Lecture A3 (2021-01-19): Chapter 1, The Appeal and Power of Strategic Modeling (Morecroft, 2015)

In this lecture, we cover topics from Chapter 1 (The Appeal and Power of Strategic Modeling) by Morecroft (2015). This chapter helps to motivate the use of quantitative, simulation models for learning, as opposed to just prediction. It uses a board game (Monopoly) to motivate how overly simplistic models can nevertheless provide more generalizable insights, which is one of the reasons why computer simulation models can still be very useful even if they do not include every detail. We close with a simple fisheries example that helps to underscore the importance of choosing the correct functional response (type-I or type-II, for example) when modeling predator--prey dynamics.