Abstract:
This article argues that the agent-based computational model permits a distinctive approach to social science for which the term β€_x009c_generativeβ€_x009d_ is suitable. In defending this terminology, features distinguishing the approach from both β€_x009c_inductiveβ€_x009d_ and β€_x009c_deductiveβ€_x009d_ science are given. Then, the following specific contributions to social science are discussed: The agent-based computational model is a new tool for empirical research. It offers a natural environment for the study of connectionist phenomena in social science. Agent-based modeling provides a powerful way to address certain enduringβ€”and especially interdisciplinaryβ€”questions. It allows one to subject certain core theoriesβ€”such as neoclassical microeconomicsβ€”to important types of stress (e.g., the effect of evolving preferences). It permits one to study how rules of individual behavior give riseβ€”or β€_x009c_map upβ€_x009d_β€”to macroscopic regularities and organizations. In turn, one can employ laboratory behavioral research findings to select among competing agent-based (β€_x009c_bottom upβ€_x009d_) models. The agent-based approach may well have the important effect of decoupling individual rationality from macroscopic equilibrium and of separating decision science from social science more generally. Agent-based modeling offers powerful new forms of hybrid theoretical-computational work; these are particularly relevant to the study of non-equilibrium systems. The agentbased approach invites the interpretation of society as a distributed computational device, and in turn the interpretation of social dynamics as a type of computation. This interpretation raises important foundational issues in social scienceβ€”some related to intractability, and some to undecidability proper. Finally, since β€_x009c_emergenceβ€_x009d_ figures prominently in this literature, I take up the connection between agent-based modeling and classical emergentism, criticizing the latter and arguing that the two are incompatible. ! 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
