Modeling biocomplexity - actors, landscapes and alternative futures

  • Authors:

  • John P. Bolte;David W. Hulse;Stanley V. Gregory;Court Smith

  • Affiliations:

  • Department of Bioengineering, Oregon State University, Oregon, USA;Department of Landscape Architecture, University of Oregon, Oregon, USA;Department of Fisheries and Wildlife, Oregon State University, Oregon, USA;Department of Anthropology, Oregon State University, Oregon, USA

  • Venue:
  • Environmental Modelling & Software
  • Year:
  • 2007

Quantified Score

Hi-index 0.00

Visualization

Abstract

Increasingly, models (and modelers) are being asked to address the interactions between human influences, ecological processes, and landscape dynamics that impact many diverse aspects of managing complex coupled human and natural systems. These systems may be profoundly influenced by human decisions at multiple spatial and temporal scales, and the limitations of traditional process-level ecosystems modeling approaches for representing the richness of factors shaping landscape dynamics in these coupled systems has resulted in the need for new analysis approaches. New tools in the areas of spatial data management and analysis, multicriteria decision-making, individual-based modeling, and complexity science have all begun to impact how we approach modeling these systems. The term ''biocomplexity'' has emerged as a descriptor of the rich patterns of interactions and behaviors in human and natural systems, and the challenges of analyzing biocomplex behavior is resulting in a convergence of approaches leading to new ways of understanding these systems. Important questions related to system vulnerability and resilience, adaptation, feedback processing, cycling, non-linearities and other complex behaviors are being addressed using models employing new representational approaches to analysis. The complexity inherent in these systems challenges the modeling community to provide tools that capture sufficiently the richness of human and ecosystem processes and interactions in ways that are computationally tractable and understandable. We examine one such tool, EvoLand, which uses an actor-based approach to conduct alternative futures analyses in the Willamette Basin, Oregon.