So I wanted to expound a bit more on why I am so enthused about CSC joining Krasnow. Perhaps the best place to start is with the notion that social complexity is an emergent of cognitive complexity. This notion: that the complex adaptive natures of social networks (from say families to entire cultures) is itself a product of the human minds that make up those social networks is not so farfetched. It certainly underlies the basic raision d’etre for the new field of neuroeconomics–where we are also now actively involved. It also to some extent subserved some of the Krasnow work with language in the Great Apes, and some of the very early interests in language development at the Institute. So I think we’re intellectually on very solid ground here.
I also think that the neuroscience at Krasnow can bring a level of biological plausibility which will be very helpful to the folks at CSC who are using agent-based modeling to study emerging social behaviors. One area that I’ve been involved with is a collaboration with Claudio Cioffi and Sean Luke to study how including mnemonic functions in agents might affect emergents in modeled social networks. I’m very hopeful that this line of research will eventually be fruitful.
In any case, I’d like to welcome our colleagues on board. We’re the better for their joining us….and we’ll plan some appropriate marking of this joining for the Fall.
Jim
Discoverers and Discoveries 