A good decision is one that leads to people's getting what they want. Luck plays a smaller role if they ask what makes a good decision‐making method or policy. This chapter discusses how often people will get more of what they want if their decisions are formed in this way, than they would have had they reasoned differently. It also describes the advantages or disadvantages of the dilemma‐managing strategies, and presents a systematic view of the strategies (partition‐shifting (...) class='Hi'>strategies, spreading strategies, and revaluing strategies), with an emphasis on how to evaluate them. Different decisions involve different partitions. The choice of a suitable partition is one of the secret skills of decision‐making. A good partition should reveal the important factors that can affect the outcomes of the acts being considered, in such a way that these outcomes can easily be compared. (shrink)

Conspiracy theories are spreading faster than ever and pose a real danger to our societies. It is natural to accuse the consumers of conspiracy theories of irrationality – that they are either not looking at or appropriately sensitive to all the available evidence. In this paper, I attempt to determine if we can make sense of this general idea. I argue that we cannot: conspiracy theories do not spread because the people who believe them are irrational – at least, (...) not necessarily so. In addition, I explore some alternative strategies for responding to the problem of the spread of conspiracy theories. I argue that in addition to confrontational strategies such as social shaming, we need more constructive programs of community activism to battle the spread of conspiracy theories. (shrink)

Cooperative spreading dynamics on complex networks is a hot topic in the field of network science. In this paper, we propose a strategy to immunize some nodes based on their degrees. The immunized nodes disable the synergistic effect of cooperative spreading dynamics. We also develop a generalized percolation theory to study the final state of the spreading dynamics. By using the Monte Carlo method, numerical simulations reveal that immunizing nodes with a large degree cannot always be beneficial (...) for containing cooperative spreading. For small values of transmission probability, immunizing hubs can suppress the spreading, while the opposite situation happens for large values of transmission probability. Furthermore, numerical simulations show that immunizing hubs increase the cost of the system. Finally, all numerical simulations can be well predicted by the generalized percolation theory. (shrink)

Bankruptcy of listed companies or shareholders delisting usually causes the crisis spreading in stock markets. Based on the systematic analysis of the epidemic diseases and rumors spreading on the complex networks, the SIR model is introduced to research the crisis spreading in shareholding networks of listed companies and their main holders on the basis of the data about ownership structure in Chinese Stock Markets. The characteristics of shareholding networks are studied, and the parameters for the SIR model (...) are obtained by empirical approach. Then, the numerical computation method is successfully used to analyze the crisis spreading in the networks when the networks meet random failures or intentional attacks. We find the networks have good robustness against the random failures. However, the crisis will spread at a high speed and cause catastrophic damage if there are some failures or attacks on hub vertices in the networks. Under this condition, the networks show obvious vulnerability. Last but not least, the controllability of the networks under the condition of intentional attacks and random failures is studied. The results show that if the network is controlled globally, it is more reliable to allow a politically good new or an appropriate exciting economical policy to play the role in orienting markets under the control of public opinions as the crisis occurs. However, under normal circumstances, controlling a small part of driver vertices representing listed companies, applying appropriate control strategies, and using its characteristics of high efficiency of sending information can effectively control the stock market. Our research provides a new reference to further exploration about the transmission mechanism of the crisis based SIR model and further research on the controllability of crisis spreading in financial markets. (shrink)

The spread of epidemics, especially COVID-19, is having a significant impact on the world. If an epidemic is not properly controlled at the beginning, it is likely to spread rapidly and widely through the coexistence relationship between natural and social systems. A university community is a special, micro-self-organized social system that is densely populated. However, university authorities in such an environment seem to be less cautious in the defence of an epidemic. Currently, there is almost no quantitative research on epidemic (...) spreading and response strategies in universities. In this paper, a case study of a university community is considered for a simulation of an infection evolving after an epidemic outbreak based on the method of system dynamics of the three stages. The results show the following: By improving the speed of the initial emergency response, the total number of patients can be effectively controlled. A quarantine policy helps to slow down the evolution of infection. The higher the isolation ratio, the higher the cost; therefore, the isolation ratio should be optimized. It is important to make emergency plans for controlling epidemic spreading and carry out emergency drills and assessments regularly. According to the results of this study, we suggest an emergency management framework for public health events in university communities. (shrink)

Exhibitions dedicated to the theme of "Red China" occupy an important place in the dissemination of "red" culture, the continuity of the "red" gene and the intensification of "red" education. They reflect the political agenda, have a distinct content and the uniqueness of the text material. Being an important element of the spread of "red" culture, exhibitions on the theme of "Red China" integrate elements of this culture into people's daily lives and play an active role in preserving and multiplying (...) the "red" gene. In this article, the systematization and generalization of knowledge in the field of narrative strategy of exhibitions on the theme of "Red China" is carried out from the point of view of ontology, structure and narrative carrier, which at the present stage is important for building a strong socialist ideology. Exhibitions on the theme of "Red China" are an important way of materialization, visualization and dissemination of "red" culture, as well as an effective means of its popularization. The study found that the "Red" exhibitions should have a "revolutionary content", have a "political character", be "mutually recognized by the authorities and the people", take on the main responsibility for providing people with common access to material and spiritual culture. From the point of view of the communication function of the "red" exhibitions, they are an important means of organizing ideological and political education by the Communist Party of China, strengthening social harmony and promoting basic values. (shrink)

