Computation has fundamentally changed the way we study nature. Recent
breakthroughs in data collection technology, such as GPS and other
mobile sensors, high definition cameras, satellite images, and genotyping, are
giving biologists access to data about wild populations, from genetic to
social interactions, which are orders of magnitude richer than any
previously collected. Such data offer the promise of answering some of
the big questions in population biology: Why do animals form social