Bayes Or Bust?

Bayes Or Bust?
Author: John Earman
Publisher: Bradford Books
Total Pages: 272
Release: 1992
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 9780262050463

There is currently no viable alternative to the Bayesian analysis of scientific inference, yet the available versions of Bayesianism fail to do justice to several aspects of the testing and confirmation of scientific hypotheses. Bayes or Bust? provides the first balanced treatment of the complex set of issues involved in this nagging conundrum in the philosophy of science. Both Bayesians and anti-Bayesians will find a wealth of new insights on topics ranging from Bayes's original paper to contemporary formal learning theory. In a paper published posthumously in 1763, the Reverend Thomas Bayes made a seminal contribution to the understanding of "analogical or inductive reasoning." Building on his insights, modem Bayesians have developed an account of scientific inference that has attracted numerous champions as well as numerous detractors. Earman argues that Bayesianism provides the best hope for a comprehensive and unified account of scientific inference, yet the presently available versions of Bayesianisin fail to do justice to several aspects of the testing and confirming of scientific theories and hypotheses. By focusing on the need for a resolution to this impasse, Earman sharpens the issues on which a resolution turns. John Earman is Professor of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh.

Probability, Statistics, and Random Processes for Electrical Engineering

Probability, Statistics, and Random Processes for Electrical Engineering
Author: Alberto Leon-Garcia
Publisher: Prentice Hall
Total Pages: 833
Release: 2008
Genre: Electric engineering
ISBN: 0131471228

While helping students to develop their problem-solving skills, the author motivates students with practical applications from various areas of ECE that demonstrate the relevance of probability theory to engineering practice.

Understanding Periodontal Diseases: Assessment and Diagnostic Procedures in Practice

Understanding Periodontal Diseases: Assessment and Diagnostic Procedures in Practice
Author: Iain L. C. Chapple
Publisher: Quintessence Publishing Company Limited
Total Pages: 214
Release: 2019-03-19
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 1850973083

This book aims to bridge the gulf between the complex pathobiology of periodontal diseases and their assessment and diagnosis in dental practice. It provides a visual tour of the periodontium, how the host responds to periodontal pathogens, and re-classifies the diseases. Risk-factor identification is introduced prior to a step-by-step guide to diagnosis, commencing with the patient's first visit.

Sustainable Development and the Limitation of Growth

Sustainable Development and the Limitation of Growth
Author: Victor I. Danilov-Danil'yan
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 263
Release: 2009-03-27
Genre: Science
ISBN: 3540752501

2007 marked the 20th anniversary of the G.H.Brundtland Commission report that broke new ground by addressing the issue of sustainable development as a means of avoiding an ecological catastrophe. This led to a multitude of political declarations, documents and scientific articles while Agenda 21 – adopted in 1992 in Rio de Janeiro – has been accepted by the governments of more than 100 countries. Sadly, however, this has not prevented certain recent dangerous trends, nor have the wider public, journalists, business circles or politicians grasped the urgency of the problem. It is therefore important to make humanity understand its real place in the natural environment and the gravity of the ecological threat before us. The exclusive role of natural ecosystems is a key factor in the maintenance of the biospheric equilibrium. The current global crisis is largely caused by their dramatic decline by 43% in the past hundred years. Ignoring the immutable laws and limitations which determine the existence of all living things in the biosphere could lead humanity to an ecological catastrophe. This book presents the ecological, demographic, economic and socio-psychological manifestations of the global crisis and outlines the immutable laws and limitations which determine the existence of all living things in the biosphere.

Before and Beyond Divergence

Before and Beyond Divergence
Author: Jean-Laurent Rosenthal
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 291
Release: 2011-04-01
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0674266846

China has reemerged as a powerhouse in the global economy, reviving a classic question in economic history: why did sustained economic growth arise in Europe rather than in China? Many favor cultural and environmental explanations of the nineteenth-century economic divergence between Europe and the rest of the world. This book, the product of over twenty years of research, takes a sharply different tack. It argues that political differences which crystallized well before 1800 were responsible both for China’s early and more recent prosperity and for Europe’s difficulties after the fall of the Roman Empire and during early industrialization. Rosenthal and Wong show that relative prices matter to how economies evolve; institutions can have a large effect on relative prices; and the spatial scale of polities can affect the choices of institutions in the long run. Their historical perspective on institutional change has surprising implications for understanding modern transformations in China and Europe and for future expectations. It also yields insights in comparative economic history, essential to any larger social science account of modern world history.

