In Global Peace Through The Global University
System
2003 Ed. by T. Varis, T. Utsumi, and W. R. Klemm
University of Tampere, Hameenlinna, Finland
Globally
Collaborative Environmental Peace Gaming
(A Personal Recollection on Its
Inception and Development)
Takeshi Utsumi
GLObal Systems Analysis
and Simulation Association in the U.S.A.
(GLOSAS/USA)
Abstract
As a computer simulationist, I
conceived in 1972 an idea of establishing a Globally Collaborative
Environmental Peace Gaming (GCEPG) with a globally distributed computer
simulation system through a global grid computer network, with a focus on the
issue of environment and sustainable development in developing countries. This is a computerized gaming/simulation
to help decision makers construct a globally distributed decision-support
system for positive sum/win-win alternatives to conflict and war. It can also be used to train would-be
decision makers in crisis management, conflict resolution, and negotiation
techniques. This gaming approach is to devise a way for conflict resolution with rational analysis and critical thinking basing on "facts and figures."
Over the past three decades I played
a major pioneering role in extending U.S. data communication networks to other
countries, particularly to Japan, and deregulating Japanese telecommunication
policies for the use of Internet e-mail.
I also contributed by conducting innovative distance teaching trials
with "Global Lecture Hall (GLH)"tm videoconferences using
hybrid delivery technologies, which spanned from Korea, Japan, New Zealand,
Finland, Italy, France, Russia, Turkey, Brazil, etc.
Using this background, we are now
creating a Global University System (GUS) with colleagues in major regions of
the world, which will be interconnected with Global Broadband Internet
(GBI). The GCEPG is one of the
proposed ways to utilize the GUS and GBI in integrative fashion. A similar scheme with globally
distributed computer simulation system can be applied to various subjects as
creating a new paradigm of joint research and development on a global
scale. This will foster not only
wisdom by collaborative interaction on knowledge but also true friendship among
people around the world with mutual understanding and lasting peace.
This paper briefly describes the history of the GCEPG project since its inception in 1972 and its future direction. It is a companion to the opening chapter “Creating Global University System” of the book “Global Peace Through The Global University System.”
War
and Peace Gaming
As a General Chairman, I organized a large Summer Computer Simulation Conference (SCSC) with several hundred attendees in Boston, in 1971. A professor from the US Naval Post Graduate School in Monterey, California presented his work on war gaming. The professor's last words were: "War gaming cannot be perfect without having its models tied together with simulation models of civilian sectors" (Schram et al., 1971). I responded, "Well, we may be able to help them, at least in the simulation of the civilian component," (see Figure 1). This motivated me to create a Globally Collaborative Environmental Peace Gaming (GCEPG), particularly on the issue of environment and sustainable development in developing countries, and the Global University System that would supply the players of the game. The games were intended to train would-be decision makers in crisis management, conflict resolution, and negotiation techniques. This gaming approach aimed to devise rational methods for conflict resolution basing on “facts and figures.”
On the
other hand, if education is based on understanding, it will foster trust among
people. They may conduct a peace
game by charging players with the responsibility of reaching a peaceful
resolution of a conflict of ideas or objectives, i.e., a plus-sum game that
increases the total size of pie collaboratively with creative ideas of the
participants. Each participant can
have bigger size of the pie than the one from the limited size pie for zero-sum
game. The objective of peace game
is then to reach a peaceful resolution of a conflict in such a way that a
nuclear war would never happen reflecting a win-win situation.
The GCEPG with a globally distributed computer simulation system is a computerized gaming/simulation to help decision makers construct a globally distributed decision-support system for positive sum/win-win alternatives to conflict and war. The idea involves interconnecting experts in many countries via global Internet to collaborate in the discovering of new solutions for world crises, such as the deteriorating ecology of our globe, and to explore new alternatives for a world order capable of addressing the problems and opportunities of an interdependent globe. Gaming/simulation is the best tool we have for understanding the world's problems and the solutions we propose for them. The understanding gained with scientific and rational analysis and critical thinking would be the basis of world peace, and hence ought to provide the basic principle of global education for peace.
Then in
1981, I coined the phrase "Global Neural Computer Network" in which
each participating game player, with his/her own desktop computer, database and
sub-model, would correspond to a neuron, router to synapses, with the Internet
serving as nerves in a global brain.
Vice President Al Gore used this term in a speech (as the result of one
of his staffs at the White House received numerous e-mail messages from my list)
and continued with the following words:
"The
Department of Defense is investing well over $1 billion in the development and
implementation of networked distributed interactive simulation. This technology, which allows dispersed
learners to engage in collaborative problem solving activities in real time, is
now ready for transfer to schools and workplaces outside of the defense
sector."
[Speaking to
communications industry leaders, January 11, 1994, Washington, D.C.]
After the
first presentation of our peace gaming project at the first International
Conference on Computer Communication (ICCC) in Washington, D.C. in October
1972, I saw a demonstration of ARPANET (Advanced Research Project Agency
Network of the U.S. Department of Defense), the first packet-switching data
telecommunication network. I then
decided to work on its extension to overseas countries, particularly to Japan,
because such a network would be the most suitable for our global peace
gaming. In a sense, it was the very first step of "closing digital divide" movement in the present day's terminology.
I heard
that the ARPANET was extended to England and then thought, why not to
Japan? My visits with many US
governmental agencies failed, however.
Later, the reason became clear.
The connection of the ARPANET to England was actually through Norway via
satellite and from Norway to England via undersea cable. The reason for connection of the
ARPANET through Norway was to detect the seismic wave of underground testing
explosion of nuclear bombs in Soviet Union. Later I learned that because Japan is an island it could not
detect seismic waves from Soviet Union.
As soon
as the Telenet, a commercial version of ARPANET, was opened in the summer of
1976, I visited their office, offering my assistance to extend their data
telecommunication network to overseas countries, particularly to Japan. The nature of telecommunications
business made it natural to expand globally.
This extension effort (which is now called "closing digital divide") met with much opposition from the U.S. firms who previously encountered difficulties in extending their time-sharing computer services to Japan. My petition to the US Federal
Communications Commission (FCC) for extension of Telenet to Japan was to
demonstrate to Japanese how networking could increase intellectual capital,
decrease the cost of communications, and increase overall efficiency. It would also reveal to Japanese
society and businesses how ridiculous and unempowering Japanese
telecommunications policies were.
The FCC finally allowed the extension of Telenet to Japan, as a demonstration of the urgency with which the FCC's determination considered my petition and contention seriously. The
extended network of Telenet provided Japanese institutions with services of
many data bank companies, compared to the exclusive time-sharing services that
were previously available only from the host computers of opposing firms. Consequently, the extension of Telenet
to Japan was an instant success.
After
attending the 1972 SCSC in San Diego, California, I visited Professor Bob Noel
of the Political Science Department of the University of California in Santa
Barbara. I saw a conference room
with a wall-size world map, and an American flag standing by. It was like a situation room of a
governmental agency. The adjacent
room was a control room with a short-wave radio that could receive world news
instantaneously. The wall adjacent
to the conference room had a glass window from which they could videotape the
activities of the conference.
Professor
Noel was conducting a political gaming on international affairs using
ARPANET. He assigned several
different schools to act as the governments of the United States, Soviet Union,
Japan, China, etc. Students had to
study about the assigned countries before the start of the game.
I
inquired about the actor for Japan, and was told that it was the University of
Southern California. I remarked
that: "However hard Americans may study about Japan, they cannot think as
Japanese, since they eat steak with knife and fork while Japanese eat noodles
with chopsticks." So I
proposed that professor Noel invite the University of Tokyo to play the role of
the Japanese government. Thus was
born the original idea of Globally Collaborative Peace Gaming.
In the
spring of 1973, I conducted the world-first global "Peace Gaming"
with professor Noel with the use of e-mail over computer networks. I invited the University of Tokyo, and
he invited the University of Brussels, and the University of London in addition
to several universities in the U.S.
