In the current efforts of harmonizing the standards and enforcement of IPRs protection worldwide, this paper explores software piracy trajectories and dynamics in Africa. Using a battery of estimation techniques that ignore as well as integrate short-run disturbances in time-dynamic fashion, we answer the big questions policy makers are most likely to ask before harmonizing IPRs regimes in the battle against software piracy. Three main findings are established. (1) African countries with low software piracy rates are catching-up their counterparts with (...) higher rates; implying despite existing divergent IPRs systems, convergence in piracy rate could be a genuine standard-setting platform. (2) Legal origins do not play a very significant role in the convergence process. (3) A genuine timeframe for standardizing IPRs laws in the fight against piracy is most likely between a horizon of 4–8 years. In other words, full (100 %) convergence within the specified horizon will mean the enforcements of IPRs regimes without distinction of nationality and locality. Policy implications and caveats are discussed. (shrink)

This study examines the efficiency of tools for fighting software piracy in the conditional distributions of software piracy. Our paper examines software piracy in 99 countries over the period 1994–2010, using contemporary and non-contemporary quantile regressions. The intuition for modelling distributions contingent on existing levels of software piracy is that the effectiveness of tools against piracy may consistently decrease or increase simultaneously with the increasing levels of software piracy. Hence, blanket policies against software piracy are unlikely to succeed unless they (...) are contingent on initial levels of software piracy and tailored differently across countries with low, medium and high levels of software piracy. Our findings indicate that GDP per capita, research and development expenditure, main intellectual property laws, multilateral treaties, bilateral treaties, World Intellectual Property Organisation treaties, money supply and respect for the rule of law have negative effects on software piracy. Equitably distributed wealth reduces software piracy, and the tendency not to indulge in software piracy because of equitably distributed wealth increases with the increasing software piracy levels. Hence, the negative degree of responsiveness of software piracy to changes in income levels is an increasing function of software piracy. Moreover, the relationships between policy instruments and software piracy display various patterns: U-shape, Kuznets-shape, S-shape and negative thresholds. A negative threshold represents negative estimates with the increasing negative magnitude throughout the conditional distributions of software piracy. We also discuss the policy implications of our study. (shrink)

This article integrates previously missing components of government quality into the governance-piracy nexus in exploring governance mechanisms by which global obligations for the treatment of IPRs are effectively transmitted from international to the national level in the battle against piracy. It assesses the best governance tools in the fight against piracy and upholding of intellectual property rights (IPRs). The instrumentality of IPR laws (treaties) in tackling piracy through good governance mechanisms is also examined. Findings demonstrate that: (1) while all governance (...) tools under consideration significantly decrease the incidence of piracy, corruption-control is the most effective weapon; (2) but for voice and accountability, political stability and democracy, IPR laws (treaties) are instrumental in tackling piracy through government quality dynamics of rule of law, regulation quality, government effectiveness, corruption-control, and press freedom. Hence, the need for a policy approach most conducive to expanding development is to implement an integrated system of both IPRs and corollary good governance policies. Moreover, our findings support the relevance of good governance measures in developing countries wishing to complement their emerging IPR regimes. (shrink)

The idea that simplicity matters in science is as old as science itself, with the much cited example of Ockham's Razor, 'entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem': entities are not to be multiplied beyond necessity. A problem with Ockham's razor is that nearly everybody seems to accept it, but few are able to define its exact meaning and to make it operational in a non-arbitrary way. Using a multidisciplinary perspective including philosophers, mathematicians, econometricians and economists, this 2002 monograph examines simplicity (...) by asking six questions: what is meant by simplicity? How is simplicity measured? Is there an optimum trade-off between simplicity and goodness-of-fit? What is the relation between simplicity and empirical modelling? What is the relation between simplicity and prediction? What is the connection between simplicity and convenience? The book concludes with reflections on simplicity by Nobel Laureates in Economics. (shrink)

