This essay presented an introduction to me for ABMs. Through the regular snapshot of a red colobus monkey’s positioning on GPS, both accounting for time and space, we can make soem strong empirical studies into the nature of movement for the monkeys. Up onto this point, most theories on movement whether they be animals or people were taken up on inference through observation of behavioral patterns. Now there is a significant presence of empirical data to back up these notions. Would this mean that zoologists tracking animals would be needing to pick up on GI Science soon? Perhaps. I understood that both quantitative and qualitative interpretations can be well married through the article.
One aspect that I found interesting was how the trackers were still working in tandem with other Arcmap layers, notably with DEM and land use mapping. Through this we can understand the constraining rules that surround the monkeys’ behavior. Hence, it sounds that with the right algorithm and inputs, it sounds like it would be possible to create adequate simulation models.
This feels as if it may have some repercussions with the advent of “big data”, and some issues concerning privacy arose while I was reading this. While it felt fine using this data on animals, and the amount of data available to measure their behavior was extolled by Sengupta, I wonder how this data carries on over to humans. Ubiquitous phone use is a real aspect of many people’s lives, and we are continuously producing data on a regular basis by the mere fact of having a phone on us. One thing that I wonder is how one would be able to access this data and who? Going by the same principle as the red colobus monkeys study, movement is subject to change largely by the change of external factors. This, I fear would mean that our assumed behaviors in ABMs may be recognized by public or private actors. One can take a cynical take on the presence of this data. This could lead to the advent of an exploitative social architecture that determines our movements in space time based on exploitative desires. This data may be potentially harmful and we ought to take note on how this is being used in the future.
-RTY