In this paper, we critically consider the analogy between “infodemic” and “pandemic”, i.e. the spread of fake news about COVID-19 as a medial virus and the infection with the biological virus itself from the perspective of cultural evolutionary theory (CET). After confronting three major shortcomings of the ‘infodemic’ concept, we use CET as a background framework to analyze this phenomenon. To do so, we summarize which bi-ases are crucial for transmission in terms of cultural selection and how transmission is restricted (...) by filter bubbles or echo chambers acting as TRIMS (transmission isolating mechanisms) post “infection”, which isolate false from trustworthy scientific information in the context of the Corona pandemic. This is followed by a demonstration of the threat to biological fitness posed by the effects of an infection with fake news, which leads to a reduced willingness to vaccinate and follow health measures. We identify fake news on Covid as pseudoscience, trying to immunize itself from external influences. We then address the question of how to combat the infodemic. Since debunking strategies, such as warnings by fact-checking, have proven relatively ineffective in combating fake news, the inoculation theory from psychology might offer an alternative solution. Through its underlying ‘prebunking strategy’, which educates individuals about the risks and tactics of fake news prior to a potential infection, they could be ‘immunized’ in advance, similar to a virological vaccination. Although we recognize that the pandemic/infodemic analogy is in fact far from perfect, we believe that CET could provide a theoretical underpinning in order to give much more semantic depth to the concept ‘infodemic’. (shrink)

We propose a framework for the description of the effects of vaccinations on the spreading of an epidemic disease. Different vaccines can be dosed, each providing different immunization times and immunization levels. Differences due to individuals’ ages are accounted for through the introduction of either a continuous age structure or a discrete set of age classes. Extensions to gender differences or to distinguish fragile individuals can also be considered. Within this setting, vaccination strategies can be simulated, tested and (...) compared, as is explicitly described through numerical integrations. (shrink)

Background: The rapid spread of COVID-19 infection has led countries across the globe to take various measures to contain the outbreak, including the closure of Universities. Forcing University students to stay at home has created enormous stress and uncertainty in their daily life.Objective: This study aimed to assess the perceived stress and coping strategies among undergraduate health science students of Jimma University amid the COVID-19 outbreak.Materials and methods: An online cross-sectional survey was conducted involving 337 undergraduate health science students (...) from August to September 5, 2020. The perceived stress scale -10 and Brief-COPE scale were used to assess the level of stress and coping strategies, respectively. Statistical Package for Social Science Version 22 was employed for data analysis. Logistic regression was conducted to identify predictors of high perceived stress.Results: The overall mean [±standard deviation ] age of the participants was 22.88 years. The mean PSS score was 22.16, and high perceived stress was reported in 121 participants. The overall mean coping score was 72.34, and approach coping was the predominantly used strategy for coping with stress. Personal perception of being stressed by the daily number of COVID-19 cases/deaths in Ethiopia, rare online talk/chat with friends, presence of confusion due to the inconsistent strategies developed by the health/government authorities in view of the scientific recommendations, perception of self/family members being at risk of getting sick, decreased household income following the COVID-19 pandemic, practicing denial, self-blame, planning, and religion as means of coping with stress were associated with high perceived stress.Conclusion: Over one-third of the participants had a high level of perceived stress, and the majority of them were practicing effective means of coping with stress. The authors recommend that the hosting University in collaboration with the concerned bodies develop innovative strategies to improve the psychological well-being of the students. (shrink)

ArgumentSince the linguistic turn, the role of rhetoric in the circulation and the popular representation of knowledge has been widely accepted in science studies. This article aims to analyze not a textual form of scientific rhetoric, but the crucial role of materiality in scientific debates. It introduces the concept ofmaterial rhetoricto understand the promotional regimes in which material objects play an essential argumentative role. It analyzes the phenomenon by looking at two students of prehistory from nineteenth-century Belgium.In the study of (...) human prehistory and evolution, material data are either fairly abundant stone tools or very scarce fossil bones. These two types of material data stand for two different strategies in material rhetoric. In this article, the first strategy is exemplified by Aimé Rutot, who gathered great masses of eoliths. The second strategy is typified by the example of Julien Fraipont, who based his scientific career on only two Neanderthal skeletons. Rutot sent his “artifacts” to a very wide audience, while Fraipont showed his skeletons to only a few selected scholars. Unlike Rutot, however, Fraipont was able to monitor his audience's interpretation of the finds by means of personal contacts. What an archaeologist gains in reach, he or she apparently loses in control. In this article we argue that only those scholars who find the right balance between the extremes of reach and control will prove to be successful. (shrink)

Bacteria have developed an impressive ability to survive and propagate in highly diverse and changing environments by evolving phenotypic heterogeneity. Phenotypic heterogeneity ensures that a subpopulation is well prepared for environmental changes. The expression bet hedging is commonly (but often incorrectly) used by molecular biologists to describe any observed phenotypic heterogeneity. In evolutionary biology, however, bet hedging denotes a risk‐spreading strategy displayed by isogenic populations that evolved in unpredictably changing environments. Opposed to other survival strategies, bet hedging evolves (...) because the selection environment changes and favours different phenotypes at different times. Consequently, in bet hedging populations all phenotypes perform differently well at any time, depending on the selection pressures present. Moreover, bet hedging is the only strategy in which temporal variance of offspring numbers per individual is minimized. Our paper aims to provide a guide for the correct use of the term bet hedging in molecular biology. (shrink)

We examine corporate philanthropic decisions in response to the local spread of COVID-19. From a strategic perspective, firms may proactively undertake philanthropic efforts to limit the spread of the pandemic and avoid a degraded business environment. From the perspective of non-trivial costs, increased economic uncertainty can raise concerns about business survival and lead to conservative philanthropic strategies. Following the proverb “prosperity makes friends, adversity tries them,” at the provincial level, our results support the second perspective. Specifically, when the spread (...) of the pandemic worsens in a province, local firms are less likely to make COVID-19-related donations in terms of likelihood and amount. Investors also react negatively, not only to the local spread of COVID-19 but also to COVID-19-related philanthropic donations. At the organizational level, our evidence indicates that there is at least some level of cost–benefit analysis underlying corporate philanthropic decisions. Specifically, corporate philanthropic donations, especially those made to the local business environment, are significantly affected by organizational-level factors, such as pre-existing resource availability and motives to acquire political and reputational resources. Overall, our multilevel study presents a comprehensive picture of corporate philanthropic decisions amid the COVID-19 crisis. (shrink)

