Motile bacteria respond to environmental cues to move to more favorable locations. The components of the chemotaxis signal transduction systems that mediate these responses are highly conserved among prokaryotes including both eubacterial and archael species. The best‐studied system is that found in Escherichia coli. Attractant and repellant chemicals are sensed through their interactions with transmembrane chemoreceptor proteins that are localized in multimeric assemblies at one or both cell poles together with a histidine protein kinase, CheA, an SH3‐like adaptor protein, CheW, (...) and a phosphoprotein phosphatase, CheZ. These multimeric protein assemblies act to control the level of phosphorylation of a response regulator, CheY, which dictates flagellar motion. Bacterial chemotaxis is one of the most‐understood signal transduction systems, and many biochemical and structural details of this system have been elucidated. This is an exciting field of study because the depth of knowledge now allows the detailed molecular mechanisms of transmembrane signaling and signal processing to be investigated. BioEssays 28:9–22, 2006. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

The feasibility of reversing human aging within a matter of decades has traditionally been dismissed by all professional biogerontologists, on the grounds that not only is aging still poorly understood, but also many of those aspects that we do understand are not reversible by any current or foreseeable therapeutic regimen. This broad consensus has recently been challenged by the publication, by five respected experimentalists in diverse subfields of biogerontology together with three of the present authors, of an article (Ann NY (...) Acad Sci 959, 452–462) whose conclusion was that all the key components of mammalian aging are indeed amenable to substantial reversal (not merely retardation) in mice, with technology that has a reasonable prospect of being developed within about a decade. Translation of that panel of interventions to humans who are already alive, within a few decades thereafter, was deemed potentially feasible (though it was not claimed to be likely). If the prospect of controlling human aging within the foreseeable future cannot be categorically rejected, then it becomes a matter of personal significance to most people presently alive. Consequently, we suggest that serious public debate on this subject is now warranted, and we survey here several of the biological, social and political issues relating to it. BioEssays 24:667–676, 2002. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Electrical resistivity and ac-calorimetric measurements reveal a complex magnetic phase diagram for single crystals of the ferromagnetic Kondo-lattice compound CeAgSb2 at high pressures up to 80 kbar. The ferromagnetic order at TC = 9.6 K at ambient pressure is completely suppressed at a critical pressure PC = 35 kbar. Another magnetic transition, possibly antiferromagnetic, found above 27 kbar, attains a maximum value TN 6 K at 44 kbar and then appears to be completely suppressed by 50 kbar. Thermodynamic and transport (...) measurements in the ferromagnetic state indicate an energy gap Δ 30 K in the spin-wave excitation spectrum at ambient pressure which decreases to Δ 10 K at P = 30 kbar. No superconductivity is observed at ambient pressure above T 0.1 K, under applied pressure in the ferromagnetic state (P = 28.5 kbar), nor in the antiferromagnetic state (P = 33 − 46 kbar) above 0.3 K. © 2003 The American Physical Society. (shrink)

The feasibility of reversing human aging within a matter of decades has traditionally been dismissed by all professional biogerontologists, on the grounds that not only is aging still poorly understood, but also many of those aspects that we do understand are not reversible by any current or foreseeable therapeutic regimen. This broad consensus has recently been challenged by the publication, by five respected experimentalists in diverse subfields of biogerontology together with three of the present authors, of an article (Ann NY (...) Acad Sci 959, 452–462) whose conclusion was that all the key components of mammalian aging are indeed amenable to substantial reversal (not merely retardation) in mice, with technology that has a reasonable prospect of being developed within about a decade. Translation of that panel of interventions to humans who are already alive, within a few decades thereafter, was deemed potentially feasible (though it was not claimed to be likely). If the prospect of controlling human aging within the foreseeable future cannot be categorically rejected, then it becomes a matter of personal significance to most people presently alive. Consequently, we suggest that serious public debate on this subject is now warranted, and we survey here several of the biological, social and political issues relating to it. BioEssays 24:667–676, 2002. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

We prove that the statement “there is aksuch that for everyfthere is ak-bounded diagonally nonrecursive function relative tof” does not imply weak König’s lemma over${\rm{RC}}{{\rm{A}}_0} + {\rm{B\Sigma }}_2^0$. This answers a question posed by Simpson. A recursion-theoretic consequence is that the classic fact that everyk-bounded diagonally nonrecursive function computes a 2-bounded diagonally nonrecursive function may fail in the absence of${\rm{I\Sigma }}_2^0$.

James Rachels has argued that a morally autonomous person (in Kant’s sense) could not consistently accept the authority of divine commands. Against Rachels, this essay argues (a) that the Kantian concept of moral autonomy is to be analyzed in terms of an agent’sresponsiveness to the best available moral reasons and (b) that it is simply question-begging against divine command theory to assume that such commands could not count as the best moral reasons available to an agent.

