Model Thinking

Model Thinking

Course
en
English
Subtitles available
48 h
This content is rated 4.6377 out of 5
Source
  • From www.coursera.org
Conditions
  • Self-paced
  • Free Access
  • Fee-based Certificate
More info
  • 12 Sequences
  • Introductive Level
  • Subtitles in Arabic, Ukrainian, Chinese, Portuguese, Turkish

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Course details

Syllabus

  • Week 1 - Why Model & Segregation/Peer Effects
    In these lectures, I describe some of the reasons why a person would want to take a modeling course. These reasons fall into four broad categories: 1)To be an intelligent citizen of the world 2) To be a clearer thinker 3) To understand and use data 4) To bette...
  • Week 2 - Aggregation & Decision Models
    In this section, we explore the mysteries of aggregation, i.e. adding things up. We start by considering how numbers aggregate, focusing on the Central Limit Theorem. We then turn to adding up rules. We consider the Game of Life and one dimensional cellular au...
  • Week 3 - Thinking Electrons: Modeling People & Categorical and Linear Models
    In this section, we study various ways that social scientists model people. We study and contrast three different models. The rational actor approach,behavioral models , and rule based models . These lectures provide context for many of the models that follow....
  • Week 4 - Tipping Points & Economic Growth
    In this section, we cover tipping points. We focus on two models. A percolation model from physics that we apply to banks and a model of the spread of diseases. The disease model is more complicated so I break that into two parts. The first part focuses on the...
  • Week 5 - Diversity and Innovation & Markov Processes
    In this section, we cover some models of problem solving to show the role that diversity plays in innovation. We see how diverse perspectives (problem representations) and heuristics enable groups of problem solvers to outperform individuals. We also introduce...
  • Week 6 - Midterm Exam
     
  • Week 7 - Lyapunov Functions & Coordination and Culture
    Models can help us to determine the nature of outcomes produced by a system: will the system produce an equilibrium, a cycle, randomness, or complexity? In this set of lectures, we cover Lyapunov Functions. These are a technique that will enable us to identify...
  • Week 8 - Path Dependence & Networks
    In this set of lectures, we cover path dependence. We do so using some very simple urn models. The most famous of which is the Polya Process. These models are very simple but they enable us to unpack the logic of what makes a process path dependent. We also re...
  • Week 9 - Randomness and Random Walks & Colonel Blotto
    In this section, we first discuss randomness and its various sources. We then discuss how performance can depend on skill and luck, where luck is modeled as randomness. We then learn a basic random walk model, which we apply to the Efficient Market Hypothesis,...
  • Week 10 - Prisoners' Dilemma and Collective Action & Mechanism Design
    In this section, we cover the Prisoners' Dilemma, Collective Action Problems and Common Pool Resource Problems. We begin by discussion the Prisoners' Dilemma and showing how individual incentives can produce undesirable social outcomes. We then cover seven way...
  • Week 11 - Learning Models: Replicator Dynamics & Prediction and the Many Model Thinker
    In this section, we cover replicator dynamics and Fisher's fundamental theorem. Replicator dynamics have been used to explain learning as well as evolution. Fisher's theorem demonstrates how the rate of adaptation increases with the amount of variation. We con...
  • Week 12 - Final Exam
    The description goes here

Prerequisite

None.

Instructors

Scott E. Page
Professor of Complex Systems, Political Science, and Economics
Center for the Study of Complex Systems

Editor

The University of Michigan (UM, UMich or simply Michigan) is a public research university located in Ann Arbor, Michigan, in the United States. Founded in 1817, the university is Michigan's oldest and largest.

The mission of the University of Michigan is to serve the people of Michigan and the world by taking a leadership role in creating, communicating, preserving, and applying academic knowledge, art, and values, and by developing leaders and citizens who will challenge the present and enrich the future.

Platform

Coursera is a digital company offering massive open online course founded by computer teachers Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller Stanford University, located in Mountain View, California. 

Coursera works with top universities and organizations to make some of their courses available online, and offers courses in many subjects, including: physics, engineering, humanities, medicine, biology, social sciences, mathematics, business, computer science, digital marketing, data science, and other subjects.

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