An individual-based simulation where species co-evolve on a 2D grid, that can generate, in a bottom-up manner, complex ecosystems of individuals. Designed to assess the long-term complex dynamics that might occur in interaction with humans.
Edmonds, B. (2018) A Socio-Ecological Test Bed. Ecological Complexity. Published Online. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecocom.2018.10.003
.h2 Abstract
A test bed simulation is described, composed of an individual-based simulation where species co-evolve on a 2D grid. This can generate, in a bottom-up manner, complex ecosystems of individuals. This test bed is designed so that the kind of ecological complexity observed is exhibited in order to be able to assess the longer-term complex dynamics that might occur if humans with different cultural characteristics are introduced. This is compared to Hubbell’s ‘Neutral Theory’. A sensitivity analysis is shown. Then an example where “human agents” are introduced half way into the simulation is described. A comprehensive exploration of the impact of introducing ‘human-like’ agents is beyond the scope of this paper, but some indicative results shown, showing both the high impact humans have, but also some of the complexity of the human-ecosystem interaction.
Model at:
Edmonds, Bruce (2014, May 04). “A test-bed ecological model” (Version 1.0.0). CoMSES Computational Model Library. Retrieved from: https://www.comses.net/codebases/4204/releases/1.0.0/
Some slides at: https://www.slideshare.net/BruceEdmonds/socioecological-simulation-a-riskassessment-approach
Previous, unrevised version of paper at link below.