It was a "normative" gaming based on exchanging diplomatic
e-mail messages without the use of quantitative computer simulation
models. American universities sent their messages through ARPANET and overseas universities through GEISCO (a GE's time-sharing service firm).
Students
acted as the heads of states and cabinet members of assigned countries. All messages were accumulated and
re-distributed by a node at the University of California in Santa Barbara. The scenario designed by professor Noel
assumed an international crisis with a border incident between Iran and Iraq ñ
which actually happened about a half dozen years later. The Japanese team sent their messages
to the United Nations team, asking to make the Straits of Malaca an
international zone to secure oil flow from the Middle East to Japan. They also asked the U.S. and Soviet Union
teams to withdraw their naval fleets from the Pacific and Indian Oceans,
respectively.
Unfortunately,
this exciting global gaming had to be terminated upon instructions from KDD
(Kokusai Denshin Denwa, the Japanese overseas telecommunications
authority). This was due to the
Japanese telecommunications regulations, which strictly prohibited message
exchange through a computer without changing its contents. However, a node in Santa Barbara,
California, performed the message exchange, which was clearly outside of the
Japanese jurisdiction. I therefore
thought that this was patently unfair.
I then found fine prints in the KDD's user manual on the Telenet's extension line, prohibiting the use of e-mail. This would
negate my previous effort of extending Telenet to Japan, since e-mail would be
the most convenient means of communication among game players. So, I chose to work through the U.S.
government on the de-regulation of the Japanese telecommunications policy for
the use of e-mail. The late Commerce Secretary, Malcolm Baldridge, kindly took this issue as one of three items for discussion as Japan's "Non-tariff Barriers" when he visited Tokyo in October 1981 (Chunichi-Shimbun, Oct. 31 1981). This was the beginning of fierce US/Japan trade battles in
the following years.
My
efforts, however, encountered severe opposition from the Japanese Ministry of
Post and Telecommunications (MPT), and of course KDD, which was the semi-governmental
monopoly at that time. This was due to the difficulty of "mind-change" from circuit-switching technology for analog telephony to packet-switching technology for data communications. Another reason was that almost 60% of
KDD's revenue was from Telex. Lo
and behold, their financial status dropped into "red" a decade after
I succeeded with the de-regulation effort!
My effort also triggered the privatization of Japanese telecommunications industries and de-monopolization of the Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT), the world's largest corporation, and KDD.
I would now say that the greatest beneficiaries of my de-regulation
efforts were large Japanese trade firms.
This was because the firms till then had to have their own leased Telex
lines all over the world with millions and millions of dollars in payments to
KDD. About a decade ago, all of
them ceased the use of Telex in favor of e-mail, thus saving huge amounts of
money.
After
successful conduct of the global gaming with professor Noel, I tried to solicit
the participation of Japanese government officers for my second round. I visited an officer at the Japanese
Economic Planning Agency, who was sent from the Japanese Ministry of Finance
(MOF), the most powerful ministry, and who was a graduate from the Political
Science Department of the University of Tokyo. I explained to him that the gaming players would act as
echelons of governments, according to scenarios for the perspectives of policy
analysis, training on negotiation techniques, etc. He replied, saying: "Are you suggesting that we, as Japanese government officers, act as KABUKI Players?" I learned how difficult it was to trigger a "mind-change," but I believe that tenacious persistence and patience will prevail and are the key ingredients of success.
"And it ought to be remembered that there is nothing more
difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its
success, than to take the lead in the introduction of new order to things. Because the innovator has for enemies
all those who have done well under the old conditions, and lukewarm defenders
in those who may do well under the new.
This coolness arises partly from fear of the opponents, who have the
laws on their side, and partly from the incredulity of men, who do not readily
believe in new things until they have had a long experience of them. Thus, it happens that whenever those who are hostile have the opportunity to attack they do it like partisans, whilst the others defend lukewarmly..."
[Niccolo Machiavelli's word on Introducing Change in his "The Prince," 1513.]
See more in Chapter 1: "Personal Recollections on the Inceptions of Peace Gaming and Global University System" in a book draft "Electronic
Global University System and Services."
Idea of Distributed Computer Simulation System
The
well-publicized book, The Limit to the Growth (Meadows, 1972) (which was the
outgrowth of the book World Dynamics by
Prof. Jay W. Forrester of Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.)) indicated
interactions of population, industrialization, agriculture, resources, and
pollution on a global scale. Some
said that the publication of this book triggered the first oil shock in the
early 1970s and changed the world economy.
On
the other hand, the book received severe criticisms that appeared in many
journals and newspapers. The main
contention was on the credibility of the data they used, i.e., how a group of
only a few scientists could claim that they knew everything of the world. I thought at the time, why not take the
motto of the Greyhound Bus Company, "Leave the Driving to Us." Namely, each
participant at appropriate locations should construct
the sub-models of their individual sectors and
countries and then connect all of their sub-models via telecommunications as if
their total acts as a single model.
The experts of those sectors and countries could bring credible data and
model structure. Thus was
born the idea of a distributed computer simulation system through a data
telecommunication network similar to an analog computer configuration, as
corresponding to each of sub-models to components of the analog computer, which
are processed in parallel fashion.
System Dynamics Methodology
Incidentally,
after contributing to the early development of digital computers and inventing
magnetic-core memory, Prof. Jay W. Forrester pioneered "system
dynamics," a computer simulation methodology for understanding complexity
that extends far beyond servomechanisms and Cybernetics theory. He applied quantitative, system
analysis and computer simulation technology to complex socio-economic, bio- and
eco-systems to evaluate how alternative policies affect growth, stability,
fluctuation, and changing behavior.
The system dynamics' cause-and-effect analysis based on feedback theory, along with computer simulation modeling, is the best tool to understand the inter-relatedness and inter-dependency of various complex world phenomena.
Under
Forrester's leadership, pioneering schools are creating a new kind of
pre-college education, starting in kindergarten that is built on a system
dynamics foundation. Such
education becomes inter-disciplinary with the same computer simulation concepts
applied to the environment, biology, history, literature, and economics. We can expect future leaders with
expanded abilities for crisis management, policy-making, and negotiation skills
for corporate, national, and global issues. The resulting deeper understanding of social and economic
complexity, arising from this new kind of education, will enhance mutual
understanding among people of different countries and cultures, and facilitate
world peace and a sustainable development of humankind in the 21st century.
Later, I conducted a demonstration
of global-scale peace gaming at the conference on "Crisis Management and
Conflict Resolution" that was organized by the World Future Society (WFS)
in New York City, in July of 1986.
It was one of the largest and perhaps the most successful demonstration
of global gaming/simulation so far.
The event was a global gaming simulation session on a crisis scenario
involving the U.S.-Japan trade, and economic issues. Nearly 1,500 people took part in New York, Tokyo, Honolulu,
and at the World's Fair in Vancouver, B.C. An officer of the United Nations wrote a game scenario, and
Prof. Akira Onishi of Soka University in Tokyo supplied FUGI Global Modeling
System, which is the world largest econometric model (Onishi, 2003).
Noted
U.S. economists (Prof. Lester C. Thurow of M.I.T., Provost William Nordhaus of
Yale University, Mr. Keith Johnson of Townsend and Greenspan Company) were
panelists of this event during which they interconnected electronically with
Japanese counterparts for three days of computer-assisted negotiations. Several hypothetical policies were
examined. One issue raised by
President Emeritus of American Arbitration Association was the effect of
raising military expenditures in Japan to the American level while lowering
those of the U.S. to the present Japanese level. Simulation that ran overnight predicted that the balance of
trade would thus be even by the year 2000, with the necessity of cooperation,
rather than competition by both countries in the future. This clearly indicated the cost and
dilemma of the American nuclear umbrella protecting Japan's economic
prosperity, thus threatening American's economic prosperity (Nikkei, 1986).
