The focus of CwU'2009 is on novel approaches to supporting robust decision-making and design, especially when uncertainty is irreducible, consequences might be enormous, and the decision process involves stakeholders with diverse interests.

Traditional scientific approaches usually rely on real observations and experiments. Yet no sufficient observations exist for new problems, and "pure" experiments, and learning by doing may be very expensive, dangerous, or simply impossible. In addition, available historical observations are often contaminated by "experimentator", i.e., our actions, and policies. The complexity of new problems does not allow us to achieve enough certainty just by increasing the resolution of models or by bringing in more links. They require explicit treatment of uncertainties using "synthetic" information composed of available "hard" data from historical observations, the results of possible experiments, and scientific facts as well as "soft" data from experts' opinions, scenarios, stakeholders, and public opinion. As a result of all these factors, our assessment will always have poor estimates. Finally, the role of science for new problems will increasingly deviate from traditional "deterministic predictions" analysis to the design of robust strategies against involved uncertainties and risks.

The workshop aims at contributing to a better understanding between practitioners dealing with management of uncertainty, and scientists working on either corresponding modeling approaches, or on methods that can be adapted for improving the understanding and management of uncertainty. In particular, the contributions on the following issues are invited:

• modeling different types of uncertainty (probabilistic and non-probabilistic),
• the formulation of appropriate deterministic substitute problems for different types of uncertainty,
• robustness of efficient solutions with respect to inherent uncertainties,
• simulation tools (for optimal decision/design under uncertainty),
• safety and security of humans, environment, and vital infrastructure facing catastrophe risks,
• lessons that can be learned from designing and operating highly reliable systems,
• downscaling methods for handling temporal or spacial scales,
• benefits and costs of (partial) postponing decions (aimed at reducing uncertainties),
• open problems in the adequate treatment of uncertainties,
• concrete applications in economics, finance, engineering, energy, population, air quality, climate change, ecology, forestry, and other environmental problems.

Participation in the workshop

The number of participants in the workshop must be limited, therefore participation is by invitation only. The invitations for the workshop will be distributed before September 30, 2009 to authors of accepted presentations.

Prospective participants are kindly requested to complete as soon as possible (but not later than September 15, 2009) the   preregistration   procedure which is composed of two elements:

• filling in a preregistration form,
• submission of an extended abstract of the proposed contribution.

Program Committee

• Yuri Ermoliev, IIASA, Laxenburg (A)
• Marek Makowski, IIASA, Laxenburg (A)
• Kurt Marti, Federal Armed Forces Univ. Munich (D)
• Gerhard Schuëller, Univ. of Innsbruck (A)

• IIASA - International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Laxenburg, (A)
• Federal Armed Forces Univ. Munich, (D)

Dates, organizational details
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