Historians of science have long believed that Abraham Trembley’s celebrity and impact were attributable chiefly to the incredible regenerative phenomena demonstrated by the polyp, which he discovered in 1744, and to the new experimental method he devised to investigate them. This essay shows that experimental method alone cannot account for Trembley’s success and influence; nor are the marvels of the polyp sufficient to explain its scientific and cultural impact. Experimental method was but one element in a new conception of the (...) laboratory that called for both experimental and para‐experimental skills whose public availability depended on a new style of communication. The strategy of generosity that led Trembley to dispatch polyps everywhere enabled experimental naturalist laboratories to spread throughout Europe, and the free circulation of living objects for scientific research led practitioners to establish an experimental field distinct from mechanical physics. Scholars reacted to the marvels of the polyp by strengthening the boundaries between the public and academic spheres and, in consequence, opened a space for new standards in both scientific work and the production of celebrity.… comme l’Auteur de l’Histoire des Polypes, il a passé de plein vol à l’immortalité.—Julien Offrey de La Mettrie … comme l’Auteur de l’Histoire des Polypes, il a passé de plein vol à l’immortalité.—Julien Offrey de La Mettrie. (shrink)

Brand rumors can harm brands’ image and bring significant impacts on customers’ decision-making and sharing behavior. Finding practical strategies for preventing the spread of brand rumors continues to be a challenge. Building on the social contagion theory, the current research enriches the discussion on understanding why people spread rumors and how to deal with the spreading of rumors. Sharing brand rumors is motivated by a variety of complex psychological reasons, but prior research didn’t adequately analyze the problem from (...) a complexity perspective. Therefore, using a sample of 416 interviewers within eight types of brand rumors, this study employs fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis to investigate the combination of rumor psychological communication motivations in brand activities and solutions to prevent the spread of brand rumors. The current study discoveries three and two first-level configurational solutions, respectively, that can promote positive and negative rumor spreading. To summarize, emotional stimulation is a key component in the spread of rumors; altruism and relationship management motivation can coexist at times; and untrusted rumors are disseminated through other motivation factors. Solutions to prevent rumors from spreading are also provided. Furthermore, the findings help to understand the psychology of configurational motivation and how it can help brands reduce the spread of brand rumors. Finally, these discoveries’ theoretical contributions and practical implications are presented. (shrink)

This paper examines social determinants of resource competition among Tsimane Amerindian women of Bolivia. We introduce a semi-anonymous experiment (the Social Strategy Game) designed to simulate resource competition among women. Information concerning dyadic social relationships and demographic data were collected to identify variables influencing resource competition intensity, as measured by the number of beads one woman took from another. Relationship variables are used to test how the affiliative or competitive aspects of dyads affect the extent of prosociality in the game. (...) Using a mixed-modeling procedure, we find that women compete with those with whom they are quarreling over accusations of meat theft, mate competition, and rumor spreading. They also compete with members of their social network and with those who were designated as cooperative helpers or as close kin. Women take fewer beads from desired friends, neighbors, and from those viewed as enemies. We interpret favoritism toward enemies as resulting from fear of retribution. Our results suggest that social relations among women are multifaceted and often cannot be simplified by exclusive focus on genetic relatedness, physical proximity, or reciprocity. We argue that a complex understanding of cooperation and competition among women may require important contextual information concerning relationship history in addition to typical features of resource ecology. (shrink)

Despite several research on HIV/aids, it is still incumbent to investigate more effective control measures to mitigate its infection level. Therefore, we introduce an HIV/aids-resistant model with behavior change and study its basic properties. In order to determine the most sensitive parameters that are responsible for disease transmission with respect to the basic reproduction number and those responsible for disease prevalence with respect to the endemic equilibrium, the sensitivity analysis was established and it was confirmed that the influx rate of (...) people into the infected population and total abstinence from all risk practices and endemic areas are some of the most sensitive parameters for disease spread and disease eradication, respectively. Furthermore, by considering controls u1\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$u_1$$\end{document} denoting the government’s intervention in promoting and encouraging behavior change, u2\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$u_2$$\end{document} representing intake of balanced nutritional supplementation, and u3\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$u_3$$\end{document} connoting antiretroviral therapy (ART), an optimal control problem was developed and analyzed. Before the establishment of the necessary conditions of the optimal control using Pontryagin’s Maximum Principle, we proved the existence of the optimal control triplet (u1(t),u2(t),u3(t)∈Φ,\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$(u_1(t),u_2(t),u_3(t)\in \Phi,$$\end{document} where Φ\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$\Phi$$\end{document} is the control set at time t,) which has been neglected by many researchers in recent years. Using the Runge–Kutta scheme, the optimal control problem was solved to understand the best combination of control strategies. Using the demographic and epidemiological data for South Africa on HIV/aids, a numerical simulation was carried out and results are presented on 3D surface plots. The obtained results suggested that the combination of all the considered control measures is the best method to ensure disease eradication. (shrink)

It has been demonstrated that the propagation of information and awareness regarding a disease can assist in containing the outbreak of epidemics. Previous models for this coevolving usually introduced the dependence between these two processes by setting a lower but time-independent infection rate for individuals with awareness. However, a realistic scenario can be more complicated, as individual vigilance and the adopted protective measures may depend on the extent of the discussion on the disease, whereas individuals may be irrational or lack (...) relevant knowledge, leading to improper measures being taken. These can introduce a time-varying dependence between epidemic dynamics and awareness prevalence and may weaken the effect of spreading awareness in containing a pandemic. To better understand this effect, we introduce a nonlinear dependence of the epidemic infection rate on awareness prevalence, focusing on the effect of different forms of dependence on the coevolving dynamics. We demonstrate that a positive correlation between vigilance and awareness prevalence can enhance the effect of information spreading in suppressing epidemics. However, this enhancement can be weakened if some individuals are irrational. Our results demonstrate the importance of rational behavior in the strategy of containing epidemics by propagation of disease information. (shrink)

