Reading Material: Geoffrey West and Understanding Cities Through Science
Submitted by John on Mon, 12/27/2010 - 22:31
There's a great article by Jonah Lehrer in the New York Times Magazine about the work of physicists Geoffrey West and Luis Bettencourt and their application of advanced math and statistics to urban studies (also linked to at Simtropolis, which is where I found it.) Lots of stuff for city sim fans to think about, but most importantly the idea that urbanization patterns can be explained in terms of a few relatively simple equations; obviously that has big implications for what we hope to do here. Fairly long but well worth taking a couple minutes to check out.
1 response to "Reading Material: Geoffrey West and Understanding Cities Through Science"
1. This is a very interesting
This is a very interesting article and had a few books cited that I would enjoy reading. It's a sure bet that science and research will, if unpolluted by speculation or personal bias, render a genuine understanding or expression through which we can better understand the world.
Personally, I was amazed to learn about the relationship size has upon energy consumption and on innovation. You would have thought these things would have actually been reversed, just by looking at it. This is some pretty bombing data that should help the project when it comes time to generate the program code to run the simulation. If we stand on the shoulders of giants, the next generation of City Simulation will be an experience that won't be compared to...until we make the sequel!
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