Activities

Guest lecture by Sergio Lozano Pérez

On 4.12.2024 at 10:00 (CET) the MATH+ Activity Group “Mathematics in the Humanities and Social Sciences” will host a guest lecture by Sergio Lozano Pérez (Universitat de Barcelona) on “Reconstructing regional socio-spatial organization in ancient societies through empirically informed network modelling”.

→ Place: ZIB Seminar Room, Takustraße 7, 14195 Berlin

→ Abstract: Understanding how population, resources and power were spatially distributed in ancient societies is crucial for studying long-term socioeconomic and cultural processes. Unfortunately, the available archaeological record is often too fragmentary and incomplete to reconstruct social and political organization at a regional scale. This limitation can be addressed through a systemic perspective by combining large archaeological databases (carefully compiled from previous literature) with network modelling techniques. This talk will introduce two illustrative case studies from different historical contexts: the Iberian Mesolithic (10,200 to 7,600 years ago) and Central Italian Iron Age (2,950 to 2,500 years ago). In the former example, network reconstruction provided empirical evidence of the multi-scalar social structure of prehistoric hunter-gatherers. In the latter case study, the comparison between empirical and simulated road networks suggested different political arrangements in the neighbouring regions of Southern Etruria and Latium Vetus.

CHANGES+

MATH+ YOUNG RESEARCHER COLLOQUIUM

This colloquium is organised by young researchers from the Math+ emerging fields Particles and Agents (EF4) and Concepts of Change (EF5), as well as from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK). They aim to bring together young scientists from different disciplines and parts of Berlin who are interested in modeling social, historical, and political/societal change processes with a special focus on the driving agents (individuals, other entities, or groups thereof).

Recent talks:

Matteo Straccamore (CREF): Interplay between technologies and development of metropolitan areas

Gesine Steudle (ZIB): Agent-based modelling of the private mobility demand and its use as a decision support tool

Aida Sarai Figueroa Alvarez (FU): The agentization of the first Green Growth Mechanics’ building block: the endogenous technical progress block

→ Subscribe to the Newsletter to stay informed about all upcoming talks!

past activities:

Guest lecture by Federico Cornalba

On 22.05.2024 at 15:00 (CET) the MATH+ Activity Group “Mathematics in the Humanities and Social Sciences” hosted a guest lecture by Federico Cornalba (University of Bath) on “ An inertial PDE system for the Cucker-Smale model of flocking dynamics: derivation and analysis”.

Guest lecture by Camille Roth

On 22.02.2024 at 11:00 (CET) the MATH+ Activity Group “Mathematics in the Humanities and Social Sciences” hosted a guest lecture by Camille Roth (CNRS & EHESS (CAMS, Paris & Centre Marc Bloch, Berlin)) on “The Echo Chamber of Echo Chambers”.

Guest lecture by Alex Brandsen and Karsten Lambers:

On 6.07.2023 at 12:00 the MATH+ Activity Group “Mathematics in the Humanities and Social Sciences” and the German Archaeological Institute (DAI) hosted a guest lecture at ZIB by Alex Brandsen and Karsten Lambers (Leiden University) on “Creating AGNES: a multilingual search engine for texts about Dutch archaeology”.

Guest lecture by Michael Barton (ASU):

On 30.05.2023 the MATH+ Activity Group “Mathematics in the Humanities and Social Sciences” and the German Archaeological Institute (DAI) hosted a guest lecture at ZIB by Prof. Michael Barton on “Risk, Resilience, and Archaeology: Where the Invisible Past Meets the Invisible Future”. Michael Barton is a Professor in the School of Complex Adaptive Systems and in the School of Human Evolution & Social Change, and a Director of the Center for Social Dynamics & Complexity at Arizona State University (USA).

Thematic Einstein Semester (TES)

In the summer semester of 2022, the Thematic Einstein Semester (TES) “The Mathematics of Complex Social Systems: Past, Present, and Future” was organized at Zuse Institute Berlin. This interdisciplinary event aimed at unlocking the potential for mathematical modeling and reasoning within the extremely large and diversified fields of study that constitute modern social sciences and the humanities. The TES consisted of a series of events, including workshops, a summer school, a final conference, the Einstein lecture series, a seminar for undergraduate students and the TES Data Challenge, fostering innovative ideas and concepts for analyzing real-world social systems. Further information can be found here.

Spring School

The “Logic, Limits, Contingency: A Critical Digital Spring School” held from March 27-30, 2023, at Freie Universität Berlin, successfully brought together PhD researchers from Germany and the UK. The interdisciplinary event explored the intersections of digital research approaches in the arts, sciences, and humanities, fostering insightful discussions and collaborative activities. Main topics of the spring school were mathematical approaches to time and human societies, artistic approaches to archives, humanistic research, and concepts of history, and humanities approaches to data, aesthetics, and exhibition. Further information can be found here.