Melanie: I' here with
Jerry Sabloff, who's the president of the Sta.Fe Institute
M: Nice to see you Jerry.
Jerry: Thank you Melanie.
M: So Jerry is an anthropologist/archaeologist
who has now come to work on the field of complexity
and Jerry, can you tell us a little bit about your background?
J: Sure. My major
interest are ancient Maya civilization and
I've worked for many years
in Guatemala and Mexico, but I'm also interested in
archeological theory,
history of archaeology and the rise of complex societies.
M: And, you've been here as president for how long?
J: Three and a half years now.
M: Okay. What attracted you to come to SFI?
J: Probably a whole host of factors.
One is the location, it's hard to beat Sta.Fe.
You look at the window, it's snowing on the mountains, outside,
but I taught in the late 70s, early 80s at the University of New Mexico, in Albuquerque
and knew New Mexico quite well
and particularly Sta. Fe.
I've been for the board of School for Advanced Research in town
and the opportunity came to come to Sta.Fe.
In general, that was hard to argue against.
But more specifically,
the institute attracted me. I've been out here and have given talks
couple of times before, and the people are terrific
and I think just on that alone, it's a wise choice cause
it's fun to work in the morning cause you don't know who you're gonna meet,
what new ideas you're gonna hear,
discuss at lunch or tea or colloquia.
And then also the focus both on complexity and interdisciplinary studies attracted me.
M: What's your view of the institute's mission?
What do you think it's here for?
J: Okay, well, the institute's almost 30 years old now
and I think its kind of initial operating principles still hold
great weight today.
And that's really to understand complex adaptive systems
and to build theory to better understand them, and to do that
through interdisciplinary approaches.
I think that's the core mission that's been here since 1984,
and it still holds firm.
We're trying to look at broad reaches of the world today,
and trying to find ways to better understand the world.
Those are all aspects of our mission and what we do,
and I think we've been, I think quite successful at it
for a number of years
and I hope for a number of years to come.
M: So is there any particular achievement that you could point to as that SFI
has produced that you think is particularly significant?
J: We've helped make sciences, in the broad sense, appreciative and aware
of the significance of the study of complex adaptive systems.
And I think., in itself...
M: That's a great achivement.
J: And I think we've also played a role in fostering interdisciplinary studies
The whole area of what is now called the 'new economics'
it was started, again back in mid 80s, by people like Brian Arthur
and others are now having significant impact in economics.
Agent-based modelling.
Although it didn't start here at SFI, we've been major players in making that approach
really important in a host of areas.
Scaling. Metabolic scaling, socio-economic scaling.
It's an area that, again, we've played an important role
Again, not everything coming here, but I think really significant.
Genetic algorithms. The past study of RNA and so on has really been important.
Studying disease spread, and particularly pandemics, using a variety of network techniques.
And more broadly, network theory.
Again, SFI, our scientists hace played key roles in advancing our understanding of complex networks.
Technological development, looking at regularities in terms of...
M: Modelling how technologies develop.
J: Yes, in general the importance of complex adaptive systems studies, emergent phenomena and non-linear thinking.
Looking at nonlinear systems over long periods of time.
They really have been major contributions of SFI science.
M: Okay. And one final question, what's the next big thing for SFI?
J: If you had asked me in December, I've would've said that
the world was gonna survive past..
M: (laughs) The Mayan..
J: all the apocalypse and so.
But I think one of the great goals when the institute was founded in 1984
was to try to build a general theory of complexity at all scales,
you know, from atoms and cells to human societies.
And that hasn't happened.
M: Many people think it can't happen.
J: No, I think I would guess the majority of scientist thinks that.
To me, I'm not certain that that's the case,
and I think we're at a point today, with new kinds of techniques in terms of
studying big data sources and so on,
that we might well be close, if not to a new theory,
at least to a synthesis of kind of common vocabulary across disciplines
in looking at complex phenomena.
But I haven't given up hope, that that might be something that we will achieve in the coming decade.
J: On the more specific level is on the whole area of scaling
and urban development.
And I think the work of Geoffrey West, Luis Bettencourt and their whole
research team has terrific promise.
So I think that's an area that's exciting both theoretically and practically,
and although we're mainly interested in the theory, we're certainly aware of the policy implications.
Generally and specifically, that's where I think SFI might well contribute in the coming years.
M: Great. Well thank you very much!
J: My pleasure indeed.
M: I appreciate it.