Towards a living earth simulator

Abstract

Abstract. The Living Earth Simulator (LES) is one of the core components of the FuturICT architecture. It will work as a federation of methods, tools, techniques and facilities supporting all of the FuturICT simulation-related activities to allow and encourage interactive exploration and understanding of societal issues. Society-relevant problems will be targeted by leaning on approaches based on complex systems theories and data science in tight interaction with the other components of FuturICT. The LES will evaluate and provide answers to realworld questions by taking into account multiple scenarios. It will build on present approaches such as agent-based simulation and modeling, multiscale modelling, statistical inference, and data mining, moving beyond disciplinary borders to achieve a new perspective on complex social systems.

A philosophical case for process-based modelling of land use change

“…Parunak et al 1998;Cecconi et al 2010) or with respect to problems such as model application over large systems or geographical extents (e.g. Cioffi-Revilla 2002; Paolucci et al 2012;Binder et al 2013;Rounsevell et al 2013). …”

Three necessary conditions for establishing effective Sustainable Development Goals in the Anthropocene

“…Climate adaptation frameworks are now beginning to look at tools from the private sector, such as supply chain risk assessments, to incorporate indirect impacts and climate risks that originate outside national borders and that are transmitted by biophysical, trade, financial, and human migration pathways (Benzie et al 2013). Finally, the agendas of new international and interdisciplinary science initiatives such as FuturICT and Future Earth are explicitly focusing on refining existing, and developing http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol19/iss3/art8/ new, tools to further our knowledge about global interactions and interdependencies between social, technological, and environmental systems; importantly, these communities are ready to participate in the codesign of the SDGs and related measures (Reid et al 2010, Brito 2012, Paolucci et al 2012). …”

Complexity aided design

“…The Technology Exploratory will respond in concert with the other FuturICT components to the key grand challenges with respect to sensing, measuring, and mining physical and social data, within the wider FuturICT platform context to ensure that our understanding of these challenges and advances is coordinated and integrated [10,11,12]. This is a prerequisite that reflects the way ICT can be used to inform and solve socio-economic problems, formulate and explore future policies, to implement the output of the investigation to our social condition.…”

“…This multi-disciplinarity further complicates the research. However, the benefits that can result from the insights are enormous, and can drastically improve the life of future generations through components of the FuturICT project as for example the Planetary Nervous System [11], the Living Earth Simulator [10], the Global Participatory Platform [12], smart applications for cities [43], energy [40], education [24] and innovation services [22]. …”