terrain, and convection. Most atmospheric models are numerical, i.e. they discretize equations of motion. They can predict microscale phenomena such as tornadoes and boundary layer eddies, sub-microscale turbulent flow over buildings, as well as synoptic and global flows. The horizontal domain of a model is either global, covering the entire Earth, or regional (limited-area), covering only part of the Earth. The different types of models run are thermotropic, barotropic, hydrostatic, and nonhydrostatic. Some of the model types make assumptions about the atmosphere which lengthens the time steps used and increases computational speed.
Agent-based computational economics (ACE) is the area of computational economics that studies economic processes, including whole economies, as dynamic systems of interacting agents. As such, it falls in the paradigm of complex adaptive systems. In corresponding agent-based models, the "agents" are "computational objects modeled as interacting according to rules" over space and time, not real people. The rules are formulated to model behavior and social interactions based on incentives and information. Such rules could also be the result of optimization, realized through use of AI methods.
Agent-based social simulation consists of social simulations that are based on agent-based modeling, and implemented using artificial agent technologies. Agent-based social simulation is a scientific discipline concerned with simulation of social phenomena, using computer-based multiagent models. In these simulations, persons or group of persons are represented by agents. MABSS is a combination of social science, multiagent simulation and computer simulation.
Computational sustainability is an emerging field that attempts to balance societal, economic, and environmental resources for the future well-being of humanity using methods from mathematics, computer science, and information science fields. Sustainability in this context refers to the world's ability to sustain biological, social, and environmental systems in the long term. Using the power of computers to process large quantities of information, decision making algorithms allocate resources based on real-time information. Applications advanced by this field are widespread across various areas. For example, artificial intelligence and machine learning techniques are created to promote long-term biodiversity conservation and species protection. Smart grids implement renewable resources and storage capabilities to control the production and expenditure of energy. Intelligent transportation system technologies can analyze road conditions and relay information to drivers so they can make smarter, more environmentally-beneficial decisions based on real-time traffic information.
Eugenia Enriqueta Kalnay is an Argentine meteorologist and a Distinguished University Professor of Atmospheric and Oceanic Science, which is part of the University of Maryland College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences at the University of Maryland, College Park in the United States.
DYNAMO is a simulation language and accompanying graphical notation developed within the system dynamics analytical framework. It was originally for industrial dynamics but was soon extended to other applications, including population and resource studies and urban planning.
Computational social science is an interdisciplinary academic sub-field concerned with computational approaches to the social sciences. This means that computers are used to model, simulate, and analyze social phenomena. It has been applied in areas such as computational economics, computational sociology, computational media analysis, cliodynamics, culturomics, nonprofit studies. It focuses on investigating social and behavioral relationships and interactions using data science approaches, network analysis, social simulation and studies using interactive systems.
Industrial and production engineering (IPE) is an interdisciplinary engineering discipline that includes manufacturing technology, engineering sciences, management science, and optimization of complex processes, systems, or organizations. It is concerned with the understanding and application of engineering procedures in manufacturing processes and production methods. Industrial engineering dates back all the way to the industrial revolution, initiated in 1700s by Sir Adam Smith, Henry Ford, Eli Whitney, Frank Gilbreth and Lilian Gilbreth, Henry Gantt, F.W. Taylor, etc. After the 1970s, industrial and production engineering developed worldwide and started to widely use automation and robotics. Industrial and production engineering includes three areas: Mechanical engineering, industrial engineering, and management science.