CSCS 530 -- General Introductory Material to "Complex Systems"


The following is small sample of general complex systems related books. Note that inclusion or exclusion of books is not meant as an endorsement/condemnation. This is just a collection of books I find myself telling people new to the field to take a look at to get a general idea of what people are doing. If your favorities are not listed here, let me know and I may add them.

Another page to check is this page of introductory Complex Systems readings assembled for a workshop related to sustainable mobility.

Also see this page of readings about agent-based modeling.



The Complexity of Cooperation 
   Axelrod, Robert
   Princeton Univ Press, 1997.

Harnessing Complexity.
   Axelrod, Robert and Cohen, Michael.
   Free Press, 2000.

Complex Adaptive Systems. 
   An Introduction to Computational Models of Social Life.
   John H. Miller and Scott E. Page
   Princeton Univ. Press. 2007.

Dynamics of Complex Systems  
   Bar-Yam, Yaneer.
   Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 1997.
   online version!

Adaptive Individuals in Evolving Populations.
  R. K. Belew and M. Mitchell (eds).
  Vol XXVI of the SFI Studies in the Science of Complexity Series,
  Addison-Wesley, 1996.

How Nature Works: the science of self-organized criticality.
  Bak, Per.
  Springer-Verlag.  1996.

The Computational Beauty of Nature.
  Gary W. Flake. (1999 ?)

Foundations of Complex System Theories
  in Economics, Evolutionary Biology, and Statistical Physics.
  Auyang, Sunny Y. 
  Cambridge Univ Press, 1998.
  Papers based on parts of the book.
  SYNTHETIC ANALYSIS OF COMPLEX SYSTEMS I - THEORIES by S. Auyang.

Reality Rules: picturing the world in mathematics.
  Casti, J. L.
  New York : J. Wiley, c1992.

Would-Be Worlds: How Simulation is Changing the Frontiers of Science.
   Casti, John.
   Wiley, NY.  1997.
   Abbrev: WBW

Growing Artificial Societies: Social Science From the Bottom Up.
   Epstein, Joshua M and Axtell, Robert.
   The MIT Press.  1996.
   Abbrev:  GAS

Hidden Order: How Adaptation Builds Complexity.
   Holland, John H.
   The MIT Press, 1995.

Emergence: From Chaos to Order.
   Holland, John H.
   Addison Wesley, Reading MA. 1998.

At Home in the Universe.
   Kauffman, Stuart.
   Oxford Univ. Press, NY, 1995.

The Origins of Order.
   Kauffman, Stuart.
   Oxford Univ Press, NY, 1993.

Out of Control
  Kelly, Kevin.
  Addison Wesley.   1996.

Making Sense of Life: Explaining Biological Development
  with Models, Metaphors, and Machines.
  Evelyn Fox Keller.
  Harvard Univ. Press, 2002.

The Difference. How the Power of Diversity Creates
  Better Groups, Firms, Schools and Societies.
  Scott E. Page. Princeton Univ. Press. 2007.

Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains,
  Cities and Software.
  Steven Johnson. 2001.

The Emergence of Everything: How the World Became Complex.
  Harold J. Morowitz.
  Oxford Univ. Press, 2002.

The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference
  Malcolm Gladwell.       
  Little Brown, 2000.

Six Degrees: The Science of a Connected Age
Duncan J. Watts.
W.W. Norton & Company, 2003.

Linked: The New Science of Networks.
  Albert-Laslo Barabasi
  Perseus Pub (2002).
  
Nexus: Small Worlds and the Groundbreaking Science
  of Networks/Small World: Uncovering Nature's Hidden Networks
  Mark Buchanan
  W.W.Norton 2002

Sync: The Emerging Science of Spontaneous Order
  Stephen Strogatz
  Hyperion Books, 2003.

Turtles, Termites and Traffice Jams.
  Mitchell Resnick
  MIT Press, 1997.

Choas Theory in the Social Sciecnes 
   Kiel, L. Douglas and Elliott, Euel (eds).
   University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, MI,  1995.

Exploring Complexity: An Introduction.
   Nicolis, Gregoire and Prigongine, Ilya,
   W.H.Freeman and Co, NY, 1989.

Business Dynamics: Systems Thinking and Modeling for a Complex World.
   John D. Sterman.
   McGraw-Hill.

Simulating Social Phenomena
   R. Conte, R. Hegselmann and P. Terna (eds).
   Springer-Verlag, 1997.

Economic Simulations in Swarm:
     Agent-Based Modelling and Object Oriented Programming
   Benedikt Stefannson and Franceso Luna
   Kluwer: 2000

Individual-based Modeling and Ecology
   Volker Grimm and Steven F. Railsback.
   Princeton Series in Theoretical and Computational Ecology.
   2005.

The Plausibility of Life
   Marc Kirschner and John Gerhart.
   Yale Univ. Press, 2005.


Managing Business Complexity
   Discovering Strategic Solutions with ABM and SImulation
   Michael J. North, Charles M. Macal.  Oxford Univ Press. 2007.

Cities and Complexity.
   Understanding Cities with Cellular Automata, Agent-Based Models, and Fractals.
   Michael Batty.      MIT Press.  2005.

Agent-Based Methods in Economics and Finance: Simulations in Swarm
   edited by Francesco Luna and Alessandro Perrone
   In : Advances in Computational Economics  : Volume 17

Simulation for the Social Scientist (online!)
   N. Gilbert and K.G.Troitzsch
   Open University Press, 1999.

Liebrand, Wim B. G., Nowak, Andrzej, and Hegselmann, Rainer (eds). 
   Computer Modeling of Social Processes.   1998

Nowak, Andrzej and Vallacher, Robin R.
   Dynamical Social Psychology.   1998

Gimblett, H. Randy (ed.)
  Integrating Geographic Information Systems and Agent-Based Modeling
  Techniques for Simulating Social and Ecological Processes.
  Santa Fe Institute Studies in the Sciences of Complexity. 
  Oxford: Oxford University Press. (2002)

Chaos, Complexity, and Sociology
   Myths, Models, and Theories
   R.A. Eve, S. Horsfall, M.E. Lee (eds)
   Sage Publications (1997)

Frontiers of Complexity
  Roger Highfield and Peter Coveny.
  Fawcett, 1996.

Complexity: The Emerging Science at the 
   Edge of Order and Chaos.
   M. Mitchell Waldrop 
   Touchstone Books. 1993.

Simulating Societies.  A Mathematica Tookkit for
   Modeling Socioeconomic Behavior.
   Richard J. Gaylord and Louis J. D'Andria.
   Springer-Verlog, NY.  1998.

Ferber, Jacques. 
   Multi-Agent Systems: An Introduction to Distributed Artificial Intelligence.
   Harlow (UK): Addison-Wesley. 1999.

Interesting papers

John Harte Toward a Synthesis of the Newtonian and Darwinian Worldviews Physics Today, October 2002. (On ecologists and physicists approaches to sustainability.)

For more specific readings, see CSCS 530 Course Readings or CSCS 501 Course Readings.