Simplicity was recently described in the philosophy of science as “perhaps the most controversial theoretical virtue” (Schindler 2018). It has been also argued that contrary to the standard view, simplicity is not merely a pragmatic virtue but also an epistemic one. Virtue epistemologists are also interested in epistemic virtues, but simplicity is usually absent in their discussions. This paper adduces several contemporary approaches to simplicity showing that in philosophy and in psychology it can be considered either as a virtue or (...) as a vice. The paper then refers to the thought of Thomas Aquinas as an example of a premodern understanding of the virtue simplicity and suggests that his notion of simplicity as a virtue might be developed today within virtue epistemology into an interesting complement to this “perhaps the most controversial theoretical virtue” (Schindler 2018) known from contemporary philosophy. (shrink)

The idea that simplicity matters in science is as old as science itself, with the much cited example of Ockham's Razor, 'entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem': entities are not to be multiplied beyond necessity. A problem with Ockham's razor is that nearly everybody seems to accept it, but few are able to define its exact meaning and to make it operational in a non-arbitrary way. Using a multidisciplinary perspective including philosophers, mathematicians, econometricians and economists, this 2002 monograph examines simplicity (...) by asking six questions: what is meant by simplicity? How is simplicity measured? Is there an optimum trade-off between simplicity and goodness-of-fit? What is the relation between simplicity and empirical modelling? What is the relation between simplicity and prediction? What is the connection between simplicity and convenience? The book concludes with reflections on simplicity by Nobel Laureates in Economics. (shrink)

Simplicity provides a new logic with which to approach intellectual situations. Using the simplicity way of thinking as a tool helps clarify intellectual standpoints and conceptually problematic situations in philosophy, mathematics and physics.

This paper presents a broad-ranging critique of the traditional strong doctrine of divine simplicity which is attributed to Augustine and Aquinas. After showing two important arguments in favor of the doctrine to be unsuccessful, it argues that the doctrine itself, in this strong version, is problematic in three main ways. First, the doctrine involves extensive category mistakes. Second, it is difficult to reconcile with truths about God that are universally acknowledged, such as that God knows contingent truths and performs actions (...) which he is not necessitated by his nature to perform. Finally, it is difficult to reconcile with personal attributes of God which are important both for the Bible and for religious practice, such as the claims that God is responsive to human beings and that he loves them. This article contends that while there is a sense in which it is true that God is simple, the traditional strong doctrine of divine simplicity, attributed to Augustine and Aquinas, is a mistake from which theology needs to be liberated. (shrink)

In part one of this paper we shall elucidate an operational concept of logical simplicity as it seems to function in natural science. Although this is a tentative and exploratory formulation, its novelty, relative to the great European philosophical tradition, seems to require a preliminary warning about misunderstandings.In Part Two we shall apply the formulation to social inquiry and make a positive suggestion for further development of the proposal.

Nelson Goodman has constructed two theories of simplicity: one of predicates; one of hypotheses. I offer a simpler theory by generalization and abstraction from his. Generalization comes by dropping special conditions Goodman imposes on which unexcluded extensions count as complicating and which excluded extensions count as simplifying. Abstraction is achieved by counting only nonisomorphic models and subinterpretations. The new theory takes into account all the hypotheses of a theory in assessing its complexity, whether they were projected prior to, or result (...) from, projection of a given hypothesis. It assigns simplicity post-projection priority over simplicity pre-projection. It better orders compound conditionals than does the theory of simplicity of hypotheses, and it does not inherit an anomaly of the theory of simplicity of predicates — its failure to order the ordering relations. Drop Goodman's special conditions, and the problems fall away with them. (shrink)

I have two criticisms of Vallicella's "Divine Simplicity: A New Defense." One is that its argument for property self-exemplification fails because it ignores the distinction between "what" clauses employing first-level quanti-fication and those employing second-level quantification. The second criti-cism is that his rejection of logically simple propositions stems from a failure to see that the argument for those propositions is based on a logical premiss, not a grammatical one.

Despite being an aristocrat and a woman, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu made herself a writer. Hard-hitting, eloquent, and often funny, this is a revised edition of her non-epistolary writings.

Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) ne cesse de fasciner ses lecteurs, par les controverses internes de ses ecrits. Dans une societe mondialisee, confrontee regulierement aux extremismes religieux qui tentent d'imposer leur vision du monde par la violence, peut-on encore entendre son verdict dans les Lettres ecrites de la Montagne : "La Religion est utile et meme necessaire aux Peuples"? Devant les theories de la laicisation, developpees dans une perspective de secularisation a sens unique, orientees vers l'expulsion de la religion de la (...) sphere publique, la relecture de la pensee politique de Rousseau est indispensable pour elaborer un contrat social acceptable par tous. La contribution du philosophe de Geneve a une analyse critique du theologico-politique, et son opposition aux perspectives atheistes de ses contemporains, est d'un grand interet dans le debat autour de la laicite des Etats postmodernes. En effet, le paradoxe, qui traverse la pensee de Rousseau, trouve son point culminant dans sa controverse avec les encyclopedistes sur le lien entre la politique et la religion. Plus que tout autre philosophe des Lumieres, Jean Jacques Rousseau eclaire la comprehension des defis que posent a notre temps la relation du politique et du religieux. (shrink)

(2011). A Review of “The School Leader's Guide to Learner Centered Education: From Complexity to Simplicity”. Educational Studies: Vol. 47, No. 1, pp. 92-95.

The traditional notion of divine simplicity is frequently misunderstood. Philosophers of religion who defend it and theologians who dismiss it agree on its Greek, rather than biblical, heritage. On the contrary, a particularly Christian account of divine simplicity, as reflected for example in Thomas, maintains a Creator‐creature distinction as understood in light of Trinity and Incarnation. Stump and Kretzmann's discussion of simplicity appears to follow Aquinas, but misses the character of this distinction, and so treats a human idea of “the (...) simple” instead of Thomas's living source of being. The true modern follower of Thomas on simplicity is not Stump and Kretzmann, but Barth. (shrink)

The doctrine of divine simplicity (DDS) is an important aspect of the classical theism of philosophers like Augustine, Anselm, and Thomas Aquinas. Recently the doctrine has been defended in a Thomist mode using the intrinsic/extrinsic distinction. I argue that this approach entails problems which can be avoided by taking Anselm’s more Neoplatonic line. This does involve accepting some controversial claims: for example, that time is isotemporal and that God inevitably does the best. The most difficult problem involves trying to reconcile (...) created libertarian free will with the Anselmian DDS. But for those attracted to DDS the Anselmian approach is worth considering. (shrink)

This paper is a sequel to my 'Theological Misinterpretations of Current Physical Cosmology' (Foundations of Physics [1996], 26 (4); revised in Philo [1998], 1 (1)). There I argued that the Big Bang models of (classical) general relativity theory, as well as the original 1948 versions of the steady state cosmology, are each logically incompatible with the time-honored theological doctrine that perpetual divine creation ('creatio continuans') is required in each of these two theorized worlds. Furthermore, I challenged the perennial theological doctrine (...) that there must be a divine creative cause (as distinct from a transformative one) for the very existence of the world, a ratio essendi. This doctrine is the theistic reply to the question: 'Why is there something, rather than just nothing?' I begin my present paper by arguing against the response by the contemporary Oxford theist Richard Swinburne and by Leibniz to what is, in effect, my counter-question: 'But why should there be just nothing, rather than something?' Their response takes the form of claiming that the a priori probability of there being just nothing, vis-à-vis the existence of alternative states, is maximal, because the non-existence of the world is conceptually the simplest. On the basis of an analysis of the role of simplicity in scientific explanations, I show that this response is multiply flawed, and thus provides no basis for their three contentions that (i) if there is a world at all, then its 'normal', natural, spontaneous state is one of utter nothingness or total non-existence, so that (ii) the very existence of matter, energy and living beings constitutes a deviation from the allegedly 'normal', spontaneous state of 'nothingness', and (iii) that deviation must thus have a suitably potent (external) divine cause. Related defects turn out to vitiate the medieval Kalam Argument for the existence of God, as espoused by William Craig. Next I argue against the contention by such theists as Richard Swinburne and Philip L. Quinn that (i) the specific content of the scientifically most fundamental laws of nature, including the constants they contain, requires supra-scientific explanation, and (ii) a satisfactory explanation is provided by the hypothesis that the God of theism willed them to be exactly what they are. Furthermore, I contend that the theistic teleological gloss on the 'Anthropic Principle' is incoherent and explanatorily unavailing. Finally, I offer an array of considerations against Swinburne's attempt to show, via Bayes's theorem, that the existence of God is more probable than not. (shrink)