Since the outbreak of the novel coronavirus disease at the beginning of December 2019, there have been more than 28.69 million cumulative confirmed cases worldwide as of 12th September 2020, affecting over 200 countries and regions with more than 920,463 deaths. The COVID-19 pandemic has been sweeping worldwide with unexpected rapidity. In this paper, a hybrid modelling strategy based on tessellation structure- configured SEIR model is adopted to estimate the scale of the pandemic spread. Building on the data pertaining to (...) the global pandemic transmission over the last six months around the world, key impact factors in the transmission and control procedure have been analysed, including isolation rate, number of the infected cases before taking prevention measures, degree of contact scope, and medical level, so as to capture the fundamental factor influencing the pandemic. The quantitative evaluation allowed us to illustrate the magnitude of risks of pandemic and to recommend appropriate national health policy of prevention measures for effectively controlling both intra- and interregional pandemic spread. Our modelling results clearly indicate that the early-stage preventive measures are the most effective action to be taken to contain the pandemic spread of the highly contagious nature of the COVID-19. (shrink)

The book takes a critical look at the phenomenon of disinformation by identifying the historical, technological and human elements that contribute to the current success of disinformation strategies. The author examines the origin of the word "Dezinformatsiya", used by Russian planners in the 1950s, to understand how military strategy has transformed into militarization of information. The book pays particular attention to the power of algorithmic platforms on the selection and dissemination of digital content and their role in the spread (...) of misinformation. This influences traditional editorial practices, disintermediating the production and distribution of news and amplifying a particular human cognitive mechanism: confirmation bias. The author investigates the Italian case to identify general archetypes, and typical and salient elements of disinformation strategies. The results offer a further interpretative aspect to studying disinformation, which represents a fracture in the digital public sphere, a kind of irrational object circulating in a space believed to be governed by rational engagement norms. The book conclusively shows how polarizing narratives used in disinformation strategies are the expression of complex ideological undergrowth embodied in extremes of the political spectrum. This highly topical book is for students and researchers from across the social sciences and media interested in the disinformation phenomenon. (shrink)

This paper is motivated by the need to respond to the spread of influential misinformation and manufactured ignorance, which places pressure on the work of experts in various sectors. To meet this need, the paper discusses the conditions required for expert testimony to evolve a reconceptualisation of negative capability as a new form of epistemic humility. In this regard, professional knowledge formation is not considered to be separate from the institutional and social processes and values that uphold its production. Drawing (...) attention to the structural and relational aspects of ignorance, as opposed to the individualistic and internal aspects, we rely on the sociology of knowledge, the social epistemologies and the feminist epistemologies that have played a fundamental role in the development of the investigation of ignorance. First, we analyse the criteria for epistemic humility based on prior theoretical discussions concerning negative knowledge as a form of reflective practice. Then, we seek to determine what kinds of strategies, virtues and skills experts need to have so as to ‘manage ignorance’ in socially complex situations. Finally, we suggest the reformulation of negative expertise as a phronetic skill for navigating through situations of ignorance and uncertainty in an epistemically and socially responsible manner. (shrink)

Understanding firms' interfaces with the community has become a familiar strategic concern for both firms and non-profit organizations. However, it is still not clear when different community engagement strategies are appropriate or how such strategies might benefit the firm and community. In this review, we examine when, how and why firms benefit from community engagement strategies through a systematic review of over 200 academic and practitioner knowledge sources on the antecedents and consequences of community engagement strategy. We (...) analytically describe evidence on the rise of the community engagement strategy literature over time, its geographical spread and methodological evolution. A foundational concept underlying many studies is the ' continuum of community engagement'. We build on this continuum to develop a typology of three engagement strategies: transactional, transitional and transformational engagement. By identifying the antecedents and outcomes of the three strategies, we find that the payoffs from engagement are largely longer-term enhanced firm legitimacy, rather than immediate cost-benefit improvements. We use our systematic review to draw implications for future research and managerial practice. (shrink)

Social media platforms have been rapidly increasing the number of informational labels they are appending to user-generated content in order to indicate the disputed nature of messages or to provide context. The rise of this practice constitutes an important new chapter in social media governance, as companies are often choosing this new “middle way” between a laissez-faire approach and more drastic remedies such as removing or downranking content. Yet information labeling as a practice has, thus far, been mostly tactical, reactive, (...) and without strategic underpinnings. In this paper, we argue against defining success as merely the curbing of misinformation spread. The key to thinking about labeling strategically is to consider it from an epistemic perspective and to take as a starting point the “social” dimension of online social networks. The strategy we articulate emphasizes how the moderation system needs to improve the epistemic position and relationships of platform users — i.e., their ability to make good judgements about the sources and quality of the information with which they interact on the platform — while also appropriately respecting sources, seekers, and subjects of information. A systematic and normatively grounded approach can improve content moderation efforts by providing clearer accounts of what the goals are, how success should be defined and measured, and where ethical considerations should be taken into consideration. We consider implications for the policies of social media companies, propose new potential metrics for success, and review research and innovation agendas in this regard. (shrink)

Evolutionary game theory and public goods games offer an important framework to understand cooperation during pandemics. From this perspective, the COVID-19 situation can be conceptualized as a dilemma where people who neglect safety precautions act as free riders, because they get to enjoy the benefits of decreased health risk from others’ compliance with policies despite not contributing to or even undermining public safety themselves. At the same time, humans appear to carry a suite of evolved psychological mechanisms aimed at curbing (...) free riding in order to ensure the continued provision of public goods, which can be leveraged to develop more effective measures to promote compliance with regulations. We also highlight factors beyond free riding that reduce compliance rates, such as the emergence of conspiratorial thinking, which seriously undermine the effectiveness of measures to suppress free riding. Together, the current paper outlines the social dynamics that occur in public goods dilemmas involving the spread of infectious disease, highlights the utility and limits of evolutionary game-theoretic approaches for COVID-19 management, and suggests novel directions based on emerging challenges to cooperation. (shrink)

