The New England Complex Systems Institute (NECSI) is a national independent educational and research institution dedicated to advancing the study of complex systems. Complex systems have multiple interacting components whose collective behaviour cannot be simply inferred from the behaviour of components. The recognition that understanding the parts cannot explain collective behaviour has led to various new concepts and methodologies that are affecting all fields of science and engineering, and are being applied to technology, business and even social policy. We invite you to join us in the investigation of these concepts.
NECSI Announcements:
NECSI will be offering the intensive one day seminar:
It is now widely held that the theory of complexity and the dynamics of complex systems may be founded on universal principles that describe disparate problems ranging from physics to economics. In this course we will introduce questions and methods of study that apply to diverse complex systems. Relevant mathematical models will be introduced at a generally accessible level with emphasis being placed on fundamental concepts that unify the study of complex systems. The course consists of six hours of lecture and discussion.
Level: Appropriate for both undergraduate and graduate students, and faculty
Outline:
Planned and tentative locations for the course include
Additional sites may be identified. If your institution would like to host a seminar please contact education@necsi.org.
The NECSI working group meetings are beginning. Each working group will be meeting approximately bimonthly. The size of meetings will be limited to about 20-30 and attendance is by application to the organisers of the working group. Contacts are given below.
The following meetings are currently scheduled:
| Human Organisations: | January 16 |
| topic of meeting: | Is one loop learning useful in rapidly changing environments? |
| contact: | Michael Lissack, lissack@lissack.com |
| Information Mechanics: | January 30 |
| topic of meeting: | Physical limits to computation |
| contact: | Richard Bagley, richard.bagley@digital.com |
| Time Series Analysis and Prediction: | February 6 |
| topic of meeting: | Nonlinear models for time series analysis |
| contact: | Alok Kumar, AKUMAR@us.oracle.com |
| Evolution: | February 20 |
| topic of meeting: | Complex adaptations |
| contact: | Gunter Wagner, gpwag@peaplant.biology.yale.edu |
| Human Organisations: | February 27 |
| topic of meeting: | Communication of complex systems concepts in a corporate setting |
| contact: | Michael Lissack, lissack@lissack.com |
| Molecular Self-Organisation: | March 6 |
| topic of meeting: | Self-assembly in materials science |
| contact: | Shuguang Zhang, shuguang@mit.edu |
| Information Mechanics: | March 27 |
| topic of meeting: | Information flow in nonequilibrium systems |
| contact: | Richard Bagley, richard.bagley@digital.com |
| Evolution: | April 24 |
| topic of meeting: | Epistasis (gene interactions) |
| contact: | Gunter Wagner, gpwag@peaplant.biology.yale.edu |
| Molecular Self-Organisation: | May 8 |
| topic of meeting: | Micelles and membrane formation |
| contact: | Shuguang Zhang, shuguang@mit.edu |
Additional working groups are being organised. If you would like to participate in organisation contact research@necsi.org.
Further information on each of the working group meetings will be available on the WWW: http://necsi.org/html/WG.html
The second ICCS will take place Oct. 25-30, 1998 at the Sheraton Tara Hotel in Nashua, NH. The format will be similar to the first ICCS with some changes arising from suggestions from participants.
Because of the high level of interest in ICCS and our intention to keep the number of participants close to that of the first ICCS, we expect to be overbooked. Registration will be possible starting in March of 1998.
The Friday session will be on human organisations and ICCS will be followed immediately by the first NECSI Corporate Community meeting on 31 October 1 November.
Sponsored by:
New England Complex Systems Institute,
Complex-M discussion group,
Joseph L. Rotman School of Management at the
University of Toronto.
Managing the Complex will have 3 days of discussions about the relationships between managing organisations and the science of complex systems. Our emphasis will be on discussions, but there will be speakers, papers and a proceedings volume.
Our aim is to be learning together. We will have four or five invited speakers. The bulk of our time will be spent in informal discussion sessions involving self-organised working groups.
Managing the Complex will attract managers, academics, consultants, and others interested in the possibility of applying the insights of the science of complex systems to day-to-day management problems.
Attendance will be limited to 75 in order to keep the size of groups at the level optimal for discussion.
For more information see http://necsi.org/html/managing.html.
InterJournal is a distributed, largely self-organising, refereed journal on selected topics in science and engineering.
Please examine it at http://www.interjournal.org, register as an author if you are not already registered (there is no obligation involved), and consider submitting a paper or a comment on one of the existing papers.
InterJournal is an especially good outlet for papers involving multimedia (color illustrations, movies, sound, etc.).
Papers from the International Conference on Complex Systems (see http://necsi.org) are also published in InterJournal.
More information about NECSI and our activities in 1998 can be found at http://necsi.org.