Schedule

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Assigned readings and media should be completed by the end of the week in which they appear in the schedule below.


Schedule Activity
Week Date Topic Reading Media Exercise Discussion
1 Aug 27 Introduction to Course
Climate Change
Emanuel (1-4) 35p
Complex Systems: Difficulty of Prediction
Stella Video 1: Introduction (8:21 mins)
Stella Video 2: Feedbacks (5:14 mins)
Stella Video 3: Model components (6:49 mins)
Stella Video 4: Causal loop diagrams (6:43 mins)
Stella Video 5: System behavior (8:12 mins)
Discussion Questions for Week 1
2 Sep 3 Climate change (continued)
Intro to modeling
Emanuel (5-8) 30p
Ford (1) 14p
Stella Video 6: First population model (12:18 mins)
Stella Video 7: Second population model (8:25 mins)
Stella Video 8: Sensitivity analysis (10:09 mins)
Stella Video 9: Optimization (5:18 mins)
Stella Video 10: Calibration (10:02 mins)
Discussion Questions for Week 2
3 Sep 10 Framework for societal collapse Intro to System Dynamics modeling
Diamond (Prologue) 25p

Ford (2, 3) 14p, 8p
Inconvenient Truth (97 mins) Stella Exercise: Population Growth
Solution
Discussion Questions for Week 3
4 Sep 17 Case study: Easter Island
SD Basics
Diamond (2) Easter Island 42p
Ford (4,6) 8p,12p
Discussion Questions for Week 4
5 Sep 24 Case study: The Anasazi
SD Basics
Diamond (4) Anasazi 21p
Ford (7, 9) 10p,18p
A Crude Awakening: The Oil Crash (83 mins) Stella Exercise: Logistic Growth Discussion Questions for Week 5
6 Oct 1 Case study: Maya
SD Intermediate modeling
Diamond (5) Maya (25p)
Ford (20,21) 12p, 22p
Stella Exercise: Predator Prey model
Discussion Questions for Week 6
7 Oct 8 Case study: Vikings part 1
Homeostasis
Diamond (6) Viking Prelude 33p
Ford (10,11,23)
Seaspiriacy (89 mins) Discussion Questions for Week 7
8 Oct 15 Case study: Vikings part 2
Introduction to Systems Thinking
Diamond (7) Greenland's Flowering 37p
Meadows (Introduction, 1) 10p, 24p
Stella Exercise: Simple Collapse Model
Discussion Questions for Week 8
9 Oct 22 Case study: Vikings part 3
Systems examples
Diamond (8) Greenland's End 29p
Meadows (2) 40p
Don't look up (138 mins) Stella Exercise: Modifying the collapse model
Discussion Questions for Week 9
10 Oct 29 Governance
Why systems work
Diamond (9) Opposite Paths 32p
Meadows (3) 12p
Reading: Smithsonian
Reading: Science
Stella Exercise: Climate Model
Data file for model
Discussion Questions for Week 10
11 Nov 5 Case study: Rwanda
Systems and surprises
Diamond (10) Rwanda 18p
Meadows (4) 24p
Planet of the Humans (100 mins) Final Project: Easter Island model
Reading: Easter Island: Bologna & Flores
Reading: Easter Island: Brander & Taylor
Discussion Questions for Week 11
12 Nov 12 Case study: Hispanola
System traps
Diamond (11) One Island, Two Peoples 29p
Meadows (5) 33p
Stella project time Discussion Questions for Week 12
13 Nov 19 Human behavior
Leverage Points
Diamond (14) Decisions 22p
Meadows (6) 21p
Podcast: Putting people into climate models: A new frontier (41 mins) Stella project time Discussion Questions for Week 13
Nov 26 Thanksgiving Break
14 Dec 3 Environmental challenges A World of Systems Diamond (16) The World 40p
Meadows (7) 21p
Reading: Limits to growth Stella project time Discussion Questions for Week 14

Final exam will be online with the date and time TBD. A final project and video presentations will be due at the same date and time of the final exam.