This response reinforces several major themes in our target article: (a) the importance of sex-specific, within-sex variation in mating tactics; (b) the relevance of optimality thinking to understanding that variation; (c) the significance of special design for reconstructing evolutionary history; (d) the replicated findings that women's mating preferences vary across their menstrual cycle in ways revealing special design; and (e) the importance of applying market phenomena to understand the complex dynamics of mating. We also elaborate on three points: (1) Men (...) who have indicators of genetic fitness may provide more direct benefits when female demand for extra-pair and short-term sex is very low; (2) both men and women track ecological cues to make mating decisions; and (3) more research on female orgasm is needed. (shrink)

I am extremely grateful to all commentators for such patient, generous, and stimulating contributions. What follows are some thoughts to enrich the conversation, but these are by no means intended to be definitive answers to the worries they have raised.

Simple mass nouns are words like ‘water’, ‘furniture’ and ‘gold’. We can form complex mass noun phrases such as ‘dirty water’, ‘leaded gold’ and ‘green grass’. I do not propose to discuss the problems in giving a characterization of the words that are mass versus those that are not. For the purposes of this paper I shall make the following decrees: (a) nothing that is not a noun or noun phrase can be mass, (b) no abstract noun phrases are considered (...) mass, (c) words like ‘thing’, ‘entity’ and ‘object’ are not mass, (d) I shall not consider such words as ‘stuff’, ‘substance or ‘matter’, (e) measures on mass nouns (like ‘gallon of gasoline’, ‘blade of grass’, etc.) are not considered, (f) plurals of count terms are not considered mass. Within these limitations, we can say generally that mass noun phrases are those phrases that ‘much’ can be prefexed to, by ‘many’ cannot be prefexed to, without an0maly.l Semantically, such phrases usually have the property of collectiveness- they are true of any sum of things of which they are true ; and of divisiveness - they are true of any part (down to a certain limit) of things of which they are true. All of this, however, is only ‘generally speaking’ - I shall mostly use only the simple examples given above and ignore the problems in giving a complete characterization of mass nouns. In the paper I want to discuss some problems involved in casting English sentences containing mass nouns into some artificial language; but in order to do this we should have some anchoring framework on which to justify or reject a given proposal. The problem of finding an adequate language can be viewed as a case of translation (from English to the artificial language), where the translation relation must meet certain requirements. I shall suggest five such requirements; others could be added. (shrink)

At the end of the Sixth Book of the Republic Plato explains the Idea of Good by means of the Figure of the Sun. As the sun is the cause both of the becoming of that which is subject to becoming and of our apprehension of it and of its changes through the eye, so the idea of good is the cause of the being of that which is and also of our knowledge of it. As the sun is beyond (...) γxs22EFνεσις, so the Idea of Good is beyond Being. Glaucon says he does not understand. The simile is further elucidated by means of a line, divided into two parts, of which one stands for the νιητxs22EFν γxs22EFνος τε καxs22EF τxs22EFπος, where the Idea of Good bears rule, the other for the xs22EFρατxs22EFν γxs22EFνος τε καxs22EF τxs22EFπος, over which the sun is lord. The line is to be divided unequally , and subdivided in the same proportions. Thus we get a line consisting of four parts in the ratio 4 : 6 : : 6 : 9. Let us call the four parts A B C D respectively, A being the smallest, D the greatest, B and C necessarily equal. A stands for εxs1F31κxs22EFνες, shadows, images in water and on polished surfaces, and the like: B stands for animals, plants, and the creations of human industry: C for the objects of that enquiry in which the objects denoted by B are treated as images, i.e. mathematical enquiries: D for the objects apprehended by dialectic, the Ideas themselves. The first equation asserted is—The objects of opinion : objects of knowledge : : representation : original . There follows an explanation of the inferiority of mathematical to philosophical reasoning, and an explanation of the statement that the objects denoted by B are used as images or symbols by the enquiry concerned with C; as a result of which Glaucon perceives that the general distinction between C and D is that between the τxs22EFχναι , i.e. those sciences in which the Guardians were to be educated, and Philosophy or Dialectic. Finally a special πxs22EFθημα or affection of the soul is allotted to each of the four divisions of the line, to A εxs1F31κασxs22EFα, to B πxs22EFστις, to C διxs22EFνοια, to D νxs22EFησις, each πxs22EFθημα being clear in the same degree in which the objects it is concerned with are true. (shrink)