Multimedia Fingerprinting Forensics for Traitor Tracing

Multimedia Fingerprinting Forensics for Traitor Tracing
Author: K. J. Ray Liu
Publisher: Hindawi Publishing Corporation
Total Pages: 268
Release: 2005
Genre: Law
ISBN: 9775945186

The popularity of multimedia content has led to the widespread distribution and consumption of digital multimedia data. As a result of the relative ease with which individuals may now alter and repackage digital content, ensuring that media content is employed by authorized users for its intended purpose is becoming an issue of eminent importance to both governmental security and commercial applications. Digital fingerprinting is a class of multimedia forensic technologies to track and identify entities involved in the illegal manipulation and unauthorized usage of multimedia content, thereby protecting the sensitive nature of multimedia data as well as its commercial value after the content has been delivered to a recipient. "Multimedia Fingerprinting Forensics for Traitor Tracing" covers the essential aspects of research in this emerging technology, and explains the latest development in this field. It describes the framework of multimedia fingerprinting, discusses the challenges that may be faced when enforcing usage polices, and investigates the design of fingerprints that cope with new families of multiuser attacks that may be mounted against media fingerprints. The discussion provided in the book highlights challenging problems as well as future trends in this research field, providing readers with a broader view of the evolution of the young field of multimedia forensics. Topics and features: Comprehensive coverage of digital watermarking and fingerprinting in multimedia forensics for a number of media types. Detailed discussion on challenges in multimedia fingerprinting and analysis of effective multiuser collusion attacks on digital fingerprinting. Thorough investigation of fingerprint design and performance analysis for addressing different application concerns arising in multimedia fingerprinting. Well-organized explanation of problems and solutions, such as order-statistics-based nonlinear collusion attacks, efficient detection and identification of colluders, group-oriented fingerprint design, and anti-collusion codes for multimedia fingerprinting. Presenting the state of the art in collusion-resistant digital fingerprinting for multimedia forensics, this invaluable book is accessible to a wide range of researchers and professionals in the fields of electrical engineering, computer science, information technologies, and digital rights management.

Competition Policy

Competition Policy
Author: Massimo Motta
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 650
Release: 2004-01-12
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780521016919

This is the first book to provide a systematic treatment of the economics of antitrust (or competition policy) in a global context. It draws on the literature of industrial organisation and on original analyses to deal with such important issues as cartels, joint-ventures, mergers, vertical contracts, predatory pricing, exclusionary practices, and price discrimination, and to formulate policy implications on these issues. The interaction between theory and practice is one of the main features of the book, which contains frequent references to competition policy cases and a few fully developed case studies. The treatment is written to appeal to practitioners and students, to lawyers and economists. It is not only a textbook in economics for first year graduate or advanced undergraduate courses, but also a book for all those who wish to understand competition issues in a clear and rigorous way. Exercises and some solved problems are provided.

Quantum Theory: Concepts and Methods

Quantum Theory: Concepts and Methods
Author: A. Peres
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 463
Release: 2006-06-01
Genre: Science
ISBN: 0306471205

There are many excellent books on quantum theory from which one can learn to compute energy levels, transition rates, cross sections, etc. The theoretical rules given in these books are routinely used by physicists to compute observable quantities. Their predictions can then be compared with experimental data. There is no fundamental disagreement among physicists on how to use the theory for these practical purposes. However, there are profound differences in their opinions on the ontological meaning of quantum theory. The purpose of this book is to clarify the conceptual meaning of quantum theory, and to explain some of the mathematical methods which it utilizes. This text is not concerned with specialized topics such as atomic structure, or strong or weak interactions, but with the very foundations of the theory. This is not, however, a book on the philosophy of science. The approach is pragmatic and strictly instrumentalist. This attitude will undoubtedly antagonize some readers, but it has its own logic: quantum phenomena do not occur in a Hilbert space, they occur in a laboratory.

Biodiversity

Biodiversity
Author: National Academy of Sciences/Smithsonian Institution
Publisher: National Academies Press
Total Pages: 535
Release: 1988-01-01
Genre: Science
ISBN: 0309037395

This important book for scientists and nonscientists alike calls attention to a most urgent global problem: the rapidly accelerating loss of plant and animal species to increasing human population pressure and the demands of economic development. Based on a major conference sponsored by the National Academy of Sciences and the Smithsonian Institution, Biodiversity creates a systematic framework for analyzing the problem and searching for possible solutions.

The Diversity of Life

The Diversity of Life
Author: Edward O. Wilson
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Total Pages: 468
Release: 1999
Genre: Nature
ISBN: 9780393319408

This classic by the distinguished Harvard entomologist tells how life on earth evolved and became diverse, and now, how diversity and life are endangered by us, truly. While Wilson contributed a great deal to environmental ethics by calling for the preservation of whole ecosystems rather than individual species, his environmentalism appears too anthropocentric: "We should judge every scrap of biodiversity as priceless while we learn to use it and come to understand what it means to humanity." And: "Signals abound that the loss of life's diversity endangers not just the body but the spirit." This reprint of the 1992 Belknap Press publication contains a new foreword. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR