simulation of coping to understand conflict dynamics
DESCRIPTION
Simulation of Coping to Understand Conflict Dynamics. George Backus, D.Engr. Policy Assessment Corporation Denver, Colorado, USA Telephone: 1-303-467-3566. CU August 19/21 2003. Peace And War. Opposites? Blends? Wrong Question? - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
. 1 Policy Assessment Corporation
Simulation of Coping to Understand Conflict Dynamics
George Backus, D.Engr.Policy Assessment Corporation
Denver, Colorado, USA
Telephone: 1-303-467-3566
CUAugust 19/21 2003
. 2 Policy Assessment Corporation
Peace And War
● Opposites?● Blends?
● Wrong Question?
● You cannot understand the future if you do not understand the past. We dare not deny what the past tells us about ourselves. We cannot make up a future that violates who we are.
● Belief/hope is not a valid approach. Math and science must have falsification.
. 3 Policy Assessment Corporation
Math Facts and Fancy
● Conclusions (given “facts) will possibly be incontrovertible.
● Need to find realistic, doable, change in system to allow sustainability and stable future.
● Optimization is not a valid approach; the assumptions violate what real humans can do.
● Human response represents a distribution --from the individual through the global level.
. 4 Policy Assessment Corporation
Two Days and then Refutation
● The End of the World● History: The present● History: -30 years● History: -6M years
● “Limits to Growth” and Technological Salvation● System Dynamics
● Overshoot and Collapse: Pacifism Prevents Peace● The Arms Race: US and Russia
● Coping with Peace● The Distribution of Nothing to Lose● Every Conflict has a Solution● United We Fall (Conflicts have No Solution)
. 5 Policy Assessment Corporation
Morality is a Choice
● Mathematical not philosophical statement ● There is only morality if you choose
● Living in affluent American neighborhood is not like living in the Ivory Coast, Liberia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Guatemala etc., etc., etc.
● Promoting group-hugs and singing “Give Peace a Chance” to stop war is a denial of reality.
● In mathematics, you must consider all alternatives (all potential choices).
● Only when you are faced with the full spectrum of possibilities does choice have a moral meaning.
. 6 Policy Assessment Corporation
End of the World
● A bit of “garage” engineering● A bit of history
● 1996: Peace: Lithuania-Kaliningrad Border● 1974: Fuel Processing: San Diego, California● 1984: Cold War: Czechoslovakia-Austrian
Border● 1971: Vietnam War: Madison, Wisconsin
. 7 Policy Assessment Corporation
Waiting on an Individual Extremist
. 8 Policy Assessment Corporation
Very Real Individual Choices
● U239+n=Pu239● Available to all who have a reactor.
● U235 is 0.007 of Natural Uranium ● Centripetal separation with vacuum cleaner would take ~ 5
years.
● Fission bomb limit is ~2MT ● Fusion has no limit
● Realistic limit is 50MT to avoid catastrophic fracture of earth’s crust.
● Requires very high tech and lots of $● Doomsday bomb is “too easy” to make. (US has it?)
● You have something to lose. You are not a threat.● But if you believed you were “right” and “they” were wrong…
. 9 Policy Assessment Corporation
Learning from History
● 1996: Peace: Lithuania-Kaliningrad Border● 1974: Fuel Processing: San Diego,
California● 1984: Cold War: Czechoslovakia-Austria
Border● 1971: Vietnam War: Madison, Wisconsin
. 10 Policy Assessment Corporation
Protesting War
● http://www.leemark.com/featuredcontent/sterling/sterling.html
. 11 Policy Assessment Corporation
Zimbardo Experiment (1971)
● Stanford University Student Pacifists● Prison Simulation: Guards and prisoners● Violence and Psychological Reality
”The Stanford Prison Experiment is a classic psychology experiment. What happens when you put good people in an evil place? Does humanity win over evil, or does evil triumph? How we went about testing these questions and what we found may astound you. Our planned two-week investigation into the psychology of prison life had to be ended prematurely after only six days because of what the situation was doing to the college students who participated. In only a few days, our guards became sadistic and our prisoners became depressed and showed signs of extreme stress.” http://www.prisonexp.org/
● The John Wayne effect● Fall of Iran and the “Ayatollah”
. 12 Policy Assessment Corporation
History – 6 Million Years and 6000 Peoples
● Constant Battles: Steven LeBlanc (2003)Guns, Germs, and Steel: Jared Diamond● Not one peaceful people in 6 Million years.● Peace is an transient accident
● Mahandas Gandhi And Martin Luther King● Neville Chamberlain and Hitler● Ecological imbalance is also economics and cultural
● Technology and Centralized Power● There is “peace” within a strongly-governed
country…if forced.● Technology will lead to abundance for all… if only
the earth were not finite.
. 13 Policy Assessment Corporation
Good versus Evil
MT MG NB SH ATH AH JS PP OBL?
Good? Evil?
0
2 .5
1 E -0 6
Frequency
Impact
AH (6-20 Million), JS(7-30M), PP(20% of Pop) 150 years ago life had no value anywhere. “Genocide” continues today.