This
event, combined with the use of inexpensive delivery systems, afforded an
opportunity to contemplate how academic departments might become linked across
national boundaries for the purpose of joint study, research and planetary
problem-solving without expending high cost for satellite video. After this successful sessions, several
former high ranking officers of the U.S. and Japanese governmental agencies
expressed strong interest in a similar multi-media teleconferencing on a more
regular basis to establish an early warning system for both countries'
ever-closely interwoven, interdependent economic and trade relationships. System analysis for systemic change at
the global level is a precondition for any significant resolution to today's
global-scale problems.
GLOSAS Activities
GLOSAS/USA
Envisioning a significant future on the use of information
and communication technologies (ICTs) in educational and healthcare fields, the
GLObal Systems Analysis and Simulation Association in the U.S.A. (GLOSAS/USA)
was established in October of 1988 in the State of New York. It is a publicly supported, non-profit,
educational service organization - in fact, a consortium of organizations ñ
that is dedicated to the use of evolving ICTs to further advance world peace
through global communications.
GLOSAS fosters science- and technology-based economic development to
improve the quality of life.
Political Contributions
As mentioned above, over the past three decades, GLOSAS/USA played a major pioneering role in extending U.S. data communication networks to other countries, particularly to Japan, and in the deregulation of the Japanese telecommunications policies regarding the use of e-mail through ARPANET, Telenet and this is now referred to as "closing the digital divide." This contribution
of GLOSAS/USA triggered the de-monopolization and privatization of Japanese
telecommunications industries, and the liberalization of the telecommunication
industry has now created a more enabling environment for economic and social
development in many other countries.
This type of reasoning has since been emulated by many other countries; at present, more than 180 countries have Internet access, and more than 700 million people are using e-mail around the world. Academic programs of universities in America and other
industrialized countries now reach many under-served developing countries. This may be an example of Gu-Kou-I-San (literally translating to "Even a stupid fellow can move a mountain," Figure 3 -- click here for larger display).
Global Lecture Hall (GLH)
Since the initial success of our global peace gaming on the US/Japan
trade issues in 1986 mentioned above, I realized the necessity of accompanying
graphics, diagrams, images and audio/video in addition to text-only e-mail
communications via data telecom networks, particularly for e-learning courses
of engineering and for continuing medical education (CME). However, around that time and up to the
early 1990s when advanced data compression technology enabled inexpensive
videoconferencing and World Wide Web via Internet, graphics could only be
transmitted with the combined use of fax via Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS)
and analog satellite, both of which were expensive, particularly, for overseas
connections.
GLOSAS then
made another major contribution towards fostering global dialogue and creating
learning environments with the innovative distance teaching trials that were
conducted every year in a series of our Global Lecture Hall (GLH) tm
multipoint-to-multipoint multimedia interactive videoconferencing, using
affordable hybrid delivery technologies, spanning many countries around the
world, from Korea and New Zealand to Finland, Ukraine, Russia, Turkey and
Brazil, etc.
Thanks to these efforts and also for initiating the
movement of global e-learning since early 1980s, I received the prestigious
Lord Perry Award for the Excellence in Distance Education in the fall of 1994
from Lord Perry, the founder of the U.K. Open University. The two-year senior recipient of the
same award was Sir Arthur C. Clark, the inventor of satellite.
See more in Chapter 2: "Global
Lecture Hall (GLH)" in a book draft "Electronic
Global University System and Services."
Three Components Necessary for Global Peace Gaming
The ultimate goal of GLOSAS/USA is to establish Globally
Collaborative Environmental Peace Gaming (GCEPG). To achieve this goal, we need the following three
components;
(1)
Data telecommunication
infrastructure:
As described above, GLOSAS helped to initiate the extension
of packet-switching data telecommunication networks from the US to various
overseas countries, particularly to Japan, albeit it was narrow-band, almost a
quarter century ago. As the second round, we are now forging ahead to construct Global Broadband Internet (GBI) (Figure 4 -- click here for larger diagram) along with the establishment of Global University System (GUS) around the world.
(2)
Communication media:
For collaboration among game players, it is necessary to
have convenient communication media on a global scale. As described above, in spite of fierce
opposition from the Japanese government and commercial carriers, we pressed for
the de-regulations of the Japanese telecommunications policies for the use of
e-mail, albeit it was only text-oriented message exchange at that time.
After many demonstrations and testing of various videoconferencing technologies during GLHs, we are now forging ahead to implement multimedia through GBI -- even in wireless mode.
The deployment of GBI for multimedia requires huge capital
investment. We have prepared the availability of such funding from the Official Development Assistance (ODA) Fund of the Japanese government – see the Chapter "Creating
Global University System" in Part II of this book "Global Peace Through The Global University
System."
(3)
Game players:
Packet-switching technology facilitates the sharing of
telecom media, bringing drastic cost reduction. We are extending this principle to sharing of information
and knowledge in e-learning and e-healthcare fields, by creating with the ODA
fund a Global University System (GUS), which is a network of higher educational
institutions in various regions of the world, e.g.;
- Amazon -- with the University of Amazona and 5 other federal universities in the Amazon region,
- Cuba and the Caribbean -- with the Havana Institute of Technology and the University of Havana,
- West Indies (Barbados, Trinidad, and Jamaica) -- with the University of West Indies,
- Malawi -- with the University of Malawai, UNDP, UNIDO, University of Milan,
- Uganda -- with the Islamic University of Uganda and the National Council for Science and Technology,
- Yugoslavia -- with the Mathematical Institute of Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts in Belgrade, Yugoslavia and the University of Macedonia and Thessaloniki Higher Technological Educational Institute in Greece, and others..
Currently institutions with faculty members who are
participating in GUS development projects include the University
of Tampere, UK Open University, 6 federal
universities of Amazonia, Havana Institute of Technology, University of Malawi in Africa, McGill University in
Canada, University of Tennessee in Knoxville,
Cornell University, Yale University, Harvard University,
Johns Hopkins University, University of Michigan,
Montana State University, Houston Community
College, University of Hawaii, Maui Community
College, University of Milan, Catalunyan Open
University, Concordia International University
in Estonia, NEXT (Generation) Project with European universities and global
commercial organizations at Cancer Research U.K., and others.
GUS member institutions will have globally distributed and
yet interconnected inexpensive mini-supercomputers through Global Broadband
Internet (GBI) to form massively parallel processing possible as if a single
supercomputer. This is, in a
sense, to construct an advanced global neural computer network of a global
brain for the proposed Globally Collaborative Environmental Peace Gaming
project (GCEPG) with globally distributed computer simulation mode.
This will also become a core of a global knowledge forum
for the exchange of ideas, information, knowledge and joint research and
development, such as 3D animation of human body, DNA, high polymer,
pharmacological molecule analysis, joint engineering design, etc.
Figure
5
We hope that GUS member
institutions (which are also members of GUS/UNESCO/UNITWIN Chair Program) will
provide experts who will construct their databases and simulation models of
their own fields and regions, and game players who will utilize the GCEPG for
their study and analysis of environmental policies.
Along with
the establishment of GUS with the GBI and E-Rate for K-12 schools, we will
forge ahead to disseminate Systems Dynamics
methodology in order to realize this GCEPG through a Global Neural Computer
Network ñ particularly, we would hope, with the participation of K-12
youngsters around the world. They could collaboratively exercise systems analysis, policy-making, crisis management and negotiation skills for global socio-economic, energy and environmental issues via global Internet (Figure 5 -- click here for larger diagram).
Globally Collaborative
Environmental Peace Gaming (GCEPG)
Need
The Bush
administration withdrew from the
Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change Treaty on global environmental protection,
lest the US should be impeded against favorable conditions to the economies of
Japan and European Union. The U.S.
administration then launched the Climate
Change Science Program (CCSP) Strategic Plan, since a broad US government plan for climate research is required under a 1990
law, the Global Change Research Act.
The CCSP with $1.7 billion/year budget of the US Commerce Department
announced the administration's plan in the fall of 2002 which called for a vast array of work through the rest of
the decade on goals like improving computer simulations for forecasting climate
change, integrating measurements of global change and clarifying regional
effects of warming, etc. (The
New York Times, 2003).
