Chen, Ping

views updated

CHEN, Ping

PERSONAL: Male. Education: University of Science and Technology, Beijing, China, B.S., 1968; University of Texas, Austin, Ph.D., 1987.

ADDRESSES: Offıce—University of Texas, C1609, Austin, TX 78712-1081; Peking University, Beijing 100871, China. E-mail—[email protected]; [email protected].

CAREER: Educator, scientist, and economist. Ilya Prigogine Center for Studies in Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics, University of Texas, Austin, research assistant, 1983-87, postdoctoral fellow, 1987-89, research associate and research scientist, 1989—; Peking University, Peking, China, professor at China Center for Economic Research, 1999—, codirector of Virtual Center for Complexity Science, 2001—.

MEMBER: American Economic Association, Chinese Economists Society in North America (founding senior fellow), American Physical Society, Chinese Young Economists Society (member, board of directors, 1986-87; president, 1987-88).

WRITINGS:

(Editor and contributor, with Richard Hollis Day) Nonlinear Dynamics and Evolutionary Economics, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1993.

Author and editor of volumes published in the Chinese language. Contributor to books, including Self-Organization, Emerging Properties, and Learning, edited by A. Babloyantz, Penguin, 1992; Nonlinear Dynamics and Economics, edited by W. A. Barnett and others, Cambridge University Press, 1996; and Joint Time-Frequency Analysis, by Shie Qian and Dapang Chen, Prentice Hall, 1996. Contributor to journals, including Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, International Journal of Theoretical Physics, and China Economic Review. Member of editorial board, China Economic Review. SIDELIGHTS: Ping Chen, an economist and physicist working in both the United States and China, has written and edited a number of volumes in Chinese and is a frequent contributor to English-language journals. The subjects of Chen's interest and research have included the empirical and theoretical evidence of monetary chaos from monetary indexes, time-frequency analysis in nonstationary time series analysis of business cycles, color chaos in the S&P 500 index and other macro indexes, fundamental limitations in equilibrium models of business cycles, the Adam Smith dilemma defined by George Stigler in 1951, a behavior model of corporate strategy in market-share competition, evolutionary economics, and understanding excess capacity and product cycles based on technology competition.

Chen and coeditor Richard Hollis Day published a collection of papers presented at a conference conducted at the University of Texas, Austin, in April 1989. Nonlinear Dynamics and Evolutionary Economics is divided into six sections, followed by the edited transcript of a roundtable discussion. Contributors include not only economists, but also physicists, ecologists, and anthropologists. Regarding Chen's own contribution, a discussion of estimation and inference. Carl Chiarella noted in Economic Record that the editor "reviews some of the techniques for distinguishing between randomly generated data and data generated by deterministic process, and some of the pitfalls in their use. He uses his earlier work on chaos in monetary aggregates to discuss the problems of inference with economic time series and also shows how a nonlinear differential equation can generate behavior that closely resembles the data."

Chiarella maintained that Nonlinear Dynamics and Evolutionary Economics "is less concerned with the intricacies of particular nonlinear economic models, but rather attempts to give the reader a feel for the broad sweep of the main ideas and issues of nonlinear and evolutionary economic dynamics." The critic cited the essays as "well written at a survey level and at the same time [able] to give a feel for and an introduction to the more intricate technicalities." Chiarella concluded by saying that "the reader who is uncomfortable with the dominance of the intertemporal utility maximizing paradigm as a basis for economic theory will find some insights into what is one possible future path for the evolution of economic theory" and dubbed the work "well worth reading."