0000000000140412
AUTHOR
Saikou Y. Diallo
Post-Supernatural Cultures: There and Back Again
The abandonment of supernatural religious beliefs and rituals seems to occur quite easily in some contexts, but post-supernaturalist cultures require a specific set of conditions that are difficult to produce and sustain on a large scale and thus are historically rare. Despite the worldwide resurgence of supernaturalist religion, some subcultures reliably produce people who deny the existence of supernatural entities. This social phenomenon has evoked competing explanations, many of which enjoy empirical support. We synthesize six of the most influential social-science explanations, demonstrating that they provide complementary perspectives on a complex causal architecture. We incorporate t…
Minority Integration in a Western City: An Agent-Based Modelling Approach
This chapter describes the design and construction of an agent-based model we refer to as the ‘Simulation of Extended Time Integration’ (SETI) model. This model was designed with the goal of obtaining a better understanding of the conditions and mechanisms leading to the structural, social, and cultural integration of minorities into large Western societies. SETI is a virtual society with structural (employment, income, education) and demographic (marriage, reproduction, life expectancy) variables typical of Westerns countries. Initialization occurs after a hypothesized immigration event in which a single minority population settles into the majority population, bracketing the first decade …
Computational Demography of Religion: A Proposal
This paper proposes a new approach to the demography of religion and non-religion that builds on and expands agent-based modeling and social simulation techniques developed in prior work by the research teams led by the authors. Traditional demographic approaches to religion and non-religion understandably focus attention on self-reports of religious identity or affiliation, where longitudinal data is most readily available, and they employ a cohort-component methodology to make projections. We argue that demographic projections of religion and non-religion could be enhanced by using multi-agent artificial intelligence models of societies. After artificial societies with suitably cognitivel…
Interacting With Human Simulations: A Prototype Application
The process of interacting and executing agent-based simulations of human phenomena is complex and difficult to follow for lay people. This is due to 1) limited access to computing power, 2) difficulty in writing analytics scripts and 3) the size and complexity of the simulation space. Consequently, agent-based simulations are normally used once to answer a limited set of questions instead of exploring all the potential paths that the model offers. Here, we describe an approach for developing user experiences that automate the analytic process and rely on interactive visualizations and life histories of societies and agents. This approach helps the user visualize simulation results, pin-poi…
Human Simulation: A Transdisciplinary Approach to Studying Societal Problems
In this chapter, we present a transdisciplinary framework where humanities scholars, social scientists, and engineers can work together to tackle large and complex societal problems. We identify the steps required to construct a human simulation model and the concerns and issues that must be addressed to ensure success. We also present some basic definitions and assumptions inherent to developing this sort of model.
Modelling terror management theory: computer simulations of the impact of mortality salience on religiosity
ABSTRACTThis article outlines the development – and reports on the experimental findings – of two computational models designed to simulate the dynamic systems and behavioural patterns identified and clarified by research on terror management theory. The causal architectures of these models are informed by empirical research on the effects of mortality salience on “religiosity” (and vice versa). They are also informed by research on the way in which perception of personal and environmental hazards activate evolved cognitive and coalitional precautionary systems that can intensify anxiety-alleviating behaviours such as imaginative engagement with supernatural agents postulated within a relig…
Minding morality : ethical artificial societies for public policy modeling
AbstractPublic policies are designed to have an impact on particular societies, yet policy-oriented computer models and simulations often focus more on articulating the policies to be applied than on realistically rendering the cultural dynamics of the target society. This approach can lead to policy assessments that ignore crucial social contextual factors. For example, by leaving out distinctive moral and normative dimensions of cultural contexts in artificial societies, estimations of downstream policy effectiveness fail to account for dynamics that are fundamental in human life and central to many public policy challenges. In this paper, we supply evidence that incorporating morally sal…
The Artificial Society Analytics Platform
Author's accepted manuscript Social simulation routinely involves the construction of artificial societies and agents within such societies. Currently there is insufficient discussion of best practices regarding the construction process. This chapter introduces the artificial society analytics platform (ASAP) as a way to spark discussion of best practices. ASAP is designed to be an extensible architecture capable of functioning as the core of many different types of inquiries into social dynamics. Here we describe ASAP, focusing on design decisions in several key areas, thereby exposing our assumptions and reasoning to critical scrutiny, hoping for discussion that can advance debate over be…