Advanced Concepts and Generative Simulation Formalisms for Creative Discovery Systems Engineering

Abstract

While M&S has been widely used in engineering and computational sciences to facilitate empirical insight, optimization, prediction, and experimentation, the role of simulation in supporting early foresight phases of creative problem solving received less attention. We advocate models of creative cognition to rethink simulation modeling so that creativity is enhanced rather than stifled. Generative Parallax Simulation (GPS) is introduced as a strategy and a generic and abstract specification for its realization is presented. GPS is based on an evolving ecology of ensembles of models that aim to cope with ambiguity, which pervades in early phases of model-based science and engineering. Besides its contributions as a modeling and simulation methodology in support of creativity, GPS provides a fertile and useful domain as an application testbed for parallel simulation. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2011.