very<\/em> cool flocking behavior in 3D.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As many of my students can attest, I’ve always loved emergent behavior where you have a whole bunch of “stupid” agents working with simple rules, but the end result is amazingly complex and wondrous. There are termites, for example, that by following simple rules (and with no “leader” in charge) manage to build large mounds … Continue reading “I think my head is full of ants”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,28],"tags":[209,208,66,79,53,864,866,876],"class_list":["post-769","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-science","category-video","tag-agents","tag-emergent-behavior","tag-evolution","tag-insects","tag-public-health","tag-research","tag-science","tag-video"],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p90sy-cp","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":791,"url":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/2008\/02\/08\/decentralized-distributed-systems-evolutionary-computation-and-prisoners-dilemma\/","url_meta":{"origin":769,"position":0},"title":"Decentralized, distributed systems, evolutionary computation, and prisoner’s dilemma","author":"Nic McPhee","date":"8 Feb 08","format":false,"excerpt":"Chris posted some cool questions on my earlier post about decentralized behavior in social insects: so what kinds of things do computer scientists do w\/this idea? is sort of what evolutionary computing is about? i picked up the evolution of cooperation recently (tit for tat wins prisoner\u2019s dilemma) you must\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Computing"","block_context":{"text":"Computing","link":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/category\/computing\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Farming up close and personal","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/farm1.static.flickr.com\/21\/31627560_bb4f4a3dc8_m.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":588,"url":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/2007\/06\/24\/evolving-buildable-lego-structures\/","url_meta":{"origin":769,"position":1},"title":"Evolving buildable Lego structures","author":"Nic McPhee","date":"24 Jun 07","format":false,"excerpt":"More cool work out of Jordan Pollack's lab at Brandeis. They've build a nice force simulator and design system for Legos called EvoCAD that lets you evolve Lego structures that satisfy various conditions. Pablo Funes, who recently finished his PhD, used this to evolve spans of over 2 meters, tree-like\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Computing"","block_context":{"text":"Computing","link":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/category\/computing\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":548,"url":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/2007\/05\/01\/jocp-im-in-wired\/","url_meta":{"origin":769,"position":2},"title":"JOCP – I’m in Wired!","author":"Nic McPhee","date":"1 May 07","format":false,"excerpt":"OK - total ego post here; feel free to look the other way. But this photo got used in a blog post on Wired's web site! Not quite as cool as having it in the magazine, but still pretty darn spiffy :-). The piece in question briefly discusses two bills\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Environment"","block_context":{"text":"Environment","link":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/category\/science\/environment\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Science buzz!!!","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/farm1.static.flickr.com\/97\/267333555_d8d1300c0c_m.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":824,"url":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/2008\/04\/01\/educations-an-investment-not-an-expense\/","url_meta":{"origin":769,"position":3},"title":"Education’s an investment, not an expense!","author":"Nic McPhee","date":"1 Apr 08","format":false,"excerpt":"Just did a pile o' dishes and listened to a SciAm podcast featuring the remarks of Robert Rosner (head of Argonne National Laboratory). The short version is that science (and, I would argue, education in general) is a matter of necessity plus vision. First, science is not a luxury, but\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Education"","block_context":{"text":"Education","link":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/category\/education\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Wrapping one's head around the data","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2042\/2217375343_c55801ed85_m.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1300,"url":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/2010\/06\/11\/incentives-and-cognitive-surplus\/","url_meta":{"origin":769,"position":4},"title":"Incentives and cognitive surplus","author":"Nic McPhee","date":"11 Jun 10","format":false,"excerpt":"Via TechDirt I found this very cool video on how our \"standard\" notions of incentives don't always work very well, especially when it comes to cognitive work. There's a ton of cool ideas in the video (and more in the TechDirt piece, including some cool links). The incentives in the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "economics"","block_context":{"text":"economics","link":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/category\/economics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":781,"url":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/2008\/01\/25\/wrapping-ones-head-around-the-data\/","url_meta":{"origin":769,"position":5},"title":"Wrapping one’s head around the data","author":"Nic McPhee","date":"25 Jan 08","format":false,"excerpt":"JOCP! It's been almost five days since I've posted anything here, and I have so much backed up in the queue... There's a major conference deadline (GECCO 2008) in a few days, and I'm struggling to finish up four different (and only loosely related) papers for submission. 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