Colloquium: COMPLEXITY IN THE NATURAL AND SOCIO-ECONOMIC SCIENCES
2012
Thursday 27 September 2012
from 15:15
to 16:15 at
Oskar Klein Auditorium
Speaker :
Luciano Pietronero (Institute of Complex Systems, CNR and Dept. of Physics, University Sapienza, Rome, Italy)
Abstract :
The role of complex heterogeneous structures can be surprising and fundamental in physical
sciences as well as in socio-economic disciplines. Here we discuss two examples:
1. Contrary to expectations galaxy structures never showed a clear evidence of homogeneity
which is a basic assumption of the standard cosmological model. This led to long standing debate
over the past 20 years (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fractal_cosmology) which is still open.
We review the facts and the possibility that the inclusion of this complexity in the cosmological
theories could drastically reduce the need of Dark Energy, leading to a novel scenario.
2. The standard theory (D. Ricardo) of fundamental economics assumes that specialization
is optimal for the industrial production of each country. Also in this case the availability of large
database disprove this assumption and show that diversification is instead more important.
Starting from this observation we construct a new metric for the Fitness of a Country which can
be compared to its monetary performance (GDP). From this comparison one can draw interesting
conclusions about its potential for growth and also identify risky situations.
