SIMULATION AS DEFORMATION

Or, the role of agent based modeling in historical

archaeology

Shawn Graham, Carleton University

@electricarchaeo“2”cc: t1ck, Flickr

A dark art, indeed.

“HUG?” cc, ~bassoonbuddy247, DeviantArt

Ein Augur erklärt Numa Pompilius nach dem Orakel des Vogelfluges zum König, Radierung von Bernhard Rode 1768-69, Wikicommons

Saul and the Witch of Endor, William Mount, 1807-1868. Wikicommons.

Practical Necromancy: as easy as Lego.

‘Classic Romero Zombies’ Cc Pedro Vezini, Flickr

Dismissals•Not useful for literate societies

•Tautological

•Not a very good analogy, is it?

Screencapture, Monty Python & The Holy Grail

Digital Zombies Shed Light

http://wallpoper.com/wallpaper/pink-floyd-407858

Parsimony & the single modeler

I’m a one-man band. My models need to be simple

in their aims in their outputs

When Digital Romans Go Bad

http://www.digitalstudies.org/ojs/index.php/digital_studies/article/viewArticle/172

…bit of garbage in there. It’s actually ‘2’.

Romanization & Information Flow

Roman Hispania, Road Network - Wikicommons

Smaller, more constrained models have bigger impacts

…at least in the humanities…

From entanglements to

flows

Hodder, Ian. Entangled: An archaeology of the relationships between humans and things. Wiley-Blackwell 2012. Pg 181, Figure 9.2 Entanglements of clay at Catalhoyuk.

Evolving Amphorae

Small models, perfectly formed

ABM need to be small for historical

archaeology

Difficulty of teasing out the key

relationships in complex models

Human-thing relationships

infinitely extensible

resistanceOne issue, one model

Part of a modular approach

Thank you

Shawn Graham, Carleton University@electricarchaeo