The philosophical significance of the procedure of applying Akaike Information Criterion (AIC) to curve-fitting problems is evaluated. The theoretical justification for using AIC (the so-called Akaike's theorem) is presented in a rigorous way, and its range of validity is assessed by presenting both instances in which it is valid and counter-examples in which it is invalid. The philosophical relevance of the justification that this result gives for making one particular choice between simple and complicated hypotheses is emphasized. In addition, recent (...) claims that the methods based on Akaike's theorem are relevant to other philosophical problems associated with the notion of simplicity are presented and evaluated. (shrink)

I defend a one category ontology: an ontology that denies that we need more than one fundamental category to support the ontological structure of the world. Categorical fundamentality is understood in terms of the metaphysically prior, as that in which everything else in the world consists. One category ontologies are deeply appealing, because their ontological simplicity gives them an unmatched elegance and spareness. I’m a fan of a one category ontology that collapses the distinction between particular and property, replacing it (...) with a single fundamental category of intrinsic characters or qualities. We may describe the qualities as qualitative charactersor as modes, perhaps on the model of Aristotelian qualitative (nonsubstantial) kinds, and I will use the term “properties” interchangeably with “qualities”. The qualities are repeatable and reasonably sparse, although, as I discuss in section 2.6, there are empirical reasons that may suggest, depending on one’s preferred fundamental physical theory, that they include irreducibly intensive qualities. There are no uninstantiated qualities. I also assume that the fundamental qualitative natures are intrinsic, although physics may ultimately suggest that some of them are extrinsic. On my view, matter, concrete objects, abstract objects, and perhaps even spacetime are constructed from mereological fusions of qualities, so the world is simply a vast mixture of qualities, including polyadic properties (i.e., relations). This means that everything there is, including concrete objects like persons or stars, is a quality, a qualitative fusion, or a portion of the extended qualitative fusion that is the worldwhole. I call my view mereological bundle theory. (shrink)

In recent years the doctrine of divine simplicity has become a topic of interest in the philosophical theological community. In particular, the modal collapse argument against divine simplicity has garnered various responses from proponents of divine simplicity. Some even claiming that the modal collapse argument is invalid. It is our contention that these responses have either misunderstood or misstated the argument, and have thus missed the force of the objection. Our main aim is to clarify what the modal collapse argument (...) in fact says, and explain why the recent responses do not succeed. In order to argue our case, we will proceed in several steps. First, we aim to systematically articulate the doctrine of divine simplicity. Second, articulate the Christian conviction that God is free to create any feasible world or no world at all. Third, argue that divine simplicity suffers a modal collapse and thus undermines God's freedom. Fourth, respond to potential objections to modal collapse. Fifth, we offer some concluding remarks. (shrink)

