“‘The Iraqi system is more decentralized and emergent than we realized,’ says Steven Johnson, author of Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities, and Software. What if the U.S. had a very good Sims-like simulation of Iraqi society — one that started with the reactions of individuals and worked up? Not a sci-fi fantasy, the CIA has consulted with Sims creator Will Wright a number of times about Sims-style modeling of nations or governments. One existing advanced version of such a wargame is a sophisticated emergent model of a generic Middle Eastern country called MEPolity built by University of Pennsylvania professor Ian Lustick.”