Inverse Generative Social Science: Backward to the Future

The Institute of Economics will hold a seminar meeting as part of its Seminar Series on Thursday, May 23, 2024: Joshua M. Epstein from New York University will present the paper “Inverse Generative Social Science: Backward to the Future".

Abstract:

The agent-based model is the principal scientific instrument of generative social science. Typically, we design completed agents—fully endowed with rules and parameters–to grow macroscopic target patterns from the bottom up. Inverse generative science (iGSS) stands this approach on its head: Rather than handcrafting completed agents to grow a target—the forward problem—we start with the macro-target and evolve micro-agents that generate it, stipulating only primitive agent-rule constituents and permissible combinators. Concrete examples of iGSS and outstanding foundational issues surrounding it are discussed. An important goal of iGSS is to evolve cognitively plausible formal alternatives to the Rational Actor, with Agent_Zero as one possible point of evolutionary departure.

The Seminar will be held in Aula 5.