The correspondence in 1680 and 1681 between John Flamsteed and Isaac Newton on Flamsteed’s theory of the comet of 1680 tells half the story. Related manuscripts reveal Newton was pursuing his own comprehensive line of inquiry based on principles that were the antithesis of Flamsteed’s procedures. Following generally accepted views in England, Newton’s work was marked by critical evaluation of data but marred by uncritical use of simple calculating techniques based on what might be termed Platonic archetypes of straightness. Flamsteed’s (...) intervention provided useful data and allowed Newton to seek additional information. Although Newton supposedly briefly considered a solution that vaguely resembled his parabolic approximation of the path of the comet determined 5 years later, the evidence Newton provided (based on simple hypotheses) did not support such a highly curved path or one in which the sun apart from the solar vortex exerted influence. Newton’s work, including an alleged harmonic law of tails, was quietly abandoned in favor of other work. With new insight, Newton revived work on comets as fully gravitational objects immediately following Halley’s visit in 1684. This little known side of the episode provides a fresh opportunity to examine Newton’s sources and actual practice in developing a new line of inquiry. An appendix dating sections of Newton’s Waste Book entries on comets is included. (shrink)

Annotation "Fearful Symmetry" brings the incredible discoveries of contemporary physics within everyone's grasp. A. Zee, a distinguished physicist and skillful expositor, tells the exciting story of how today's theoretical physicists are following Einstein in their search for the beauty and simplicity of Nature. Animated by a sense of reverence and whimsy, the book describes the majestic sweep and accomplishments of twentieth-century physics. In the end, we stand in awe before the grand vision of modern physics--one of the greatest chapters in (...) the intellectual history of humankind. (shrink)

Metaphysicians frequently appeal to the idea that theoretical simplicity is truth conducive in metaphysics, in the sense that, all other things being equal, simpler metaphysical theories are more likely to be true. In this paper I defend the notion that theoretical simplicity is truth conducive in metaphysics, against several recent objections. I do not give any direct arguments for the thesis that simplicity is truth conducive in metaphysics, since I am aware of no such arguments. I do argue, however, that (...) there is no special problem with the notion that simplicity is truth conducive in metaphysics. More specifically, I argue that if you accept the idea that simplicity is truth conducive in science, then it would be objectionably arbitrary to reject the idea that simplicity is truth conducive in metaphysics. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to offer a formal criterion for physical computation that allows us to objectively distinguish between competing computational interpretations of a physical system. The criterion construes a computational interpretation as an ordered pair of functions mapping (1) states of a physical system to states of an abstract machine, and (2) inputs to this machine to interventions in this physical system. This interpretation must ensure that counterfactuals true of the abstract machine have appropriate counterparts which are (...) true of the physical system. The criterion proposes that rival interpretations be assessed on the basis of simplicity. Simplicity is construed as the Kolmogorov complexity of the interpretation. This approach is closely related to the notion of algorithmic information distance and draws on earlier work on real patterns. (shrink)

A widespread assumption in experimental comparative cognition is that, barring compelling evidence to the contrary, the default hypothesis should postulate the simplest cognitive ontology consistent with the animal’s behavior. I call this assumption the principle of cognitive simplicity . In this essay, I show that PoCS is pervasive but unjustified: a blanket preference for the simplest cognitive ontology is not justified by any of the available arguments. Moreover, without a clear sense of how cognitive ontologies are to be carved up (...) at the joints—and which tools are appropriate for the job—PoCS rests on shaky conceptual ground. (shrink)

The author demonstrates the central role that the ideal of unity and simplicity has played in classical and contemporary science. She argues that despite current difficulties in realizing this ideal it has deep psychological roots and is therefore likely to persist.

This paper outlines an indigenous Indian approach for the training of engineers to fulfil the objective of effective technology transfer to a new site from the mother plant. The approach reflects the courage of conviction to translate the holistic and ancient model of knowledge transfer: the guru-shishya relationship. The requirements of such a model, the practical working out of these requirements, and the views of both shishyas and gurus after the experience are shared with great simplicity.

