Modelling chance and necessity in natural systems

• Published in: ICES Journal of Marine Science
• Main Authors: Planque, Benjamin, Mullon, Christian
• Other Authors: Tromsø department (IMR), Institute of Marine Research Bergen (IMR), University of Bergen (UiB)-University of Bergen (UiB), MARine Biodiversity Exploitation and Conservation (UMR MARBEC), Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)-Institut Français de Recherche pour l'Exploitation de la Mer (IFREMER)-Université de Montpellier (UM)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2020
• Subjects: constraints; recruitment; marine ecosystems; fisheries management; uncertainty; time; comanagement; chaos; chaos theory; community management; complexity; food-web dynamics; nonlinear systems; parametric management; participatory modelling; viability theory; [SDE.BE]Environmental Sciences/Biodiversity and Ecology; [SDE.MCG]Environmental Sciences/Global Changes; Barents Sea
• Online Access: https://hal.umontpellier.fr/hal-03411058; https://doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsz173

Place: Oxford Publisher: Oxford Univ Press WOS:000582718700026 International audience Nearly 30 years ago, emerged the concept of deterministic chaos. With it came sensitivity to initial conditions, nonlinearities, and strange attractors. This constituted a paradigm shift that profoundly altered how numerical modellers approached dynamic systems. It also provided an opportunity to resolve a situation of mutual misunderstanding between scientists and non-scientists about uncertainties and predictability in natural systems. Our proposition is that this issue can be addressed in an original way which involves modelling based on the principles of chance and necessity (CaN). We outline the conceptual and mathematical principles of CaN models and present an application of the model to the Barents Sea food-web. Because CaN models rely on concepts easily grasped by all actors, because they are explicit about knowns and unknowns and because the interpretation of their results is simple without being prescriptive, they can be used in a context of participatory management. We propose that, three decades after the emergence of chaos theories, CaN can be a practical step to reconcile scientists and non-scientists around the modelling of structurally and dynamically complex natural systems, and significantly contribute to ecosystem-based fisheries management.