Department of Anthropology Colloquium
4:10-5 p.m. Thursday, November 2
College Hall 220
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Fully Bayesian Reconstruction of Past Demography
Michael Price
ASU-SFI Center, Santa Fe Institute
I describe a novel, age-structured, Bayesian framework for reconstructing past demography.
The framework is quite flexible and can incorporate and synthesize a wide range of data. Conceptually, the framework is useful because it addresses in a statistically principled way two vexing sources of equifinality in archaeological data: (1) the radiocarbon calibration curve and (2) the fact that even if demographic rates such as age-specific mortality, fertility, and migration are stable an infinite set of demographic histories can yield the same predicted growth rate and stable age distribution. Fortunately, not all demographic histories are equally likely and some are even impossible. The method utilizes theoretical and empirical knowledge from evolutionary demography and life history theory to parameterize and specify prior probabilities for alternative demographic histories. Radiocarbon and/or age-at-death data from human burials update these prior probabilities to give posterior probabilities, yielding a (hopefully) sensible and accurate reconstruction of past demography.
Michael Price is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Santa Fe Institute. He received a PhD in Anthropology from Stanford University and a BS in Physics from Harvey Mudd College. Active research areas include improving age estimation techniques for skeletal data, reconstructing past demography, automating the geo-referencing of historic aerial images and recent UAV images, and understanding the evolution of economic preferences.
All are welcome to attend!