Trustworthy climate forecasts would be of great value for policymakers
at all levels to help decision makers and the public determine how serious the
problem is so that they can make clear choices about how to deal with it.
Thomas
Graedel, professor of industrial ecology at Yale University and chairman of the
panel of the National Research Council, the research arm of the National Academy of Sciences, which advises the
government on scientific and technical matters, said that research in the past
tried to gauge how the climate was changing and its effects on nature. He also said, "future science
must also focus on more applied research that can directly support
decision-making (emphasis is mine).
Research is especially needed to improve our understanding of the
possible impacts of climate change on ecosystems and human society as well as
options for responding to -- and reducing -- these effects." Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts
also said "Global climate change affects every aspect of our daily lives,
from land and water resources to agriculture and human health," (CNN.com, 2003).
In a sense, these voices call for stronger institutions of global
decision-making mechanism.
Hans
Blix, the chief weapons inspector of United Nations Monitoring, Verification and
Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) said:
"…on many [other] issues the United States must be multilateral: … To me the question of the environment is more ominous than that of peace and war. We
will have regional conflicts and use of force, but world conflicts I do not
believe will happen any longer.
But the environment, that is a creeping danger. I'm more worried about global warming
than I am of any major military conflict (Blix, 2003)"
[The New York Times, "QUOTE OF THE WEEK: Hans Blix's Greatest Fear," March 16, 2003]
There
is therefore a clear need to help limited understanding of the underlying
causes and impacts of climate change in order to set explicit prioritization
and a management plan. American
efforts to refine advanced computer models used to project the effects of
rising greenhouse-gas concentrations have so far fallen behind those overseas,
partly because of a lack of coordination.
Because of the global nature of this matter, a unified approach is
necessary with those other countries, and also because of the conflicting environmental
issues in global scale, Globally
Collaborative Environmental Peace Gaming (GCEPG) would be the best way to cope
with the enormous planetary problems jointly by the people around the world.
Previous Works
Global Peace Gaming for Oil Crisis
I once proposed a global peace gaming to cope with the oil crisis in early 1970s in response to Meadows' "Limit to the Growth" mentioned above. An outline of the hierarchical structure and distributed components of an integrated, interactive peace gaming/simulation system for energy, economics, and foreign trade in the USA and the Japanese sides was depicted in Figure 6 -- click here for larger diagram (Utsumi, 1974a).
Each block in the figure represented dissimilar computers in
those countries interconnected through data telecom network (e.g., Internet
nowadays).
These computers included simulation models designated in each
block. All models would be
executed in concertedly via satellite and terrestrial telecommunication links. For example, suppose pollution in Japan exceeded a certain allowable level, say, around 1977 on Figure 7 -- click here for larger diagram (Utsumi, 1974b), the Japanese expert watching it on the
display unit would stop the entire simulation. All participants, wherever they were located, would then try
to find, with the use of the conferencing system, e.g., Forum MATRIX (Klemm, 2003), a consensus on a new set of
pseudo-alternative policy parameters which would be executed until a new crisis
appears, say, around 1984 on the figure.
The process would be repeated for rational policy analysis, based on
facts and figures, and with international cooperation of experts in both
countries.
Figure 6: Structure of Integrated Models and Communication Network
Boxes are dispersed, dissimilar computers around the global Internet.
Figure 7: Growth of
Japanese Petrochemical Industry
Use of Global Gaming
The purpose of an interactive gaming mechanism is to help find appropriate alternative policies by establishing consensus among participating parties. It is suggested here that globally distributed computer simulation should be tested interactively with the game player inserting pseudo-policy parameters into the models whenever necessary, during the execution of simulation. This is called peace gaming/simulation (Utsumi, 1977) similar to war games practiced by military strategists (Schram et al., 1971). With the advent of global broadband Internet and standard interface protocols for interconnecting various dispersed, dissimilar host computers, the potential exists for ensuring the coordination of international efforts by providing more frequent communications and an environment for shared development, enabling more credible simulation study than was previously possible.
It is now possible to combine existing technologies to make sophisticated and more holistic explorations of various scenarios for solving global social problems. Many small computers in different countries can be interconnected, through globally distributed network and information processing, into modeling and simulation instruments for playing peace games on the scale of Pentagon war games (McLeod 1987).
About two decades ago, I proposed the development of global decision support system with globally distributed interactive gaming simulation for global socio-energy-economic system with the use of global data telecommunication network (e.g., Internet nowadays) and interactive gaming simulation. Interconnection of dissimilar computers and models for peace gaming on energy, resources and environmental (ERE) systems, architectures for linking heterogeneous computers were outlined. The reference also described communication procedures through multi-party gaming simulation (Utsumi and DeVita, 1982).
I then examined the application of the new development in the area of distributed systems and Computer Aided Communication (CAC) to the analysis of the global sociological and economical issues. Based on the review of the past attempts and experiences with model acceptance and validation, meaningful and credible simulation has to be implemented as a modeling network composed of a large number of locally developed and verified models. No single model, developed by a local group of experts has a chance for universal acceptance when it deals with controversial and confrontation-prone area such as global resource allocation and economical policies.
Yet, a comprehensive model of global resources, ecology, and economy is needed for the rational management of ecosystems and for economic cooperation between nations and economic blocks. As a solution to the dilemma between the need for a unified model and a diversity of views and the special interests of diverse groups, a public Open Modeling Network (OMN) was proposed which would consist of models developed by local experts interconnected by global Internet (Utsumi, et al., 1986).
The problem of managing the variety of heterogeneous models, each operating locally, yet affected from time to time by the results of similar runs at other locations, was compared to Scheduling Algorithm problem which is required by all asynchronous distributed systems consisting of the distributed communicating processors, in particular the application of Time Warp algorithm (Jefferson, 1984) and the Virtual Time concept that allows organization of the information exchange among dispersed, dissimilar computational resources with asynchronous and parallel executions.
The GLObal Systems Analysis and Simulation (GLOSAS) Project proposes to utilize the semantic benefits of gaming simulation on a global scale to aid decision makers in appreciating the impact of their decisions on interwoven global problems, i.e., the construction of Globally Distributed Decision Support System (GDDSS) with Distributed Computer Simulation Systems (DCSS), which deals with coordination of the distributed sub-models and their experts via the global Internet for global crisis and ecology management for plus sum, peace game.
After making those comprehensive project proposals (Utsumi and DeVita, 1982 and Utsumi, et al, 1986), I embarked on the systematic testing and successful demonstrations of various hybrid telecom infrastructures by way of the "Global Lecture Hall (GLH)." GLH consists of multipoint-to-multipoint, interactive multimedia videoconferencing almost every year spanning around the globe, as mentioned above. The following are descriptions of necessary components and recent developments, which may be integrated into further achievement of the GCEPG Project.
Computer Simulation Models
Socio-Economic Models
Since I created Summer Computer Simulation Conference (SCSC) in Denver, CO in 1970, myriad of simulation models in almost every facets of our globe appeared. However, the four categories depicted in Figure 5 above are to be the major ones to be dealt with by our GCEPG. There are also three major methodologies of socio-economic modelings; (1) econometric modeling (initiated by Professor Lawrence R. Klein of University of Pennsylvania and an economic Nobel Laureate), (2) input-output modeling (initiated by Professor Wassily Leontief of New York University, an economic Nobel Laureate and a panelist of our Nagoya/Japan GLH videoconferencing on environmental issues from New York), and (3) system dynamics modeling (initiated by Professor Jay W. Forrester of M.I.T.). Onishi compiled about 20 socio-economic models of various kinds in his new book "UNESCO EOLSS (Encyclopedia of Life Support System) Theme 1.47: Integrated Global Models for Sustainable Development," which is to be published in the summer of 2003 (Onishi, 2003).
Prof. Onishi has already indicated his strong willingness to cooperate with this GCEPG project as providing his Futures of Global Interdependence (FUGI) model. When we conducted a US/Japan foreign trade peace gaming in 1986, we used it as a single simulation model residing in a supercomputer in Tokyo and we asked him to execute his simulation model with the alternative policy parameters according to the progress of our gaming scenario, as mentioned above.
