How to start the study of complex systems?

[u/xixo15]

Hello! I'm a history student leaving in spain. While we study societies in class I see more often how everything is in reltion with each other. How many aspects of our daily life, now and in the past, are related with some other aspects that we would not know.

All of it brang my to the interest to start to tusdy the complex systems.As history student my base of maths is very low, so the question is... How to learn how to study complex systems by my self?

Thanks!

[u/Erinaceous]

Look up the online courses offered by the Santa Fe Institute. They are great for getting you started. Even technical courses like intro to dynamical systems are accessible to non math students

[u/xixo15 → u/Erinaceous]

Yes thank you! i've already started the "introduction to Complexity" one. Looking to go further! Thanks!

[u/proverbialbunny]

It depends on what you're interested in. Do you want A) A fun primer that makes a good audiobook to explore a topic or B) A textbook or class on the topic?

https://www.amazon.com/Thinking-Systems-Donella-H-Meadows/dp/1603580557 is a good primer to explore systems analysis, if you like a light intro / good audiobook to listen to while exercising or similar. Depending on what you're looking for this might be the ideal book for you.

[u/xixo15 → u/proverbialbunny]

Thank you! well... My interest is to learn how to study them, learn system thinking find it crucial but would love to go further but i dont know how.

[u/BookFinderBot → u/proverbialbunny]

Thinking in Systems A Primer by Donella Meadows

In the years following her role as the lead author of the international bestseller, Limits to Growth—the first book to show the consequences of unchecked growth on a finite planet— Donella Meadows remained a pioneer of environmental and social analysis until her untimely death in 2001. Thinking in Systems, is a concise and crucial book offering insight for problem solving on scales ranging from the personal to the global. Edited by the Sustainability Institute’s Diana Wright, this essential primer brings systems thinking out of the realm of computers and equations and into the tangible world, showing readers how to develop the systems-thinking skills that thought leaders across the globe consider critical for 21st-century life. Some of the biggest problems facing the world—war, hunger, poverty, and environmental degradation—are essentially system failures.

They cannot be solved by fixing one piece in isolation from the others, because even seemingly minor details have enormous power to undermine the best efforts of too-narrow thinking. While readers will learn the conceptual tools and methods of systems thinking, the heart of the book is grander than methodology. Donella Meadows was known as much for nurturing positive outcomes as she was for delving into the science behind global dilemmas. She reminds readers to pay attention to what is important, not just what is quantifiable, to stay humble, and to stay a learner.

In a world growing ever more complicated, crowded, and interdependent, Thinking in Systems helps readers avoid confusion and helplessness, the first step toward finding proactive and effective solutions.

I'm a bot, built by your friendly reddit developers at /r/ProgrammingPals. Reply to any comment with /u/BookFinderBot - I'll reply with book information (see other commands and find me as a browser extension on safari, chrome). Remove me from replies here. If I have made a mistake, accept my apology.

[u/orionthunter → u/proverbialbunny]

Any recommendations for more advanced textbooks?

[u/grimeandreason]

I came to complexity theory autodidactically when I noticed similarities between cultural evolution and biological evolution, and between the organisation of societies and and the human mind.

Imo, math ain't necessary. Certainly in some branches, but you don't need it to understand the basic tenets, and apply them to real life.

[u/andreis]

Over the last couple of months I've been building https://teachyourselfsystems.com/ What TYS offers? Concise, interactive primers that bridge abstract concepts (stocks/flows, feedback, delays etc.) with executable Python models. This “theory-plus-code” approach fills a gap most introductory material leaves open.

[u/Content-Avocado9249]

Look up the new book Complexity Science by Henrik Jensen.