This manuscript considers the transmission dynamics of lymphatic filariasis with some intervention strategies in place. Unlike previously developed models, our model takes into account both the exposed and infected classes in both the human and mosquito populations, respectively. We also consider vaccinated, treated and recovered humans in the presented model. The global dynamics of the proposed model are completely determined by the basic and effective reproduction numbers. We then use Lyapunov function theory to find the sufficient conditions for global (...) stability of both the disease-free equilibrium and endemic equilibrium. The Lyapunov functions show that when the basic reproduction number is less than or equal to unity, the disease-free equilibrium is globally asymptotically stable, and when it is greater than unity then the endemic equilibrium is also globally asymptotically stable. Finally, numerical simulations are carried out to investigate the effects of the intervention strategies and key parameters to the spread of lymphatic filariasis. The numerical simulations support the analytical results and illustrate possible model behavioral scenarios. (shrink)

A compartmental model is described for the spread of Gambian sleeping sickness in a spatially heterogeneous environment in which vector and human populations migrate between two "patches": the village and the plantations. The number of equilibrium points depends on two "summary parameters": gr the proportion removed among human infectives, and R0, the basic reproduction number. The origin is stable for R0 1. Control strategies are assessed by studying the mix of vector control between the two patches that bring R0 (...) below 1. The results demonstrate the importance of vector control in the plantations. For example if 20 percent of flies are in the village and the blood meal rate in the village is 10 percent, then a 20 percent added vector mortality in the village must be combined with a 9 percent added mortality in the plantations in order to bring R0 below 1. The results are quite insentive to the blood meal rate in the village. Optimal strategies (that minimize the total number of flies trapped in both patches) are briefly discussed. (shrink)

A new multi-stage deterministic model for the transmission dynamics of syphilis, which incorporates disease transmission by individuals in the early latent stage of syphilis infection and the reversions of early latent syphilis to the primary and secondary stages, is formulated and rigorously analysed. The model is used to assess the population-level impact of preventive and therapeutic measures against the spread of the disease in a community. It is shown that the disease-free equilibrium of the model is globally-asymptotically stable whenever the (...) associated control reproduction number is less than unity. A special case of the model is shown to have a unique and globally-asymptotically stable endemic equilibrium whenever the associated reproduction number exceeds unity. Uncertainty and sensitivity analysis of the model, using parameter values and ranges relevant to syphilis transmission dynamics in Nigeria, show that the top three parameters that drive the syphilis infection are the disease transmission rate, compliance in condom use and efficacy of condom. Numerical simulations of the model show that the targeted treatment of secondary syphilis cases is more effective than the targeted treatment of individuals in the primary or early latent stage of syphilis infection. (shrink)

Horizontal gene transfer (HGT) is a major mechanism responsible for the spread of antibiotic resistance. Conversely, it is often assumed that antibiotics promote HGT. Careful dissection of the literature, however, suggests a lack of conclusive evidence supporting this notion in general. This is largely due to the lack of well‐defined quantitative experiments to address this question in an unambiguous manner. In this review, we discuss the extent to which HGT is responsible for the spread of antibiotic resistance and examine what (...) is known about the effect of antibiotics on the HGT dynamics. We focus on conjugation, which is the dominant mode of HGT responsible for spreading antibiotic resistance on the global scale. Our analysis reveals a need to design experiments to quantify HGT in such a way to facilitate rigorous data interpretation. Such measurements are critical for developing novel strategies to combat resistance spread through HGT. -/- . (shrink)

The spreading of COVID-19 misinformation on social media could have severe consequences on people's behavior. In this paper, we investigated the emotional expression of misinformation related to the COVID-19 crisis on Twitter and whether emotional valence differed depending on the type of misinformation. We collected 17,463,220 English tweets with 76 COVID-19-related hashtags for March 2020. Using Google Fact Check Explorer API we identified 226 unique COVID-19 false stories for March 2020. These were clustered into six types of misinformation. Applying (...) the 226 classifiers to the Twitter sample we identified 690,004 tweets. Instead of running the sentiment on all tweets we manually coded a random subset of 100 tweets for each classifier to increase the validity, reducing the dataset to 2,097 tweets. We found that only a minor part of the entire dataset was related to misinformation. Also, misinformation in general does not lean towards a certain emotional valence. However, looking at comparisons of emotional valence for different types of misinformation uncovered that misinformation related to “virus” and “conspiracy” had a more negative valence than “cures,” “vaccine,” “politics,” and “other.” Knowing from existing studies that negative misinformation spreads faster, this demonstrates that filtering for misinformation type is fruitful and indicates that a focus on “virus” and “conspiracy” could be one strategy in combating misinformation. As emotional contexts affect misinformation spreading, the knowledge about emotional valence for different types of misinformation will help to better understand the spreading and consequences of misinformation. (shrink)

The spread of the COVID-19 virus shows that it is time to re-emphasize the ethical attitude of “awe of others, awe of nature, and awe of life.” It once again reveals the importance of green development. In this study, we introduce awe into the context of COVID-19 and construct an “emotion-motivation-behavior” framework, aiming to explore the relationship between the epidemic and green purchasing behavior from a psychological perspective. Study 1 demonstrates the effect of awe on green purchasing and examines the (...) mediating role of the motivation perspective, to reveal the potential different path. Specifically, prosocial motivation mediates the effect of positive awe evoked by COVID-19 on green purchasing; risk avoidance motivation mediates the effect of negative awe evoked by COVID-19 on green purchasing. Study 2 examined the moderating effect of self-construal. These findings have important management implications for enterprises to correctly use emotional guidance strategies and promote green marketing practices during the COVID-19. (shrink)

