Tradebot Simulation Summary

Bring on the Tradebots!

At the Economic Simulation Conference co-sponsored by the Bionomics Institute and the Center for Computable Economics at UCLA, a consensus developed that a simple multi-agent, evolutionary simulation targeted to first-time model developers was needed as a design reference. Jim Bowlby and the Bionomics Institiute are partnering to fill that need with the Tradebots series of simulations. The Tradebot simulations are not intended to be state-of-the-art and cutting-edge; instead, they are designed to demonstrate one cross-platform approach to developing multi-agent, evolutionary simulations to novice simulation developers. This first in a series of instructional simulations shows how a developer might reimplement Robert Axelrod's "A Model of the Emergence of New Political Actors" described in Many-Agent Simulation and Artificial Life (IOS Press). Axelrod's paper, and the book in general, provide an excellent introduction to the subject area.

What does the Institute hope to accomplish with this work?

• We plan to continue evolving more sophisticated simulations in the future.
• We invite public comments and involvement in development of these simulations.
• We intend to use these simulations as a way of researching bionomic principles in a rigorous manner.
• We would like to help others learn the underlying simulation principles and both their value and limitations.

Future simulations will show how to retarget this original work to address more traditional Bionomic/Economic problems, demonstrating the generality of the underlying simulation principles

Explanation of simulation

Tradebot simulation