However, this time, his FUGI's sub-models will be split and be dispersed to the countries where the sub-models belong. We will arrange GUS', which are members of our GUS/UNESCO/UNITWIN NETWORKING Chair Program, to host the sub-models of their countries – along with construction and maintenance of its databases, revision and modification of their sub-models, and supply of game players in cooperation with their overseas counterparts through the global neural computer network.
Prof. Forrester has also indicated to me that his System Dynamics Group already constructed a US national model, which may be used in conjunction with FUGI model. The Millennium Institute in Arlington, VA also has national models of Bangladesh, China, Ghana, Guyana, Italy, Malawi, Somaliland, Tunisia, and the United States. As soon as we establish our GUS in these countries, we may ask their cooperation to tie together those national models. Dr. G. O. Barney, the founder of the institute, once presented their work from his office during our "Global Lecture Hall (GLH)" videoconference held in Florianopolis, Brazil in the summer of 1996.
As millenniums of human history tell, those people in Central America, Peru, Egypt, India, China, etc., who could predict future with the celestial movements, assisted the decision-makings of kings and rulers. Future leaders of global village need to have the capability of understanding the computer simulation of socio-economic-environmental system, since it will assist them (hopefully, even at local level) with rational analysis and critical thinking basing on "facts and figures."
Climate Simulation Model
Earth Simulator built by NEC at US$350 million can simulate environment of the entire earth with the use of real-life climate data from satellites and ocean buoys. Japanese scientists have already completed a forecast of global ocean temperatures for the next 50 years, and a full set of climate predictions was ready by the end of 2002. "Soon, instead of speculating about the possible environmental impact of, say, the Kyoto accord, policymakers will be able to plug its parameters into the virtual Earth, then skip ahead 1,000 years to get a handle on what effect those policies might have. That kind of concrete data could revolutionize environmental science. By digitally cloning the Earth, we might just be able to save it." (TIME.com, "Best Inventions, 2002")
This simulator resides in a single purpose supercomputer which is the most powerful one ever built. Previously, the fastest computer in the world was an American military machine that can perform 7.2 trillion calculations per second. The Earth Simulator runs at more than 35 trillion calculations per second, almost five times faster. In fact, it is as powerful as the next 12 fastest supercomputers in the world put together.
Albeit the world acclaim on its speed, this computer is based on vector processing, which is the old fashioned digital computation mechanism. Because of its price and size (four tennis courts), we cannot expect to mass-produce this simulator in the near future to install in every participating countries of our GCEPG project. Luckily, as taking the principle of "Leave the Driving to Us," the motto of the Greyhound Bus Company mentioned above, the distributed computer simulation with the network of the clusters of inexpensive personal computers is now on the horizon, as I have continued to advocate since the fall of 1972.
Beowulf Mini Supercomputer with Cluster Computing
In contrast to the single supercomputer as the Earth Simulator, the current and future trend of high performance computing is to build a cluster of personal computers with inexpensive off-the-shelf (or even second-hand, used) PCs. The parallel processing of this cluster system divides a complex problem into smaller component tasks, as similar to distributed computer simulation system mentioned above. This scheme of PC cluster is now called the Beowulf mini supercomputer.
Beowulf was the name of a lean, mean hero of medieval legend who defeated the giant monster Grendel by ripping off one of the creature's arms. This name has been widely adopted to refer to any low-cost cluster constructed from commercially available personal computers (Hargrove, et al, 2001).
Incidentally, David Miller, founder of Denelco in Denver, CO constructed the Heterogeneous Element Processor (HEP) with 50 Central Processing Units (CPUs) in a single box, which was the first commercially available parallel processing supercomputer in early 1970s. Prior to this, he consulted me of his venture. My response was why not distribute those CPUs around the world and connect them with global data telecom network, e.g., DARPANet (Department of Defense/Advanced Research Project Agency Network), which was the predecessor of Internet. My suggestion (which is a similar one to global grid computing network of nowadays – see below) (McLeod, 2000) was based on my experiences with analog and hybrid computers over a dozen years by then, i.e., as making analogy between computing elements of analog computer with CPUs of digital computer, and of wiring on the former to telecom network. I had a privilege of exclusively using then the world largest hybrid computer (made by Bechman Instrument Co.) for a half year, which was later used for the simulation of the first lunar landing by Eagle at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in late 1960s. Both the hybrid computer and HEP were designed by Maxwell Gilliland. Almost two decades ago, I had introduced HEP to NEC, but they seemed not having followed its model for the construction of Earth Simulator mentioned above.
This cluster concept promises to revolutionize the computing field by offering tremendous processing power to any research group, school or business. This is, in a sense, a poor-man's approach since the cluster can often be built with less than $50,000, which is about one tenth the price of a comparable commercial supercomputer. Compared with the exorbitant price of Earth Simulator at $350 million, those commodity clusters – networked arrays of standard computing subsystems – are perceived as the only economically viable pathway: they require little additional development in spite of the programming difficulties and communications delays inherent in using clustered systems.
The Beowulf concept (PC-Cluster) is an empowering force. It wrests high-level computing away from the privileged few and makes low-cost parallel-processing systems available to those with modest resources. Research groups, high schools, colleges or small businesses can build or buy their own Beowulf clusters, realizing the promise of a supercomputer in every basement (Hargrove, et al, 2001).
As interconnecting those Beowulf mini supercomputers around the world via Global Broadband Internet (GBI) (see Figure 8 below), researchers of GUS can conduct joint research across continents and oceans as tapping into a "computational grid" that will work like a power grid: users will be able to obtain processing power just as easily as they now get electricity. This is the next future of Internet development.
Grid Computing Network
Rapid improvements in communications technologies (e.g., broadband Internet) are leading many to consider more decentralized approaches to the problem of computing power. Internet computing seeks to create powerful distributed computing systems with global reach and supercomputer capabilities for communities to share resources as they tackle common goals. Science today is increasingly collaborative and multidisciplinary, and it is not unusual for teams to span institutions, states, countries and continents. E-mail and the web provide basic mechanisms that allow such groups to work together. But what if they could link their data, computers, sensors and other resources into a single virtual laboratory? So-called Grid technologies seek to make this possible, by providing the protocols, services and software development kits needed to enable flexible, controlled resource sharing on a large scale (Foster, I., 2000).
Grid technology takes Cluster Computing to the next level by providing a distributed architecture that delivers computational and data resources over the Web in much the same way that electricity is delivered over the power grid - making resources available to users when and where they are needed. The vision of scientific computing in the future relies on computational grids -- powerful processors, research instruments, and huge data archives linked by fast networks and advanced software. These grids will be as easy to use as the Web and as convenient as turning on your kitchen faucet to get water (Online, 2001).
Grid computing refers to computing in a distributed networked environment in which computing and data resources are located throughout the network. Grid infrastructure provides basic infrastructure for computations that integrate geographically disparate resources, create a universal source of computing power that supports dramatically new classes of applications. Globus, Infospheres and DARPA CoABS are efforts, which are now underway to build computational grids (Cybenko, G., et al, 1999).
Grid Computing is one of the fastest-growing trends in high-end scientific and engineering computing, which builds on the result of previous and ongoing research in networking, distributed computing, seamless computing, meta computing, web technologies, and other related topics. Like the Web, it has grown from an education and government R&D concept into a major component in any company's strategy (Sun.com, no date). The grid is an emerging infrastructure that will fundamentally change the way we think about and use computing. Grid computation is foreseen to be one of the most critical yet challenging technologies to meet the exponentially growing demands for high-performance computing in a large variety of scientific disciplines. Especially the universal connectivity provided through the Internet gives hope that the vision depicted by a Grid Computing can become reality in day-to-day production outside a closed research community.
Designed to support and address the needs of multiple sites and organizations, Global Grid Computing Network provides the power of distributed resources to users anywhere in the world for computing and collaboration. Individuals or organizations can use them, as sending overflow work to a grid provider. Or, multiple parties can work together as sharing data, crossing their boundaries with ease. Grid computing is computation, collaboration and communication over the advanced web. It's a model for problem solving, through resource pooling in virtual systems (Gentzsch, W., no date).
