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Hi, my name is Scotty Page. I'm a
professor of complex systems, political

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science and economics at the University of
Michigan in Ann Arbor. And I'd like to

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welcome you to this free online course
called Model Thinking. In this opening

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lecture, I just want to do four things.
The first thing I want to do is I want to

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sort of explain to you why you know, I
personally think it's, it's so important

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and fun to take a course in models.
Second, what I'd like to do is, I want to

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give you a sense of the outline of the
course. Like, what we're gonna cover, a

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little bit, and how it's gonna be
structured. Third thing is, I'll talk a

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little bit about an online course that
you, I've never taught an online course

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before, you probably haven't taken one.
So, let's talk a little bit how it's, just

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how it's structured, how it's set up, you
know, what, what's out there on the web,

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that sort of thing. And then the last
thing I'll do is I'll talk about, sort of,

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how I'm gonna structure particular units.
Each unit will focus on a single model or

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a class of models. I wanna give you some
sense of exactly how we're gonna unpack

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those things, analyze them and think about
them, alright? Okay, so let's get started.

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Why model?. First reason, I think,
is this. In order to be an intelligent

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citizen of the world, I think you have to
understand models. Why do I say that?

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Well, when you think about, like, a
liberal arts education, I think some of us

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classically think of, sort of, the great
books, like, this long shelf of books that

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everyone should know. And when the great
books curriculum was formed, right, and

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I'll talk about this some in the next
lecture, you know, most of human knowledge

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didn't have models in it. Models are a
relatively new phenomena. Right? So, if

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you take, you know, whether you go from
anthropology to zoology, anywhere in

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between. When you go to college, you'll
sorta find, like, oh my gosh, I'm learning

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models in this course. And we'll talk, in
a minute, about some of the reasons why

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we're using models, right? But models are
everywhere. And so in order to just be

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involved in a conversation, it's important
these days that you can use and understand

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models. Alright. Reason number two. The
reason models are everywhere, the reason

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they're everywhere from anthropology to
zoology is, they're better, right? They

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sort of make us clearer, better thinkers.
Anytime anybody's ever run a horse race

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between models making, you know, people
using models to make decisions, and people

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not using models to make decisions, the
people with models do better. So models

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just make you a better thinker. The reason
why is that they sort of weed out the

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logical inconsistencies. They're a crutch,
right, they just, you know, we sort of are

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crazy, you know, think silly things, can't
think through all the logical

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consequences. Models sort of tie us to the
mast a little bit. And in doing so, right,

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we think better. We get better at what we do.
All right. Reason number three to use and

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understand data. So. There's just so much
data out there, right? When I first became

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a social scientist, I mean, it was, it
would be a real effort for somebody to go

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grab a data set. Now there's just a ton of
it. I like to think of it as a fire hose

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of data, but my friends who are computer
scientists, they call it a hairball of

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data, right, cuz it's just sort of all
mangled and messed up. So, models, they'll

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just take that data, right, and sort of
structure it into information, and then

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turn that information into knowledge. And
so, without models, all we've just got is

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a whole bunch of numbers out there. With
models, we actually get information and

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knowledge and eventually maybe even some
wisdom. At least we can hope, right? Okay.

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Reason number four: last piece of main
category reason. And by the way, the next

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four lectures I'm gonna un-, I'm gonna
sort of work through and unpack each of

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these four reasons in more depth. But I
just sorta want to lay them out there,

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this first lecture. So, reason number
four: to decide, strategize, and design.

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So, when you've gotta make a decision,
whether it's, you know, whether you're the

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President of the United States or whether
you're running your local PTO

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organization, it's helpful to build or
structure that information in a way to

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make better decisions. So we'll learn
about things like decision trees and game

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theory models and stuff like that, to just
help us make better decisions and to

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strategize better. And also, at the very
end of the class, we'll talk about design

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issues, right? You can use models to
design things like institutions and

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policies and stuff like that. So, models
just make it better at making choices,

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better at taking actions. Okay, so those
are the big four. Now let's talk a little

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bit about, the outline of the course, what
it's like. So, this isn't gonna be a

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typical course, not just because it's
online, but because the structure of the

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course is very different. So most courses,
like if you take a math course, it sort of

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starts here and moves along, right, with
each thing building on the thing before

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it. Now the difficulty with a course like
that is if you ever, like fall off the

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train, right? Fall behind. That's it.
You're just lost. Because you know,

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everything, what I'm doing in lecture six
you need to know lecture five. And for

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lecture five you need to know lecture
four. Well this course is going to be very

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different. This course is going to be a
little bit more like, a trip to the zoo.

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[laugh] Right? So we're gonna learn about
giraffes, and then we're gonna learn about

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rhinos, and then we go over the lion cage.
So if you didn't quite understand the

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rhinos, it's not gonna hurt you too much
when we go over the lion cage, right? So

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it's more like just moving from one topic
to the next. They're somewhat related in

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that they're all sort of animals, but you
don't need to fully know the giraffe to

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move to the rhino, but obviously like
we're not gonna take like giraffes and

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rhinos, we're gonna study models and
[inaudible]. So what kind of models. We're

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gonna study models like collective action
models. These are models where individuals

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have to decide how much to contribute to
something that's for the public good.