In ‘On Denoting’ and to some extent in ‘Review of Meinong and Others, Untersuchungen zur Gegenstandstheorie und Psychologie’, published in the same issue of Mind (Russell, 1905a,b), Russell presents not only his famous elimination (or contextual defi nition) of defi nite descriptions, but also a series of considerations against understanding defi nite descriptions as singular terms. At the end of ‘On Denoting’, Russell believes he has shown that all the theories that do treat defi nite descriptions as singular terms fall (...) logically short: Meinong’s, Mally’s, his own earlier (1903) theory, and Frege’s. (He also believes that at least some of them fall short on other grounds—epistemological and metaphysical—but we do not discuss these criticisms except in passing). Our aim in the present paper is to discuss whether his criticisms actually refute Frege’s theory. We fi rst attempt to specify just what Frege’s theory is and present the evidence that has moved scholars to attribute one of three different theories to Frege in this area. We think that each of these theories has some claim to be Fregean, even though they are logically quite different from each other. This raises the issue of determining Frege’s attitude towards these three theories. We consider whether he changed his mind and came to replace one theory with another, or whether he perhaps thought that the different theories applied to different realms, for example, to natural language versus a language for formal logic and arithmetic. We do not come to any hard and fast conclusion here, but instead just note that all these theories treat defi nite descriptions as singular terms, and that Russell proceeds as if he has refuted them all. After taking a brief look at the formal properties of the Fregean theories (particularly the logical status of various sentences containing nonproper defi - nite descriptions) and comparing them to Russell’s theory in this regard, we turn to Russell’s actual criticisms in the above-mentioned articles to examine the extent to which the criticisms hold.. (shrink)

In order for true beliefs acquired from reading fiction to count as knowledge proper, they must survive ‘the challenge from luck’. That is, it must be established that such beliefs are neither luckily true, nor luckily believed by readers. The author considers three kinds of true belief a reader may, she assumes, get from reading fiction: a) those based on testimony about empirical facts; b) those based on ‘true in passing’ sentences; and c) those beliefs about counterfactuals one may get (...) from reading a ‘didactic’ fiction. The first group escape the challenge from luck relatively easily, she argues. However, things turn out to be more complicated with the second group. The author examines Mitchell Green’s suggestion, effectively, that knowledge of fictional genre may see off the challenge from luck here, but rejects this in the form presented by Green, adapting it substantially to offer beliefs of this kind a more promising escape route. The author finishes by following Green’s lead once again, and discussing the category of ‘didactic’ fiction, as he calls it. She argues that any true beliefs about counterfactuals gained from such fictions are likely to be lucky. The author concludes however that things are much more promising for any true beliefs gained about oneself as a result of engaging with what Green calls an ‘interrogative’ fiction. (shrink)

There has long been a history of studies investigating how people (“ordinary people”) perform on tasks that involve deductive reasoning. The upshot of these studies is that people characteristically perform some deductive tasks well but others badly. For instance, studies show that people will typically perform MP (“modus ponens”: from ‘If A then B’ and ‘A’, infer ‘B’) and bi-conditional MP (from: ‘A if and only if B’ and ‘A’, infer ‘B’) correctly when invited to make the inference and additionally (...) can discover of their own accord when such inferences are appropriate. On the other hand, the same studies show that people typically perform MT (“modus tollens”: from ‘If A then B’ and ‘not-B’, infer ‘not-A’) and biconditional MT badly. They not only do not recognize when it is appropriate to draw such inferences, but also they will balk at doing them even when they are told that they can make it. Related to these shortcomings seems to be the inability of people to understand that contrapositives are equivalent (that ‘If A then B’ is equivalent to ‘If not-B then not-A’). [Studies of people’s deductive inference-drawing abilities have a long history, involving many studies in the early 20th century concerning Aristotelian syllogisms. But the current spate of studies draws much of its impetus from Wason (Wason, 1968; see also Wason & Johnson-Laird, 1972). ] The general conclusion seems to be that there are specific areas where “ordinary people” do not perform very logically. This conclusion will not come as a surprise to teachers of elementary logic, who have long thought that the majority of “ordinary people” are inherently illogical and need deep and forceful schooling in order to overcome this flaw. (shrink)

We report empirical results on factors that influence how people reason with default rules of the form "Most x's have property P", in scenarios that specify information about exceptions to these rules and in scenarios that specify default-rule inheritance. These factors include (a) whether the individual, to which the default rule might apply, is similar to a known exception, when that similarity may explain why the exception did not follow the default, and (b) whether the problem involves classes of naturally (...) occurring kinds or classes of artifacts. We consider how these findings might be integrated into formal approaches to default reasoning and also consider the relation of this sort of qualitative default reasoning to statistical reasoning. (shrink)

