Brian Lawler
From Santa Fe Institute Events Wiki
Contact Information
- blawler(at)mitre.org
- blawler(at)jhu.edu
- brian(at)brianlawler.org
Links to SFI/CSSS '07 Program Info.
- CSSS 2007 Santa Fe-Schedule
- CSSS 2007 Santa Fe-Readings
- CSSS 2007 Santa Fe-Tutorials
- CSSS 2007 Santa Fe-Projects & Working Groups
Education
- Masters, Engineering, Johns Hopkins University
- Bachelors, Political Science, University of Colorado
Experience
- Principal Engineer, Center for Enterprise Modernization, MITRE
- Most of my work is devoted to enterprise modernization efforts in the Internal Revenue Service (IRS)
- Senior Analyst, Fidelity Investments
- This was in the privately funded venture capital business
- Officer, United States Marine Corps
- Primarily operating in the 1st Marine Division
SFI/CSSS Interests
- The courses on non-linear dynamics, modeling (including agent-based), computational complexity, finance, economics, pattern recognition, and markets
- Really interested in SFI's work on complexity economics.
Goals for SFI/CSSS Program
- Hear about lots of interesting ideas and meet lots of interesting people
- Acquire some new ways of thinking about problems (esp. related to my work)
- Correct my appalling ignorance of complexity theory, complexity science, complexity economics, etc.
Candidate Project/Paper Ideas
- I work with very large, very complex, systems that include technical and non-technical participants. They span organizations, borders and time. Established engineering and management practices don't actually seem to guide them all that well and it is in our social interest that they function properly. I'm interested to learn, think and write about ideas that help us thrive amidst this chaos.
Potentially Useful Skills
- Very strong, expert-level, at UML and using the dominant UML tools (e.g. Rational Rose(tm)) for modeling technical and non-technical systems.
- Basic skills at using Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) including using ExpertChoice.
- Current reading material includes Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach but mostly for the chapters on constraints.
- Fairly good technical and business audience writer.
- Decent programmer in C++, Java, XML, etc. and using a variety of info-worker tools (Project, Excel, MindMap, etc.)
Documents (Summer 2007)
- Overview of UML Notation BL_UML_2b_NotationSuggestions_v2007-06a.ppt
- Overview of UML diagrams - Supermarket Example BL_UML_2c_PointOfSaleExample_v2007-06a.ppt
- UML to Code BL_UML_7a_UML-to-Code_v2007-06a.ppt
- UML Notations for Large/Complex Systems BL_UML_5a_MechanismsForScale_v2007-06a.ppt
- Presentation on object conversions in complex type hierarchies - SFI_CSSS_2007_Lawler_Conversions_v7.6.29a_.ppt
Documents (post 2007)
- Book review of "Computational Complexity: A Conceptual Perspective" by Oded Goldreich. To be published by Assoc. of Computing Machinery in Jan. 2010 - BL_ACM_2010-01_complexity.pdf
Hobbies
- Video games. Most genres. Pretty much anything that comes with a toolkit so I can create my own stuff - e.g. Unreal engine.
- Puzzles. Mostly things that are metaphors for my work. I spend more time than I ought to on Sudoku and Bejeweled.
My websites
- My personal website is at www.brianlawler.org
- My blog at blogs.jhu.edu/blawler
- My personal info page at MITRE www.mitre.org/staffpages/blawler/
- My profile on LinkedIn www.linkedin.com/in/brianlawler
- My homepage on Facebook www.facebook.com/blawler