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We'll study things like the wisdom of
crowds. Like, how is it that groups of

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people can be really smart? We'll study
models that have, like, fancy names like

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[inaudible] models and Markov models.
These are models of sort of processes,

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right? So they, they sound scary, but
they're actually always sort of fun and

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interesting. We'll study game theory
models. We'll study something called the

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Colonel Blotto game, which is a game where
you have to decide how many resources to

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allocate across different front. So this
can be thought of as a really interesting

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model of war. It can also be an
interesting model of, you know, firm

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competition or sports, or legal defenses,
all sorts of stuff. So. We're going to

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just you know, play with a whole bunch of
moth. Everything from economic growth to

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tipping points. You know, a whole bunch in
between. So it should be lots and lots of

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fun. Okay. What's the format for this?
How's this going to work? What does an

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online course even look like? Okay. Well.
Let's think about it. So first thing,

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there's these videos. You're watching one
right now. I'm going to try to keep them

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between eight and fifteen minutes in
length. Right? Sometimes I may sneak to

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sixteen but mostly I'll be creating
fifteen minutes in length. And inside the

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videos there'll be questions. So I may,
all of a sudden the video may stop and

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it'll say, what's the capital of Delaware?
Well actually it won't say that, but

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something germane, hopefully, you know, to
the, to the lecture. So, there'll be these

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fifteen eight to fifteen minute lectures.
Each module, each section will have, you

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know, somewhere between like three and six
of those. Right? Okay. In addition,

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there'll be readings. So on the wiki
you'll find links to the reading. Not a

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bunch of these readings will come out of
some books that I'm, I've written, and

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some, one that I'm about to write about
actually this course, and it'll all be

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free. So, you'll know that Princeton
University Press has been very generous in

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letting a lot of that content of my books
be out there. So we're going to you'll be

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free to download whatever you need to look
at. All right? There's some assignments.

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So there's an assignment on the web page.
You'll see a little assignment thing, so

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all sorts of assignments. So, just make
sure you're following. What's going on

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with the course, and then finally there
will be some quizzes, right so there are

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some quizzes out there just to make sure
you know hey am I really getting this.

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You'll, you'll watch me and you'll think,
yea Scott gets these models but that's not

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what this is about, right this is about
you understanding the models. So there'll

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be some quizzes, right but all in good
fun. Okay, and finally, there's the

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discussion form. I mean, there's 40 to
50,000 people in this class, right, so,

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office hours can get sort of crowded. So,
we're gonna have a discussion forum where

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people are gonna ask questions. I'll
answer some. I've got some graduate

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students who'll answer some. Other
students can answer things, but there'll

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be a place for people to sorta share
ideas, share thoughts, give feedback and

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should be, hopefully, you know, really
useful and structured in a way that will

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work for everybody. Okay so how does it
work, what's one of these sections gonna

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look like, well each section which of
course is gonna be 21. It's gonna be

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focused on, you know, particular model.
Right, and so, we talk about the model and

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say, okay, what is the model? What are the
assumptions? What are the parts? How does

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it work? You know, what are the main
results? What are the applications? So, we

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just sort of you know talk through how the
thing sort of plays out. Then it'll go

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into some technical details. Sometimes in
the same lecture, I present the model.

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Sometimes in later lectures. This will be,
you know, more technical stuff. A little

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bit more mathematics. Now, I'll try and be
very clear about whether or not the math

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is, you know, easy, medium, or hard. You
know, I'll let you know upfront. Like

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okay, this may require a lot of Algebra or
this is just, you know, sort of simple

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logical thinking. Right, so. I'll be
pretty clear about how much effort it's

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gonna take to get through, trudge through
some of the examples. And there will be

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practice problems you can work on as well.
And the other thing I'm gonna do in every

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one of these sections is talk about the
fertility of the models. Tonight's memory

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[inaudible] is this kernel blotter model
that was, could be used to model war or

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sports or legal defenses, right. Most of
these models were developed for one

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purpose but we can apply them to other
purposes. So we're going to talk a lot

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about how, okay, now that we just learned
this model, where can we apply it. Where

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does it, you know, where else does it
work? Right? Okay, so that's it. That's

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sort of how it's gonna work, right?
Learning models is really important. It

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makes you a more intelligent citizen,
probably just, you know, sort of, just a

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more engaged person out there in the
world. ?Cause so much of how people think

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and what people do is now based on models.
Makes you a clearer thinker. That's why so

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many people are using models. It helps you
use and understand data, and it's gonna

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help you make better decisions, strategize
better, and even, you know, design things

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better. So the course should be really,
really useful. We're gonna cover a lot of

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topics. The don't necessarily build on the
one before, right? There'll be some

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quizzes and videos and that sort of stuff.
And this should be just a great time.

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Alright. Welcome, and let's get started.
Thank you.