Trans-Continental Grid Computing Network
Case 1: TeraGrid. In the summer of 2002, the US National Science Foundation began installing the hardware for the TeraGrid, a transcontinental supercomputer network that should do for computing power what the Internet did for documents. First, clusters of high-end microcomputers were set up at four sites: the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; the U.S. Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory outside Chicago; Caltech in Pasadena, CA; and the San Diego Supercomputer Center at the University of California, San Diego. Then, by early 2003, those four clusters would be networked together so tightly that they would behave as a single entity.
This virtual computer will rip through problems at up to 13.6 trillion floating-point operations per second, or teraflops. Such speed will enable scientists to tackle some of the most computationally intensive tasks on the research docket -- from problems in protein folding that will form the basis for new drug designs to climate modeling to deducing the content and behavior of the cosmos from astronomical data.
But more than that, the TeraGrid will be a prime example of what has come to be known as "grid computing"--the massive integration of computer systems to offer performance unattainable by any single machine (Waldrop, 2002).
Case 2: Maui Community College in Hawaii. With a fund from the US National Science Foundation (NSF), Maui Community College in Hawaii is now forming a consortium with four community colleges in the US mainland, each of which has High Performance Computing (HPC) facility. They are to establish the Advanced Technology Education Centers of Excellence for High Performance Computing (HPC) of which Beowolf mini super computers will be connected together through broadband Internet to act as a single supercomputer. Each of their members was chosen because of the diversity of student populations, partnerships with regional business and industry, and potential four-year college affiliations.
Maui Community College as the National Center will develop skill set standards and competencies needed for certifying HPC technicians and for developing an articulated Associate Degree (two year, undergraduate) program in HPC technology. The Regional Education and Training Centers (RETCs) at each community college will develop curriculum in HPC Technology that will articulate with four-year college information science, computer science, and high performance computing technology programs and will include the establishment of 2 + 2 agreements with regional high schools Tech Prep Programs (Converse, R., no date)
The "2 + 2 agreements" are agreements between community colleges and high schools that allow students to take community college courses during the junior and senior year and get credit both at high school and at college.
For the realization of the proposed Globally Collaborative Environmental Peace Gaming (GCEPG) Project, we would like to have each of the member universities of our GUS/UNESCO/UNITWIN Networking Chair Program equipped with Beowulf mini-supercomputer, follow the model of Maui Community College, and then extend jointly with GUS' around the world the network of such mini-supercomputers (which are now starting to exist in the US as mentioned above) further to various overseas countries (e.g., Amazon region of Brazil, Cuba and the Caribbean, African countries, etc.) via global broadband Internet -- see also Figure 8 below.
Global Grid Computing Network for GCEPG Project
We face a basic dilemma on the conduct of GCEPG Project. John McLeod, the founder of the Society for Computer Simulation (which I named) once said that the successful simulation requires the simulation model to be very close to its "simuland" (a term coined by McLeod), which is the object for which the model is to simulate. Namely, decision-makers must be concerned with the issues and matters of their constituents within the boundaries of regions, countries, municipalities, and counties for which they are elected and have their jurisdictions. Even though distributed simulation models we advocate may represent their concerns, they will be confined within their boundaries and borders. On the other hand, climate simulation cannot, by nature, regard the boundaries and borders, i.e., they have to be continuous phenomena. For example, dust storm from Sahara often causes trouble to Amazon rain forest or coral in the Caribbean sea; the other dust storm from Gobi desert causes respiratory disease in Korea and Japan and even reaching Denver, CO or Australia; or forestry and fishery in Scandinavia are dying due to acid rain caused by industrial smoke from European countries, etc. Problems are now too intertwined to be well resolved in a system consisting of nation-states, in which citizens give their primary, and near exclusive, loyalty to their own nation-state, rather than to the largely global community.
The best remedy and hope to cope with this modeling difficulties stemming on the basic difference between discrete, boundary-oriented socio-economic-environmental simulation and continuous climate simulation would be to accomplish distributed computer simulation networks of both of them with dispersed mini supercomputers in parallel fashion and both networks to be interlinked at appropriate locations (red lines in Figure 8 -- click here for larger display). The network of dispersed mini supercomputers (each of them with socio-economic-environmental model of their localities) will work as a single simulation of global economy. In a similar fashion, another network of dispersed mini supercomputers (each of them with climate model of their region) will work as a single simulation of global climate. Both networks can be linked in such a way that global socio-economic-environmental simulation will work closely together with global climate simulation. The decision-making parameters can directly be fed into nearby mini supercomputers for its regional socio-economic-environmental simulation model, yet having effects on both global simulation networks. This will be a perfect democratic participatory of global simulation. This will then eliminate the need of such a giant Earth Simulator mentioned above.
Figure 8: Globally Collaborative Environmental Peace Gaming Networks
Globally Distributed Climate Simulation System
Globally Distributed Socio-Economic-Environmental Simulation System
This is a way that I also envisioned almost three decades ago (McLeod, 2000), i.e., a global neural computer network (which was mentioned above) with the use of globally distributed computer simulation system for globally distributed decision support system. Such a network of mini-supercomputers around the world can also be used by researchers, even in developing countries to perform with their counterparts in developed countries for joint collaborative researches on various subjects, e.g., micro-biology, meteorology, chemical molecular study, DNA analysis, medicine/bioscience, 3D human anatomy, agriculture, commerce and finance, nanotechnology, advanced engineering, astronomy, etc. (Sterling, 2001).
In a sense, our GUS/UNESCO/UNITWIN Networking Chair project aims to construct global scale knowledge forum with advanced Information and Communication Technology (ICT), i.e., with the use of massive parallel processors of globally distributed and yet interconnected mini-supercomputers through global neural computer network. This will be a paradigm shift of research and development in global scale, out of the so-called "Ivory Tower" approach.
Access Grid Project
During the execution of the proposed GCEPG, it would be essential to have close human contacts among model builders, game players, and technical support groups, not only by asynchronous computer conferencing but also by audio/video conferencing. This need is the same for any other joint global scale research and development projects mentioned above. Subsequently, as soon as we establish GUS around the world and connect them with Global Broadband Internet (GBI), we will associate with the Access Grid Project.
The Access Grid (AG) is the ensemble of resources that can be used to support human interaction across the grid. It consists of multimedia display, presentation and interactive environments, interfaces to grid middleware, and interfaces to visualization environments. The Access Grid will support large-scale distributed meetings, collaborative work sessions, seminars, lectures, tutorials and training. The Access Grid design point is group-to-group communication (thus differentiating it from desktop to desktop based tools that focus on individual communication).
During our "Global Lecture Hall (GLH)" videoconference at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville in July, 1994, a professor at the US Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, CA demonstrated multicasting videoconferencing via broadband Internet with a 3D ocean current model of El Nino in the South Pacific, which was broadcast throughout the world, including Japan, an international conference on e-learning in Moscow, etc. During our international workshop/conference on "Emerging Global Electronic Distance Learning (EGEDL/'99)" at the University of Tampere in Finland in August of 1999, we demonstrated NetMeeting point-to-point videoconferencing via broadband Internet with an inexpensive desktop camera. Both demonstrations produced superb audio/video quality, indicated the vital necessity of having broadband Internet.
The Access Grid environment must enable both formal and informal group interactions. Large-format displays integrated with intelligent or active meeting rooms are a central feature of the Access Grid nodes. Access Grid nodes are "designed spaces" that explicitly contain the high-end audio and visual technology needed to provide a high-quality compelling user experience.
The Access Grid complements the computational grid; indeed, the Access Grid node concept is specifically targeted at providing "group" access to the Grid. This access may be for remote visualization or interactive applications, or for utilizing the high-bandwidth environment for virtual meetings and events.
Access Grid Nodes provide a research environment for the development of distributed data and visualization corridors and for the study of issues relating to collaborative work in distributed environments.