In the fifth book of his De aspectibus, the medieval Latin version of Ibn al-Haythamb al-Manir, Alhacen undertakes to determine precisely where a given ray of light will reflect to a given center of sight from a variety of convex and concave mirrors based on circular sections. As applied specifically to convex and concave spherical mirrors, this problem exercised several seventeenth-century thinkers, Christiaan Huygens foremost among them, and in that context it soon became known as Alhazens solution (or solutions) of (...) this problem is deficient in comparison to that of Huygens and later mathematicians. It is my purpose in this paper to show by reconstruction that in fact, far from deficient in any absolute sense, Alhacen’s approach to this problem was remarkably ingenious and elegant in its conceptual simplicity. (shrink)

Predication is an indisputable part of our linguistic behavior. By contrast, the metaphysics of predication has been a matter of dispute ever since antiquity. According to Plato—or at least Platonism, the view that goes by Plato’s name in contemporary philosophy—the truths expressed by predications such as “Socrates is wise” are true because there is a subject of predication (e.g., Socrates), there is an abstract property or universal (e.g., wisdom), and the subject exemplifies the property.1 This view is supposed to be (...) general, applying to all predications, whether the subject of predication is a person, a planet, or a property.2 Despite the controversy surrounding the metaphysics of predication, many theistic philosophers—including the majority of contemporary analytic theists—regard Platonism as extremely attractive. At the same time, however, such philosophers are also commonly attracted to a form of traditional theism that has at its core the thesis that God is an absolutely independent.. (shrink)

We address the problem of predicting how people will spontaneously divide into groups a set of novel items. This is a process akin to perceptual organization. We therefore employ the simplicity principle from perceptual organization to propose a simplicity model of unconstrained spontaneous grouping. The simplicity model predicts that people would prefer the categories for a set of novel items that provide the simplest encoding of these items. Classification predictions are derived from the model without information either about the number (...) of categories sought or information about the distributional properties of the objects to be classified. These features of the simplicity model distinguish it from other models in unsupervised categorization (where, for example, the number of categories sought is determined via a free parameter), and we discuss how these computational differences are related to differences in modeling objectives. The predictions of the simplicity model are validated in four experiments. We also discuss the significance of simplicity in cognitive modeling more generally. (shrink)

There is now a well-established distinction recognized in the ways simplicity considerations enter into science. Laws of nature may be graded either with regard to their simplicity of form or with regard to the fewness of the concepts employed to express them. I shall distinguish these as formal simplicity and conceptual simplicity respectively. Dr. J. O. Wisdom suggests that it should be fewness of non-instantial concepts that serves as the guide for making judgements of relative simplicity; a “non-instantial” concept being (...) a concept which is constructed for the purpose of theory, its meaning not being derived simply from experience. Hence non-instantial concepts are, from a logical point of view, to be contrasted with the concepts used to express and record observations directly, that is with instantial concepts representing observables. This seems to be too narrow a restriction on the reduction of concepts. Clearly an advance towards simplicity has been made not only when e.g. a non-instantial concept like “force of gravity” is eliminated from our technical language, but also when the number of instantial concepts is reduced by redefinition, in terms of a smaller number of observables. For example a great simplification was surely made when space-traversed, time taken and mass were chosen as the dynamic “simples”, for the multiplicity of kinds of motion were found to be expressible as functions of these concepts. “Motion” is not non-instantial in the same way as “force of gravity” or “kinetic energy” is non-instantial. However, once this extension to instantial concepts is made there is no need to quarrel with the form/concept distinction as marking a pritma facie difference in criteria of some methodological importance; for a choice say to concentrate on using the fewest concepts does, and one would be inclined to think must , lead to a “decrease” in the formal simplicity of the laws of nature. (shrink)

Explaining the connection, if any, between simplicity and truth is among the deepest problems facing the philosophy of science, statistics, and machine learning. Say that an efficient truth finding method minimizes worst case costs en route to converging to the true answer to a theory choice problem. Let the costs considered include the number of times a false answer is selected, the number of times opinion is reversed, and the times at which the reversals occur. It is demonstrated that (1) (...) always choosing the simplest theory compatible with experience, and (2) hanging onto it while it remains simplest, is both necessary and sufficient for efficiency. †To contact the author, please write to: Department of Philosophy, Carnegie Mellon University, Baker Hall 135, Pittsburgh, PA 15213-3890; e-mail: [email protected]. (shrink)