. 14 Policy Assessment Corporation
Limits to Growth and Technological Salvation
● Dynamics of Growth in a Finite World: D. L. Meadows (1972)● “Discredited”… except it is still forecasting correctly.
● Technology can overcome, but at the wrong time.● Technology extends the low-cost exploitation of a
finite resource. It delays the hard decisions.● With even weak exponential growth, there is no time
to substitute from one resource to the next.● War is the outcome.
● Mathematical models can change the world.
. 15 Policy Assessment Corporation
WORLD3 Model
. 16 Policy Assessment Corporation
Mathematical Simulation: System Dynamics
● Business Dynamics: Systems Thinking and Modeling in a Complex World. John Sterman.
● POP(t)=POP(t-1)+dt*(BR-DR)● d(POP)/dt=BR-DR: BR=POP*FR: DR=POP*MR● Feedback, Delays, DQ as causal language● Complete: Constant to Variable, One to Many● Fear and greed behavior (Only need fear.)
BR POP DR Balancing Reinforcing
FR MR
+ +
+
+
+
-
. 17 Policy Assessment Corporation
Population and “Needs”
BR POP DR Balancing Reinforcing
FR MR
+ +
+
+
+
-
FOOD RG CR
RR
+
-
- FPR
-
+ +
+
. 18 Policy Assessment Corporation
Overshoot and Collapse (And War)
0.00
5.00
10.00
15.00
20.00
25.000 9 18 27 36 45 54 63 72 81 90 99 108
117
126
135
144
(Th
ou
san
ds)
Time (Years)
Un
its
Population
Food
. 19 Policy Assessment Corporation
Detailed Dynamics
0
200
400
600
800
1000
12000 9 18 27 36 45 54 63 72 81 90 99 108
117
126
135
144
Birth Rate
Death Rate
Consumption Rate
Regeneration Rate
. 20 Policy Assessment Corporation
Resources and Population
● At collapse, all die or some WILL die. It is a “war” choice.
● Maya, Indus, Mesopotamia, Moche, etc. are examples of the collapse.
● If factions, largest (fastest growing population) wins.
● 26 members of the human family may have existed together. Only the ONE best predator survived – by destroying the others.
. 21 Policy Assessment Corporation
Arms Race
● The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers: Paul Kennedy● Uncertain Mistrust
● Peace as a Darwinian Dead-End (Is that same ultimately true of war?)
GR2 Weapons1 GR2
ECON2
Weapons2
ECON1 +
+
+
+ - - - -
-
-
. 22 Policy Assessment Corporation
Unlimited Arms Race
0.00
10.00
20.00
30.00
40.00
50.00
60.000 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36
(Th
ou
san
ds)
Time
Wea
po
ns
Weapons 1
Weapons 2
. 23 Policy Assessment Corporation
The Rise and Fall of Nations
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36
Time
$/Ye
ar (
Billi
ons)
Economy 1
Economy 2
0.00
5.00
10.00
15.00
20.00
25.00
30.00
35.00
40.00
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36
(Tho
usan
ds)
Time
Wea
pons
Weapons 1
Weapons 2
. 24 Policy Assessment Corporation
Coping With (Human) Nature
Coping Enhancement
Response
Attention Pressure
Atrophication
Gap
(-) (+) (+) (+) (-) (+) (-) (+) (+) (+)
. 25 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 1: Attention Behavior
Attention to Pressure
0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
1.2
-3.5 -3.0 -2.5 -2.0 -1.5 -1.0 -0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 3.5
(Pressure-Coping)/Coping
Att
entio
n Le
vel
. 26 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 2: Response Behavior
Response to Pressure
0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
1.2
-3.5 -3.0 -2.5 -2.0 -1.5 -1.0 -0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 3.5
(Pressure-Coping)/Coping
Res
po
nse
Lev
el
. 27 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 3: Net Active Behavior
Net Response
0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
1.2
-3.5 -3.0 -2.5 -2.0 -1.5 -1.0 -0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 3.5
(Pressure-Coping)/Coping
Net
Res
po
nse
Lev
el
. 28 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 4: Steady State Pressure.
. 29 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 5: Coping-Skill Atrophication
. 30 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 6: Maximum Sustainable Growth
. 31 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 7: Near the Limits to Growth
. 32 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 8: Collapse
. 33 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 9: Moderate Coping-Skill Overshoot
. 34 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 10: Gradual Coping-Skill Overshoot
. 35 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 11: Maximum Sustainable Growth with a Coping-
Skill Limit
. 36 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 12: Excess Repetitive Pressure
. 37 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 13: Tolerable Repetitive Pressure
. 38 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 14: Almost Burnout
. 39 Policy Assessment Corporation
Figure 15: Burnout
. 40 Policy Assessment Corporation
What is the Probability?
● Any individual bilateral conflict can be accommodated via coping.
● Given a distribution of incompatible (irrational?) individuals, there is no stable solution for multiple interacting parties at the extremes of the distribution.
● “The End” probability goes to unity in the long-term.
● Will an attempt to make all have something to lose succeed soon enough?