My name is Mason Porter. I am a Professor in the Department of Mathematics at UCLA. Previously I was Professor of Nonlinear and Complex Systems in the Mathematical Institute at University of Oxford. I was also a Tutorial Fellow of Somerville College.
Wednesday, June 03, 2009
Steve Strogatz on Networks and the Phillips Machine
I had never heard of the Phillips Machine, but there is a refurbished one at Cambridge that "works". As Steve Strogatz explains in his latest guest column in the New York Times, it's basically a miniature hydraulic caricature of the economy. The article then relates this briefly to some modern work in networks and complex systems, more generally bringing up the point that one of the really exciting and challenging things of these subjects is the attempt to move beyond reductionism.
This is yet another reason why Pratchett is awesome! I had no idea such a thing existed outside of Ankh-Morpork. And if I'd had to pick a goofy Discworld thing that actually exists, that would not have been high on my list, either...
ReplyDeleteI caught the note on the wikipedia entry about the Pratchett connection.
ReplyDelete