Based on a rather simple thesis that we can learn from our mistakes, Karl Popper developed a falsificationist epistemology in which knowledge grows through falsifying, or criticizing, our theories. According to him, knowledge, especially scientific knowledge, progresses through conjectures that are controlled by criticism, or attempted refutations . As he puts it, ‘Criticism of our conjectures is of decisive importance: by bringing out our mistakes it makes us understand the difficulties of the problem which we are trying to solve. This (...) is how we become better acquainted with our problem, and able to propose more mature solutions: the very refutation of a theory ... is always a step forward that takes us nearer to the truth. And this is how we can learn from our mistakes’ . Since criticism plays such a crucial role in Popper's falsificationist methodology, it seems natural to envisage his heuristic as a helpful resource for developing critical thinking. However, there is much controversy in the psychological literature over the feasibility and utility of his falsificationism as a heuristic. In this paper, I first consider Popper's falsificationism within the framework of his critical rationalism, elucidating three core and interrelated concepts, viz. fallibilism, criticism, and verisimilitude. Then I argue that the implementation of Popper's falsificationism means exposing to criticism various philosophical presuppositions that work against criticism, such as essentialism, instrumentalism, and conventionalism; it also means combating what seems a common tendency of humans to be biased towards confirmation. I examine the confirmation bias, to which Popper did not give much attention: its pervasiveness and various guises, some theoretical explanations for it, and the role of teachers in undermining its strength and spread. Finally, I consider the question whether students can and should be taught to use disconfirmatory strategies for solving problems. (shrink)

The global spread of corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices is widely explained in institutional-isomorphic terms: Corporations worldwide adopt CSR in reaction to isomorphic pressures exerted on them by a pro-CSR global environment, including normative calls for CSR, activist targeting, civil regulation frameworks, and educational activities. By contrast, this article considers the proactive agency of corporations in CSR diffusion, which is informed by nonmarket strategies that seek to instrumentally reshape the political and social environment of corporations. Applying a “channels-of-diffusion” perspective, (...) we show that in the initial phase of CSR’s transnational diffusion—as exemplified by the cases of Venezuela (1962-1967) and Britain (1977-1981)—CSR traveled through learning exchanges between business elite “exporters” and “importers” whose engagement in diffusion addressed crisis-enhanced political threats and opportunities in the receiving country. The focal agents established national CSR business associations, which disseminated among local corporations CSR practices adapted to confront the challenges at hand. We identify the features of such “business-led cross-national diffusions of CSR”; formulate propositions regarding their conditions, dynamics, and effects; and suggest that further research of this mode of diffusion would advance a more nuanced and balanced understanding of CSR’s globalization. (shrink)

In the evolutionary approach to the repeated prisoner's dilemma, strategies spread in populations of emulating and experimenting agents through the principle of survival of the fittest. Although no pure strategy is evolutionarily stable in such populations, the processes of differential strategy propagation provide a promising area of study. This paper employs computer simulations to uncover how these processes govern the oscillating and open-ended evolution of alternative forms of behaviour. Certain `ecological' relationships between important strategy types which are found to (...) be responsible for these behavioural shifts are explored. (shrink)

The 2019 coronavirus (COVID‐19), also known as SARS‐CoV‐2, is highly pathogenic and virulent, and it spreads very quickly through human‐to‐human contact. In response to the growing number of cases, governments across the spectrum of affected countries have adopted different strategies in implementing control measures, in a hope to reduce the number of new cases. However, 5 months after the first confirmed case, countries like the United States of America (US) seems to be heading towards a trajectory that indicates a (...) health care crisis. This is in stark contrast to the downward trajectory in Europe, China, and elsewhere in Asia, where the number of new cases has seen a decline ahead of an anticipated second wave. A data‐driven approach reveals three key strategies in tackling COVID‐19. Our work here has definitively evaluated these strategies and serves as a warning to the US, and more importantly, a guide for tackling future pandemics. Also see the video abstract here https://youtu.be/gPkCi2_7tWo. (shrink)

This paper discusses the role of cognitive factors in language change; specifically, it investigates the potential impact of argument ambiguity avoidance on the emergence of one of the most well-studied syntactic alternations in English, viz. the dative alternation. Linking this development to other major changes in the history of English like the loss of case marking, I propose that morphological as well as semantic-pragmatic ambiguity between prototypical agents and prototypical recipients in ditransitive clauses plausibly gave a processing advantage to patterns (...) with higher cue reliability such as prepositional marking, but also fixed clause-level order. The main hypotheses are tested through a quantitative analysis of ditransitives in a corpus of Middle English, which confirms that the spread of the PP-construction is impacted by argument ambiguity and demonstrates that this change reflects a complex restructuring of disambiguation strategies. (shrink)

To reduce the spread of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), Granich et al. 1 ( 2009 ) have proposed a new strategy for universal voluntary HIV testing immediately followed by antiretroviral therapy. Although this proposal is likely to benefit the partners of those affected and thus promote public health, it is by no means clear that it benefits the infected people themselves and indeed it may be harmful. Since the proposal involves an intervention that is not clinically indicated, it falls (...) foul of the normal ethical standards of clinical medicine, which is to act in the best interests of patients. Neither is it a measure that would be imposed under the protection of public health law on people who are seen as representing such danger to others that significant restrictions in liberty are appropriate. Thus, the proposal represents a third category of public health measure. We argue that a coherent ethical framework including a robust process is appropriate to proposals of this kind and that medical research offers a useful model since some research, like this proposal, is motivated not by the interests of the individual participants but by the common good. We outline some possible elements of such an ethical framework. (shrink)

