A unifying approach in the study of complex systems: the role of heterogeneity and the concept of time in models and data

It is a widely shared belief that complex phenomena arise from systems comprised of many interacting entities with a collective action such that the behavior of each component depends on the behavior of others. Such coupled interactions entail the emergence of global properties that cannot entirely be inferred from properties of the parts. Such systems require the development, or the use of, new scientific tools, nonlinear models, out-of-equilibrium descriptions and computer simulations.

We focus our discussion on theories, models and empirical analysis where the heterogeneity among agents play a key role in the onset of some typical features of complex systems not only in terms of spatial but also in terms of "temporal" interactions.

In particular, the traditional notion of time has been seen in terms of a clock-box counting a sequence of events. We will explore the possibility that, in a complex system, time is an emergent property from a microstructure of single interactions to a global onset of macro events, which can be perceived as temporal sequences.

These new results are also contributing new views on the ambitious problem of searching for a unifying theory of complexity, which could encompasses different scientific areas with important implications in theoretical models and in interpretations of real data.

In particular, we will discuss concepts related to complex economics with heterogeneous agents, temporal self-organized criticality, non-ergodic processes, evolutionary economics and biology, extreme and rare events, machine-learning techniques and inferential statistical analysis.

This workshop rests on a series of interdisciplinary seminars organized in such a way as to favor fruitful interactions among physicists, economists, neuro-physiologists, mathematicians and computer scientists.

No registration is required, and there are no conference fees. Participants are expected to cover their travel and accommodation expenses.

It is recommended to send an email to fa.vanni@santannapisa.it to attend the workshop for number of attendees in the room.