We are back with our 4th UCLA Lake Arrowhead Conference on Human Complex Systems. from Wednesday April 25, 2007 through Sunday April 29, 2007.

We look forward to another cross-disciplinary gathering of social scientists who employ cutting-edge agent-based computational modeling and related computational ideas and methods in their research and teaching. As in past years, dozens of presenters from numerous disciplines are presenting. We are also hosting evening panels, a live simulation, and opportunities for networking and relaxation amid gorgeous surroundings.

Advancing Agent Modeling in the Social Sciences
The conference is a forum for sharing the most recent advances -- in theory, methodology and application - in the area of agent modeling throughout the social sciences (e.g., Anthropology, Communication Studies, Economics, Geography, History, Political Science, Sociology, Urban Planning). We also welcome social scientists in professional schools (e.g., Business, Education, International Relations, Public Health, Public Policy, Social Welfare) and in the public and private sectors. Researchers and theorists in Psychology, Media Studies and social aspects of Cognitive Science, Artificial Intelligence, Robotics and related disciplines also welcome!

For a paper presentation, authors present for 20 minutes and receive an additional 10 minutes for Q&A. We also welcome 90-120 minute symposium proposals consisting of 3-4 individual papers on a related topic of inquiry. Finally, we are open to someone wishing to organize an evening panel discussion on a �hot topic� in agent modeling.

"To understand the true nature of warnings, it helps to see them not as single events, like an air-raid siren, but rather as swarms of messages racing through overlapping social networks, like the buzz of gossip. Residents of New Orleans didn't just need to know a hurricane was coming. They also needed to be informed that floodwaters were threatening to breach the levees, that not all neighborhoods would be inundated, that certain roads would become impassible while alternative evacuation routes would remain open, that buses were available for transport, and that the Superdome was full.

"No central authority possessed this information. Knowledge was fragmentary, parceled out among tens of thousands of people on the ground. There was no way to gather all these observations and deliver them to where they were needed. During Hurricane Katrina, public officials from top to bottom found themselves locked within conventional channels, unable to receive, analyze, or redistribute news from outside. In the most egregious example, Homeland Security secretary Michael Chertoff said in a radio interview that he had not heard that people at the New Orleans convention center were without food or water. At that point they'd been stranded two days.