Anticipated Difficulties
Unavoidable Latency and Time Warp Scheduling Algorithm
Oxygen is extremely vital to sustain most of the life forms on earth. Global warming due to greenhouse effect is caused by carbon dioxide gas emitted by human activities. Carbon dioxide is converted back to oxygen by plants. Amazon rain forest is said to cover, by acreage, 20 % of world total forest. If the Amazon forest will be denuded by thrash and burn cultivation technique, all human will be choked to death with the lack of sufficient oxygen. Namely, Amazon rain forest is the vital treasure for our human's survival in the future. This is one of our major reasons why we are forging ahead to create a GUS/Amazon/Brazil which will be centered at the University of Amazonia as mentioned above, so that they can host a Beowulf mini supercomputer with their region's socio-economic-environmental simulation model (Utsumi, T., et al, 2003).
Aforementioned Trans-Continental Grid Computing Networks (e.g, TeraGrid) connects supercomputers around the US through terrestrial, very expensive higher speed Internet (e.g., 165 Mbps at Maui Community College, etc.) for synchronous grid computing. This is a rich-man's approach, and we cannot expect to extend it to various developing countries (e.g., Amazon or African countries) in the foreseeable future, though many of scientific papers optimistically mention of the advent of the "global" grid computing network. We have to rely on digital satellite linkage for it, but such a linkage via a satellite transponder would cost almost $1 to 1.5 million per year for leasing. Also, though Pelton predicts the advent of giga bps digital satellite in the future (Pelton, 2003), all geo-synchronous satellite necessitates about 0.3 second for the round-trip of signal.
Subsequently, even considering unavoidable time difference around the globe and head-scratching time of game players, this will require us to utilize asynchronous global grid computing with Time Warp scheduling algorithm mentioned above, as compromising between slower Internet lines and their costs (Utsumi, et al, 1986). If this is the case not only for Amazon, but also for other GUS components especially in developing countries, the results of regional socio-economic-environmental simulation may be collected at specified time intervals by the Earth Simulator (mentioned above) till the time when the global distributed climate simulation network of Figure 8 would be established, and have it simulate global climate for the next time interval and then to distribute the computational results to every participating regional socio-economic-environmental simulation mini supercomputers for their subsequent policy analysis. This asynchronous scheme would also benefit researchers of other various subjects in developing countries.
Multilateral Funding
Almost two decades ago, the Japanese government embarked on the 5th Generation Computer Project to build an artificial intelligence computer with $500 million. My GCEPG Project was the second contender, but did not get funded. Nonetheless, I carried it on with the belief that "Even a stupid fellow can move a mountain," as mentioned above.
Late Dr. Hiroshi Inose, Director General of the National Center for Science Information System (NACSIS), Laureate of Culture Medal (highest in Japan) and a Laureate of Marconi Award (the highest in telecom field) then commented on our GUS and GCEPG projects as follows;
"I ask to those people who wish to build artificial intelligence machine; ‘Which of the machine or human brain is superior?' Everybody answers, ‘Of course, human brain is superior.' I then say to them ‘If so, rather than spending huge money to develop such machine, wouldn't it be wise and beneficial to world society to spend such money for education of excellent, capable youngsters in developing countries?'"
[Nikkei Shimbun (an equivalent to Wall Street Journal) (February 9, 1992)]
He agreed with me in 1998 that the global proliferation of Internet came to the stage of political matter more than technical development. This culminated with the Japanese government's pledges of $15 billion at the Okinawa Summit in July of 2000 and another $2 billion at the G8 Summit in Canada in 2002, for closing the so-called digital divide, especially in education and healthcare fields in developing countries.
The Japanese government is now switching its ODA policy from demand-oriented to supply-oriented, i.e., they are more concerned with what benefits can be brought to Japan with the ODA funds. This is the same trend with other major governmental funding sources, e.g., the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), European Commission, etc., and it is understandable due to its nature of expending their taxpayers' money. However, because of our planetary issues, we need to have a new international, multilateral funding mechanism, which can transcend all conventional national boundaries. This is the direction Hans Blix suggested as mentioned above.
Conclusions
Clearly, our GCEPG Project is ambitious due to its scope and nature. Any one group, university, or national government cannot achieve it. As mentioned above, every step we have taken since its inception three decades ago was in the right direction. For example, we initiated and/or helped on;
- creation of Summer Computer Simulation Conference (SCSC), most advanced and authoritative conference in computer simulation field, -- which I named,
- creation of "Advanced Computer Simulation Language (ACSL)," most widely used continuous system simulation language, -- which I named,
- “closing digital divide” as introducing Telenet (a predecessor of Internet) to Japan, etc.,
- deregulation of telecom policies on the use of e-mail,
- de-monopolization and privatization of telecom industries,
- end of life-time employment system in Japan, which was triggered with the proliferated use of e-mail,
- global neural (or grid) computer network,
- “Global Lecture Hall (GLH)” videoconferencing,
- use of voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP),
- use of wireless broadband Internet,
- global e-learning movement,
- Global University System project,
- pledges of Japanese government’s ODA fund which recently triggered the global movement on the closing of digital divide, etc.
We can expect further numerous spin-off benefits in various fields in global e-learning and e-healthcare. The program will however need substantial collaborative contribution of ideas, expertise, technology resources, and money from multiple sources. We invite those who value the vision of this Globally Collaborative Environmental Peace Gaming to join us in this urgently necessary project for human survival.
The proposed global peace gaming system can become an educational tool for the students of international affairs and political science. Moreover, such a system can also become the fundamental foundation for our Global University System with students and faculty members of various countries, which will promote mutual understanding among people of the world. Education of youngsters/adults on a global scale is the best future investment for world peace and progress. Senator Fulbright once said that learning together and working together are the first steps toward world peace.
Addendum to Figure 2
My schoolmate at Montana State University was Dr. Rafael Bozeman Rodriguez, Former President of Trinity College of Quezon City in the Philippines. He once told me a story of his uncle who was a chief of resistance during the Japanese occupation in the World War II (WW-II). One day he was caught and taken to the Japanese army camp. His family was deeply afraid and worried if he might be be-headed. In the middle of night, they heard loud voices at their house entrance. When they opened the door, they were totally astonished to find him with a captain of the Japanese military police. Both of them were completely drunk and singing joyously a school song of Yale University – they happened to be classmates.
The father of my wife, Hisae, was born in Montreal, Canada. When he went back to Tokyo, he studied at a French-speaking high school. At the time when the WW-II ended, he was the president of "Malay Shimbun," a Japanese newspaper in Singapore. To his surprise, he happened to meet his old high school classmate there, who was stationed as the Commanding General of the British Army. They renewed their friendship once again. Since then her father received special favor from the general until he returned to Tokyo.
These real stories of saving life even in wartime tell us how important it is to have trustful friendship among the people of the world with mutual understanding in early age of their education as much as possible.
The Chinese proverb says, "I hear and I forget, I see and I remember, I do and I understand!" Another Chinese proverb says, "Knowledge gained with interaction becomes wisdom." E-mail and multimedia World Wide Web of Internet so far contributed significantly to the world society on the dissemination of information. The next phase of the Internet development with global neural (or grid) computer network should be the globally collaborative experiential learning and constructive creation of wisdom with interactive actions on virtual reality simulation models of joint global research and development projects on various subjects mentioned above. This will promote trustful friendship among youngsters around the world to realize the Knowledge Society of the 21st century, and their collective creativity will enlarge the size of pie for stakeholders to reach peaceful win-win consequences. Another Chinese proverb says, "Acquiring knowledge is a joy, and sharing knowledge is an ultimate joy."
I sincerely hope to foster such friendship among the people of the world with our GUS and GCEPG projects for inevitable emergence of a global civilization.
References
Bush climate plan vexes science panel. CNN.com. February 26, 2003.
Retrieved April 29, 2003 from http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/science/02/26/bush.climate.reut/index.html
Converse, R. Summary of NSF High Performance Computing Technology Project.
