This book presents the latest leading-edge international research on artificial life, cellular automata, chaos theory, cognition, complexity theory, synchronisation, fractals, genetic algorithms, information systems, metaphors, neural networks, non-linear dynamics, parallel computation and synergetics. The unifying feature of this research is the tie to chaos and complexity.

Chaos theory has firmly established itself in many of the physical sciences, such as geology and fluid dynamics. This edited volume helps locate this revolutionary theory in sociology as well as the other social sciences. Doors previously closed to social scientists may be opened by this dynamic theory, which attempts to capture movement and change in exciting new ways. Editors Raymond A. Eve, Sara Horsfall, and Mary Lee, with guidance from Editorial Advisor Frederick Turner, provide a timely and well-chosen collection of articles, which first examines the emerging myths and theories surrounding the study of chaos and complexity. In the volumeÆs second part, methodological matters are considered. Finally, conceptual models and applications are presented. "Postmodern science" has provided and refined conceptual tools that have special value for the social sciences. This perceptive and thorough volume will be useful to sociologists and other social scientists interested in chaos and complexity theory.

Chaos theory has firmly established itself in many of the physical sciences, such as geology and fluid dynamics. This edited volume helps locate this revolutionary theory in sociology as well as the other social sciences. Doors previously closed to social scientists may be opened by this dynamic theory, which attempts to capture movement and change in exciting new ways. Editors Raymond A. Eve, Sara Horsfall, and Mary Lee, with guidance from Editorial Advisor Frederick Turner, provide a timely and well-chosen collection of articles, which first examines the emerging myths and theories surrounding the study of chaos and complexity. In the volumeAEs second part, methodological matters are considered. Finally, conceptual models and applications are presented. "Postmodern science" has provided and refined conceptual tools that have special value for the social sciences. This perceptive and thorough volume will be useful to sociologists and other social scientists interested in chaos and complexity theory.

Chaos and catastrophe theories have become one of the major frontiers in the social sciences. Brown helps to clarify this complex new technique for modeling by approaching it with the following questions: What is Chaos? How can it be measured? How are the models estimated? What is catastrophe? How is it modeled? Beginning with an explanation of the differences between deterministic and probabilistic models, Brown introduces the reader to chaotic dynamics. Other topics covered are finding settings in which chaos can be measured, estimating chaos using nonlinear least squares, and specifying catastrophe models. Finally, the author estimates a nonlinear system of equations that models catastrophe using real survey data. Researchers wanting to understand and make use of this exciting new direction in social measurement and modeling will find this book an excellent and cogent introduction.

Honorable Mention, 1998, category of Computer Science, Professional/Scholarly Publishing Annual Awards Competition presented by the Association of American Publishers, Inc. In this book Gary William Flake develops in depth the simple idea that recurrent rules can produce rich and complicated behaviors. Distinguishing "agents" (e.g., molecules, cells, animals, and species) from their interactions (e.g., chemical reactions, immune system responses, sexual reproduction, and evolution), Flake argues that it is the computational properties of interactions that account for much of what we think of as "beautiful" and "interesting." From this basic thesis, Flake explores what he considers to be today's four most interesting computational topics: fractals, chaos, complex systems, and adaptation. Each of the book's parts can be read independently, enabling even the casual reader to understand and work with the basic equations and programs. Yet the parts are bound together by the theme of the computer as a laboratory and a metaphor for understanding the universe. The inspired reader will experiment further with the ideas presented to create fractal landscapes, chaotic systems, artificial life forms, genetic algorithms, and artificial neural networks.

This is the first monograph dealing with the applications of the Lie group analysis to the modeling equations governing internal wave propagation in the deep ocean. A new approach to describe the nonlinear interactions of internal waves in the ocean is presented. While the central idea of the book is to investigate oceanic internal waves through the prism of Lie group analysis, it is also shown for the first time that internal wave beams, representing exact solutions to the equation of motion of stratified fluid, can be found by solving the given model as invariant solutions of nonlinear equations of motion. On the illustrative basis, it is also shown that the presence of the invariant solutions makes it possible to construct a more general class of disturbances, which represent wave beams propagating in certain direction coinciding with the beam energy.This book is designed for specialists in Geophysical Fluid Dynamics, Ocean and Atmospheric Modeling, as well as for researchers, teachers and students - mathematicians and nonmathematicians - interested in methods of applied group analysis for investigating nonlinear problems in physical, engineering and natural sciences. It can also serve as a textbook on practical applications of symmetries of nonlinear differential equations for graduate students in applied mathematics, physics and engineering.

This text is one of the first to treat vector calculus using differential forms in place of vector fields and other outdated techniques. Geared towards students taking courses in multivariable calculus, this innovative book aims to make the subject more readily understandable. Differential forms unify and simplify the subject of multivariable calculus, and students who learn the subject as it is presented in this book should come away with a better conceptual understanding of it than those who learn using conventional methods.

http://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/0323

As the head of the theory group at Los Alamos, Hans A. Bethe played a central role in the dawn of the Nuclear Age. In the 50 years since, he has played an equally central role in the debate over the use and control of this new power. This volume collects together Bethe's best essays on the bomb, arms control, nuclear power and astrophysics. It also includes his reflections on science and morality and his comments on five fellow physicists. Of interest to physicists, particularly those working in nuclear physics and astrophysics, historians and philosophers of science, science policy makers, environmentalists, those concerned with disarmament and the role of science in society, and general science readers.