The global spread of the novel coronavirus is affected by the spread of related misinformation—the so-called COVID-19 Infodemic—that makes populations more vulnerable to the disease through resistance to mitigation efforts. Here, we analyze the prevalence and diffusion of links to low-credibility content about the pandemic across two major social media platforms, Twitter and Facebook. We characterize cross-platform similarities and differences in popular sources, diffusion patterns, influencers, coordination, and automation. Comparing the two platforms, we find divergence among the prevalence of popular (...) low-credibility sources and suspicious videos. A minority of accounts and pages exert a strong influence on each platform. These misinformation “superspreaders” are often associated with the low-credibility sources and tend to be verified by the platforms. On both platforms, there is evidence of coordinated sharing of Infodemic content. The overt nature of this manipulation points to the need for societal-level solutions in addition to mitigation strategies within the platforms. However, we highlight limits imposed by inconsistent data-access policies on our capability to study harmful manipulations of information ecosystems. (shrink)

The current spread of democracy has not enabled the poor to use rights to win equity, raising questions about whether the poor and weak can use liberal democratic freedoms to address inequality. An oft-cited model of success, however, is the Treatment Action Campaign ’s campaign to press the South African government into distributing anti-retroviral medication to people living with HIV/aids. This article finds that TAC’s strategy of using the rights and rules of constitutional democracy to win gains may offer an (...) exemplar for forms of collective action which can win substantive equality, but that the model remains of limited application. (shrink)

To mitigate the spread of schistosomiasis, a deterministic human-bovine mathematical model of its transmission dynamics accounting for contaminated water reservoirs, including treatment of bovines and humans and mollusciciding is formulated and theoretically analyzed. The disease-free equilibrium is locally and globally asymptotically stable whenever the basic reproduction number R0<1\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$R_0<1$$\end{document}, while global stability of the endemic equilibrium is investigated by constructing a suitable Lyapunov function. To support the analytical results, parameter values from published (...) literature are used for numerical simulations and where applicable, uncertainty analysis on the non-dimensional system parameters is performed using the Latin Hypercube Sampling and Partial Rank Correlation Coefficient techniques. Sensitivity analysis to determine the relative importance of model parameters to disease transmission shows that the environment-related parameters namely, εs\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$\varepsilon _s$$\end{document} (snails shedding rate of cercariae), ps\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$p_s$$\end{document} (probability that cercariae shed by snails survive), c (fraction of the contaminated environment sprayed by molluscicides) and μc\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$\mu _c$$\end{document} (mortality rate of cercariae) are the most significant to mitigate the spread of schistosomiasis. Mollusciciding, which directly impacts the contaminated environment as a single control strategy is more effective compared to treatment. However, concurrently applying mollusciciding and treatment will yield a better outcome. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic has led a number of countries to introduce restrictive ‘lockdown’ policies on their citizens in order to control infection spread. Immunity passports have been proposed as a way of easing the harms of such policies, and could be used in conjunction with other strategies for infection control. These passports would permit those who test positive for COVID-19 antibodies to return to some of their normal behaviours, such as travelling more freely and returning to work. The introduction (...) of immunity passports raises a number of practical and ethical challenges. In this paper, we seek to review the challenges relating to various practical considerations, fairness issues, the risk to social cooperation and the impact on people’s civil liberties. We make tentative recommendations for the ethical introduction of immunity passports. (shrink)

As the crisis around Covid-19 evolves, it becomes clear that there are numerous negative side-effects of the lockdown strategies implemented by many countries. Currently, more evidence becomes available that the lockdowns may have more negative effects than positive effects. For instance, many measures taken in a lockdown aimed at protecting human life may compromise the immune system, and purpose in life, especially of vulnerable groups. This leads to the paradoxical situation of compromising the immune system and physical and mental (...) health of many people, including the ones we aim to protect. Also, it is expected that hundreds of millions of people will die from hunger and postponed medical treatments. Other side effects include financial insecurity of billions of people, physical and mental health problems, and increased inequalities. The economic and health repercussions of the crisis will be falling disproportionately on young workers, low-income families and women, and thus exacerbate existing inequalities. As the virus outbreak and media coverage spread fear and anxiety, superstition, cognitive dissonance reduction and conspiracy theories are ways to find meaning and reduce anxiety. These behavioral aspects may play a role in the continuance of lockdown decisions. Based on theories regarding agnotology (i.e. the ways ignorance or doubt about certain topics is created by means of withholding or presenting information in a certain way), social influence, superstition and stress and coping, I seek to explain the social and behavioral aspects of human behavior in times of crises. Both the Covid-19 crisis itself as well as the resulting economic and (mental) health crisis are global problems that may require global solutions. I present a model of drivers and outcomes of lockdown behaviors and offer suggestions and a tool to counteract the negative psychological effects by means of online life crafting therapeutic writing interventions. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic has been a sharp reminder that large scale, unpredictable events always bring about profound changes with significant consequences on many levels. In light of lockdown measures taken in many countries across the world to control the spread of the virus, academics were “forced” to adapt and move to online settings all teaching, mentoring, research, and support activities. Academic leaders in higher education had to make decisions and to act quickly how were they to manage large educational communities, (...) addressing students', teachers', and staff's needs, as well as society's needs. Using an inductive approach, our study seeks to highlight the main challenges faced by university leaders and to understand their responses to those challenges. The current study aims to investigate perceptions and experiences of academic leaders in a University in Romania during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our foci were the processes underlying their leadership decisions and actions during the second part of the 2019–2020 academic year. Data was collected through semi-structured interviews with 11 university and faculty leaders in Babeş-Bolyai University, Romania. The findings from the thematic analysis revealed three main themes emerging from participants' responses: “the leader's personal attributes,” “unity through decentralization,” and “opportunities to reinvent the university.” Good practices to manage academic institutions in times of crises and changes are discussed, along with insights into strategies for supporting higher education development during crisis and post-crisis times resulting into recommendations for increasing management effectiveness. (shrink)