Grant application submitted to Tinker Foundation, August 15, 2002;
Retrieved April 16, 2003 from
http://www.friends-partners.org/GLOSAS/Manaus Workshop/Tinker Foundation/Application Form/Tinker_Proposal_Web/Appendices/Appendix-VIII_Joint_Programs/APPENDIX VIII-8_Access-Grid/Access Grid Project.htm
Cybenko, G., Jiang, G. and Bilar, D. (1999). Machine Learning Applications in Grid Computing. Dartmouth College, September 22,
Retrieved April 16 from
http://agent.cs.dartmouth.edu/research/Allerton/sld001.htm
Erwin, D. (2000). Grid Computing, June,
Retrieved April 16, 2003 from
http://www.egrid.org/ec_initiatives/erwin.html
Forrester, J. W. (1996). System Dynamics and K-12 Teachers, May 30.
Retrieved April 16, 2003 from
http://sysdyn.clexchange.org/people/jay-forrester.html
Foster, I. (2000). Internet Computing and the Emerging Grid, Nature: web matters, 7 December. Retrieved April 16, 2003 from
http://www.nature.com/nature/webmatters/grid/grid.html
Gentzsch, W. (no date). Grid Technology: Interview, sun.com.
Retrieved April 16, 2003 from
http://wwws.sun.com/software/grid/interview.html
Grid Computing, (no date). Sun.com.
Retrieved April 16, 2003 from
http://www.sun.com/solutions/hpc/grid_computing.html
Hargrove, W. W., Hoffman, F. M., and Sterling, T. (2001). Supercomputer, Scientific American, August, pp. 72-79
Retrieved April 29, 2003 from
http://www.sciam.com/2001/0801issue/0801hargrove.html
Jefferson, D. and Motro, A. (1984). The Time Warp Mechanism for Database Concurrency Control. Technical Report TR-84-302, January, Los Angeles: University of Southern California.
Klemm, W. R. (2003), Building Global Community Over the Internet, Global Peace Through The Global University System. Tampere, Finland: University of Tampere Press, June, 2003
McLeod, J. (1987). TAK is TICKING, Simulation, December, pp 273-4
McLeod, J. (2000). Power (?) Grid! Simulation, September, pp 178-179.
Meadows, Donella H., et al (1972). The Limits to the Growth. New York: Universe Books
The New York Times (2003, Feb. 26) Experts Fault Bush's Proposal to Examine Climate Change.
Retrieved Apirl 16, 2003 from http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/26/science/26CLIM.html?pagewanted=print&position=bottom
Nikkei, Shimbun (1986, Aug. 8). In Japanese
Onishi, A. (2003). UNESCO EOLSS (Encyclopedia of Life Support System) Theme 1.47: Integrated Global Models for Sustainable Development. Oxford, U.K.: EOLSS Publisher.
Online (2001, May 16). Harnessing the Power of Grid Computing, V, 10.
Retrieved April 16, 2003 from
http://www.npaci.edu/online/v5.10/cactus.html.
Pelton, J. (2003). The Future of Broadband Satellite Communications, in Global Peace Through The Global University System. Tampere, Finland: University of Tampere Press.
Retrieved April 16, 2003 from
http://www.friends-partners.org/GLOSAS/Global_University/Global University System/UNESCO_Chair_Book/Manuscripts/Part_IV_Global_Collaboration/Pelton, Joe/Pelton_D4_web/Pelton_D4.htm
Schram S, Marks H, Behrens W, Levin G, and McLeod J, et al. (1971). Macro-system simulation, Panel Discussion Session at the 1971 Summer Computer Simulation Conference (SCSC), 1972 SCSC Proceedings, pp 1491-1502, Society for Computer Simulation
Sterling, T., (2001). How to Build a Hyper Computer, Scientific American, July, Pages 38-45
Utsumi, T. (1974a). Joint US/JAPAN project on global systems analysis and simulation (GLOSAS) of energy, resources and environment (ERE) systems. Proceedings of the Conference on Energy Modelling and Forecasting. Berkeley, California, 28-29 June 1974; pp 121-144
Utsumi, T. (1974b), Japan petrochemical industry model for the GLOSAS Project, Proceedings of 1974 SCSC, pp 318-325, Society for Computer Simulation
Utsumi, T. (1977). Peace game. Simulation. November. pp. 135
Utsumi, T. and DeVita, J. (1982). GLOSAS Project (GLObal Systems Analysis and Simulation). In S. Schoemaker (Editor), Computer Networks and Simulation II (pp. 279-326). Amsterdam: North-Holland Publishing Company.
Utsumi, T., Mikes, P. O., Rossman, P. (1986). Peace Games with Open Modeling Network. In S. Schoemaker (Editor), Computer Network and Simulation III, pp. 267-298, Amsterdam: Elsevier Science Publisher B.V., (North-Holland).
Retrieved April 29, 2003 from
http://www.friends-partners.org/GLOSAS/Bookwriting/PART_I/Chapter_V/Schoemaker-III/SCHOEMKR-III_total.htm
Utsumi, T., Varis, T., and Klemm, W. R., Editors (2003). Creating Global University System, Global Peace Through The Global University System. Tampere, Finland: University of Tampere Press, June.
Retrieved May 31, 2003 from
http://www.friends-partners.org/GLOSAS/Global_University/Global%20University%20System/UNESCO_Chair_Book/Manuscripts/Part_II_Intercultur/Utsumi%20Creating%20GUS/Creating_GUS/GUS_web_upload/Creating%20GUS-D11-053003.htm
Varis, T., Utsumi, T., and Klemm, W. R. (Editors) (2003). Global Peace Through The Global University System, Tampere, Finland: University of Tampere Press, June.
Waldrop, M. M. (2002). Grid Computing. Technology Review. MIT. May.
Retrieved April 16, 2003 from
http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/waldrop0502.asp
Author Biographical Sketch
|
Takeshi Utsumi, Ph.D., P.E.
Founder and Vice President for Technology & Coordination
Global University System (GUS)
Chairman, GLObal Systems Analysis and Simulation Association in the U.S.A.
(GLOSAS/USA)
43-23 Colden Street
Flushing, NY 11355-3998 U.S.A.
Tel: +1-718-939-0928
Fax: +1-718-939-0656
utsumi@columbia.edu
http://www.friends-partners.org/GLOSAS/
|
|
Takeshi Utsumi, Ph.D., P.E., is Chairman of GLObal Systems Analysis and Simulation Association in the USA (GLOSAS/USA) and Vice President for Technology and Coordination of the Global University System (GUS) <http://www.friends-partners.org/GLOSAS>. He is the 1994 Laureate of the Lord Perry Award for Excellence in Distance Education. His public services have included political work for deregulation of global telecommunications and the use of e-mail through ARPANET, Telenet and Internet; helping extend American university courses to developing countries; the conduct of innovative distance teaching trials with "Global Lecture Hall" multipoint-to-multipoint multimedia interactive videoconferences using hybrid technologies; as well as lectures, consultation, and research in process control, management science, systems science and engineering at the University of Michigan, the University of Pennsylvania, M.I.T. and many other universities, governmental agencies, and large firms in Japan and other countries. Among more than 150 related scientific papers and books are presentations to the Summer Computer Simulation Conferences (which he created and named) and the Society for Computer Simulation International. He is a member of various scientific and professional groups, including the Chemists Club (New York, NY); Columbia University Seminar on Computer, Man and Society (New York, NY); Fulbright Association (Washington, D.C.); International Center for Integrative Studies (ICIS) (New York, NY); and Society of Satellite Professionals International (Washington, D.C.). Dr. Utsumi received his Ph.D. Ch.E. from Polytechnic University in New York, M.S.Ch.E. from Montana State University, after study at the University of Nebraska on a Fulbright scholarship. His professional experiences in simulation and optimization of petrochemical and refinery processes were at Mitsubishi Research Institute, Tokyo; Stone & Webster Engineering Corp., Boston; Mobil Oil Corporation and Shell Chemical Company, New York; and Asahi Chemical Industries, Inc., Tokyo.
