Alperen "Alp" Yasar

Table of Contents

About me

I am a Ph.D. student in Economics/Applied Mathematics. I try to model human behavior, especially the ones that could be considered "irrational" by classical economists. Some examples are:

  • Why some people are racist?
  • Why are there crazy conspiracy groups?
  • How can people believe that the Earth is flat?

I am using mostly computational methods to study these 'interesting' behaviors.

Why FOSS?

Free and open source software is growing in all fields, and Academia should be no exempt. Today, many softwares commonly used in science are proprierity. Heck, even scientific papers are behind proprierity licenses. This might have been necessary to a degree in the past, due to publishing costs etc. Today? I say it is completely bullshit (though I'm sure it's not an unpopular opinion anymore).

Here, I will try to publish all of my codes that I used during my doctoral studies. If you see any error in the code, I would be happy if you could notify me about it.

I expect to create a good documentary for my code, which I had no access during my period of learning. I will use Python and Julia, mostly. Though I can sometimes switch to R.

Jack of all trades

I can sometimes write stuff about archery, Go, Machine Learning, ethics, Noam Chomsky, anarcho-syndicalism. I can also go crazy angry over big corporations and why shouldn't you use Google, Apple or Microsoft. You might also see some music suggestions from classical to metal music.

mdBook

I have created this website using free and open-sourced mdBook. I am pretty sure that any bugs you'll encounter here will be because of my bad implementation. Moreover, I have used Yethiel's guide to implement it in my GitLab Page.

Projects

Here, I will publish codes that I used during my studies. I plan to keep them updated and well-documented. I am also open to suggestions.

Agent-based modelling

Agent-based models are being more and more common in various fields. I am using ABMs to predict the emergence of different phenomena, such as discrimination or conspiracy theory groups.

Python

Agent-based models are built through various softwares and programming languages. Netlogo is pretty strong and easy-to-use. However, I prefer to use either Python or Julia for ABMs. I believe that the differences are not extreme if you're not creating very complicated models. My suggestion would be to use what you are already familiar with.

Power struggles and gender discrimination in the workplace

This code is used for the following paper:

Power struggles and gender discrimination in the workplace

Abstract:

This study explores the impact of power struggles on the emergence of gender discrimination within the organizational culture. Utilizing an agent-based model, we simulate power struggles as an asymmetric hawk and dove game where agents may categorize their opponents based on their observable traits to make effective decisions. Our model includes two categories: prestigious education and sex, with prestigious education having higher struggling power. We examine three categorization strategies: fine-grained, regular-grained, and coarse-grained categorization. Our results indicate that fine-grained categorizers gain an advantage when the cost of fighting is low. In contrast, coarse-grained categorizers become more peaceful, leading to an advantage when the cost of fighting is high. Our simulation reveals that although there is no meaningful difference between sexes, different behaviors emerge when fine-categorizing agents dominate.

Available from SocArXiv:

  • Yasar, Alperen. 2023. “Power Struggles and Gender Discrimination in the Workplace.” SocArXiv. doi:10.31235/osf.io/t4g83. Accessible online

Linda Fallacy

A direct copy from Wikipedia:

Linda is 31 years old, single, outspoken, and very bright. She majored in philosophy. As a student, she was deeply concerned with issues of discrimination and social justice, and also participated in anti-nuclear demonstrations.

Which is more probable?

  • Linda is a bank teller.
  • Linda is a bank teller and is active in the feminist movement.

Check Wikipedia for the correct answer!

CV

Education

  • PhD Student in Economics in Ca' Foscari University of Venice (2021 - Current)
  • PhD Student in Applied Mathematics in Paris I Pantheon-Sorbonne University (2021 - Current)
  • Galatasaray University: Master's in Economics (2018-2020)
  • Galatasaray University: Bachelor's in Business Administration (2011-2018)

Publications

  • Yasar, Alperen. 2023. “Power Struggles and Gender Discrimination in the Workplace.” SocArXiv. doi:10.31235/osf.io/t4g83. Accessible online