Modular Approach to Designing Computer Cultural Systems: Culture as a Thermodynamic Machine

Leland Gilsen ()

Interdisciplinary Description of Complex Systems - scientific journal, 2015, vol. 13, issue 1, 71-81

Abstract: Culture is a complex non-linear system. In order to design computer simulations of cultural systems, it is necessary to break the system down into sub-systems. Human culture is modular. It consists of sets of people that belong to economic units. Access to, and control over matter, energy and information is postulated as the key to development of cultural simulations. Because resources in the real world are patchy, access to and control over resources is expressed in two related arenas: economics (direct control) and politics (non-direct control). The best way to create models for cultural ecology/economics lies in an energy-information-economic paradigm based on general systems theory and an understanding of the "thermodynamics" of ecology, or culture as a thermodynamic machine.

Keywords: cultural ecology; thermodynamics; systems theory (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: N51 N91 O13 Q22 Q57 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zna:indecs:v:13:y:2015:i:1:p:71-81

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