PLEASE NOTE (11 January 2002): This course homepage for Econ 308x (agent-based computational economics) has been moved to http://www.econ.iastate.edu/classes/econ308x/tesfatsion/. All future updates to this homepage will only be made at this new site.

Homepage for Econ 308X
Agent-Based Computational Economics

Last Updated: 11 January 2002

Course Offering: Spring 2002
Meeting Time and Place: TR 12:40-2, Heady 160
Instructor:
Leigh Tesfatsion
Department of Economics
Iowa State University
Ames, Iowa 50011-1070
http://www.econ.iastate.edu/tesfatsi/
tesfatsi@iastate.edu

Office Hours:
Heady 375, TR 2:10-3:40 and by appointment
ACE Logo

(Graphic by T. Eymann)

On-Line Course Syllabus:
http://www.econ.iastate.edu/classes/econ308x/tesfatsion/syl308x.htm

Course Objectives:

A modern market-based economy is an example of a complex adaptive system, consisting of a decentralized collection of autonomous adaptive agents interacting over time in various market contexts. These massively parallel local interactions give rise to global regularities such as trade networks, socially accepted monies, market protocols, business cycles and the common adoption of technological innovations. The recent advent of powerful computational tools, particularly object-oriented programming, is giving economists an increased opportunity to study market-based economies in their true complex form.
The primary objective of this course is to introduce, motivate, and explore through concrete applications the potential usefulness of agent-based computational economics (ACE), a new methodology for the study of economies as complex adaptive systems. ACE is the computational study of economies modelled as evolving systems of autonomous interacting agents. Course topics include: learning and the embodied mind; evolution of market protocols and social norms; modeling specific market processes (financial, agricultural and natural resource, labor, electricity, Internet auctions,...); economic network formation; using ACE laboratories to design and test market protocols; and using ACE laboratories to design and test artificial agents (shopbots, webbots, chatterbots,...) for e-commerce.

Course Credits:

Three credits. Graduate students can take this course for non-major credit.

Course Prerequisites:

Principles-level microeconomics and a willingness to learn and apply simple programming techniques. Previous study of a general programming language is desirable but not required. For more detailed information about Econ 308X, please see the Econ 308x course syllabus or contact the instructor Leigh Tesfatsion.

Required Textbooks:

Course Activities:

Grading:

Student grades will be based on class and take-home exercises related to assigned readings (1/3), plus a written and oral project presentation (2/3) on some student-selected topic related to ACE. Regarding class exercises, students will be assigned to small "discussion groups" and each group will be asked to prepare a written class hand-out on some assigned reading and moderate an in-class discussion of this reading during part of a regular class meeting. Several take-home exercises of a more traditional sort might also be assigned.
Students will be encouraged (but not required) to work in teams for their course projects. Project teams can include up to a maximum of four students and can be self-selected. Project presentations will be scheduled for the last half of the course; written project reports in final form must be received by me on or before the last day of classes in order to ensure that course grades can be determined in a timely fashion. Project topic areas and scope will be tailored to student backgrounds and interests. Examples of suitable projects would include: a review and critique of existing ACE-related work focusing on a particular issue of interest; the design and running of experiments to study an issue of interest using existing ACE software; and the design and running of experiments to study an issue of interest using an originally constructed ACE framework.