What makes fast, cumulative cultural evolution work? Where did it come from? Why is it the sole preserve of humans? We set out a self-assembly hypothesis: cultural evolution evolved culturally. We present an evolutionary account that shows this hypothesis to be coherent, plausible, and worthy of further investigation. It has the following steps: (0) in common with other animals, early hominins had significant capacity for social learning; (1) knowledge and skills learned by offspring from their parents began to spread because (...) bearers had more offspring, a process we call CS1 (or Cultural Selection 1); (2) CS1 shaped attentional learning biases; (3) these attentional biases were augmented by explicit learning biases (judgements about what should be copied from whom). Explicit learning biases enabled (4) the high-fidelity, exclusive copying required for fast cultural accumulation of knowledge and skills by a process we call CS2 (or Cultural Selection 2), and (5) the emergence of cognitive processes such as imitation, mindreading and metacognition – ‘cognitive gadgets’ specialised for cultural learning. This self-assembly hypothesis is consistent with archaeological evidence that the stone tools used by early hominins were not dependent on fast, cumulative cultural evolution, and suggests new priorities for research on ‘animal culture’. (shrink)

In this paper, we argue that, in order to account for the apparently substantive nature of definitional disputes, a commitment to what we call ‘Socratic essentialism’ is needed. We defend Socratic essentialism against a prominent neo-Carnapian challenge according to which apparently substantive definitional disputes always in some way trace back to disagreements over how expressions belonging to a particular language or concepts belonging to a certain conceptual scheme are properly used. Socratic essentialism, we argue, is not threatened by the possibility (...) that some apparently substantive definitional disputes may turn out to be verbal or conceptual, since this pluralist strategy, in our view, requires a commitment to more, rather than fewer, essences. What is more, a deflationary, metaphysically ‘light-weight’ construal of the essence-ascriptions in question leads to a peculiar conception of the pursuit of metaphysicians as behaving like deceptive (or self-deceived) grammarians pretending to be scientists. Moreover, this deflationary attitude, we argue, spreads beyond metaphysics and philosophy more broadly to apparently substantive definitional disputes in the sciences as well as other in other disciplines, such as art criticism. (shrink)

The justification of induction is of central significance for cross-cultural social epistemology. Different ‘epistemological cultures’ do not only differ in their beliefs, but also in their belief-forming methods and evaluation standards. For an objective comparison of different methods and standards, one needs (meta-)induction over past successes. A notorious obstacle to the problem of justifying induction lies in the fact that the success of object-inductive prediction methods (i.e., methods applied at the level of events) can neither be shown to be universally (...) reliable (Hume's insight) nor to be universally optimal. My proposal towards a solution of the problem of induction is meta-induction. The meta-inductivist applies the principle of induction to all competing prediction methods that are accessible to her. By means of mathematical analysis and computer simulations of prediction games I show that there exist meta-inductive prediction strategies whose success is universally optimal among all accessible prediction strategies, modulo a small short-run loss. The proposed justification of meta-induction is mathematically analytical. It implies, however, an a posteriori justification of object-induction based on the experiences in our world. In the final section I draw conclusions about the significance of meta-induction for the social spread of knowledge and the cultural evolution of cognition, and I relate my results to other simulation results which utilize meta-inductive learning mechanisms. (shrink)

In the last 20 years or so, since the publication of a seminal paper by Watts and Strogatz :440–442, 1998), an interest in topological explanations has spread like a wild fire over many areas of science, e.g. ecology, evolutionary biology, medicine, and cognitive neuroscience. The topological approach is still very young by all standards, and even within special sciences it still doesn’t have a single methodological programme that is applicable across all areas of science. That is why this special issue (...) is important as a first systematic philosophical study of topological explanations and their relation to a well understood and widespread explanatory strategy, such as mechanistic one. (shrink)

The COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic raises a host of challenging ethical questions at every level of society. However, some of the most acute questions relate to decision making in intensive care. The problem is that a small but significant proportion of patients develop severe viral pneumonitis and respiratory failure. It now seems likely that the number of critically ill patients will overwhelm the capacity of intensive care units within many health systems, including the National Health Service in the UK. The experience (...) of Northern Italy—a couple of weeks ahead of the UK, suggests that it will simply not be possible to provide mechanical ventilation to every patient who might need it. When the crunch comes, the unpalatable question facing clinicians is which patient to save. There are some obvious strategies to avoid or reduce the problem—through measures to increase intensive care capacity, and via society-level interventions to reduce the spread of the virus. These are vitally important, but unfortunately they are unlikely to prevent the problem of demand outstripping supply from occurring. What, then, should clinicians do? How should they allocate the scarce resource of intensive care—particularly over the coming weeks as the crisis escalates? There are different values at stake in triage decisions, but at a basic level the key values are those of benefit and …. (shrink)

This article poses the question of the social and intellectual conditions for genuine social scientific internationalism, through an analysis of the worldwide spread of a new global vulgate resulting from the false and uncontrolled universalization of the folk concepts and preoccupations of American society and academe. The terms, themes and tropes of this new planetary doxa - `multiculturalism', `globalization', `liberals versus communitarians', `underclass', racial `minority' and identity, etc. - tend to project and impose on all societies American concerns and viewpoints, (...) thereby transfigured into tools of analysis and yardsticks of policy fit to naturalize the peculiar historical experience of one peculiar society, tacitly instituted as a model for humanity. The article suggests how the logic of the international circulation of ideas, the transformations of the academic field, the strategies of foundations and publishers, and of local collaborators in global conceptual `import-export' converge to foster a particularly powerful and pernicious form of cultural imperialism of which academics are at once perpetrators and victims. (shrink)

Many epidemics consist in individuals spreading infection to others. From the population perspective, they also have population characteristics important in modeling, explaining, and intervening in epidemics. I analyze epidemiology’s contemporary population perspective through the example of epidemics by examining two central principles attributed to Geoffrey Rose: a distinction between the causes of cases and the causes of incidence, and between “high-risk” and “population” strategies of prevention. Both principles require revision or clarification to capture the sense in which they (...) describe distinct perspectives on the same phenomenon, each perspective capturing a different level of contrastive analysis. (shrink)