Different researchers use "the philosophy of automated theorem p r o v i n g " t o cover d i f f e r e n t concepts, indeed, different levels of concepts. Some w o u l d count such issues as h o w to e f f i c i e n t l y i n d e x databases as part of the philosophy of automated theorem p r o v i n g . (...) Others wonder about whether f o r m u l a s should be represented as strings or as trees or as lists, and call this part of the philosophy of automated theorem p r o v i n g . Yet others concern themselves w i t h what k i n d o f search should b e embodied i n a n y automated theorem prover, or to what degree any automated theorem prover should resemble Prolog. Still others debate whether natural deduction or semantic tableaux or resolution is " b e t t e r " , a n d c a l l t h i s a part of the p h i l o s o p h y of automated theorem p r o v i n g . Some people wonder whether automated theorem p r o v i n g should be " h u m a n oriented" or "machine o r i e n t e d " — sometimes arguing about whether the internal p r o o f methods should be " h u m a n - I i k e " or not, sometimes arguing about whether the generated proof should be output in a f o r m u n d e r s t a n d a b l e by p e o p l e , and sometimes a r g u i n g a b o u t the d e s i r a b i l i t y o f h u m a n intervention in the process of constructing a proof. There are also those w h o ask such questions as whether we s h o u l d even be concerned w i t h completeness or w i t h soundness of a system, or perhaps we should instead look at very efficient (but i n c o m p l e t e ) subsystems or look at methods of generating models w h i c h might nevertheless validate invalid arguments. A n d a l l of these have been v i e w e d as issues in the philosophy of automated theorem proving. Here, I w o u l d l i k e to step back from such i m p l e m e n t - ation issues and ask: " W h a t do we really think we are doing when we w r i t e an automated theorem prover?" My reflections are perhaps idiosyncratic, but I do think that they put the different researchers* efforts into a broader perspective, and give us some k i n d of handle on w h i c h directions we ourselves m i g h t w i s h to pursue when constructing (or extending) an automated theorem proving system. A logic is defined to be (i) a vocabulary and formation rules ( w h i c h tells us w h a t strings of symbols are w e l l - formed formulas in the logic), and ( i i ) a definition of ' p r o o f in that system ( w h i c h tells us the conditions under which an arrangement of formulas in the system constitutes a proof). Historically speaking, definitions of ' p r o o f have been given in various different manners: the most c o m m o n have been H i l b e r t - s t y l e ( a x i o m a t i c ) , Gentzen-style (consecution, or sequent), F i t c h - s t y l e (natural deduction), and Beth-style (tableaux).. (shrink)

Kathleen Stock on what we might mean when we talk about sexual objectification.

A intenção deste artigo é primàriamente exegética. Não pretende chegar a conclusães filosóficas substanciais nem fazer uma apreciação crítica. Pretende simplesmente esclarecer a versão de Russell quanto ao atomismo lógico, apresentando a sua teoria do juízo empírico num contexto histórico. A maior parte dos comentários contemporâneos falham neste ponto; contudo, afigura-se impossível compreender perfeitamente a teoria de Russell aeerca do conhecimento, bem como a Teoria das Descrições, como parte integrante daquela teoria, se não for encarada como uma tentativa para evitar (...) as consequencias de certas teorias alternativas do juízo. Pensa o autor que muitas críticas contemporâneas da Teoria das Descrições estão deslocadas, simplesmente por não conseguirem apreender o papel que aquela teoria devia desempenhar na análise russelliana do juízo empírico. A título de exemplo tenta o autor mostrar como as críticas de P. F. Strawson a respeito da Teoria das Descrições, como foram formuladas no seu artigo On Referring, não vêm a propósito (cf. Secção VT). A principal comparação histórica aqui apresentada refere-se à teoria idealista do juízo de F. H. Bradley. Contudo, parece também importante salientar o acordo que existe entre Russell e Bradley quanto a rejeitar como inadequado o tipo de análise do juízo apresentado por Leibniz e, numa primeira etapa da sua carreira, por G. E. Moore. Leibniz e Moore apresentaram, em moldes diversos, aquilo a que podíamos chamar teorias 'essencialmente genéricas' do juízo. Para Leibniz uma proposição é uma conexão analitica de conceitos, para Moore uma proposição é uma conexão sintética de conceitos. Tanto Russell como Bradley afirmam que é impossível formular uma teoria do juízo satisfatória, se concebermos a relação entre uma mente e uma proposição, implicada no juízo, como uma simples conexao de conceitos. O juízo deve ser apresentado como algo que implica experiência imediata pré-conceitual, experiência essa que, embora em si mesma não seja capaz de verdade ou falsidade, está pressuposta na própria possibilidade de qualquer juízo, verdadeiro ou falso, acerca da realidade. Dum modo geral, podíamos dizer que um juízo, cujo conteúdo é conceitual, é em virtude da experiência imediata que 'atinge a realidade' ('reaches right up to reality'). Contudo, embora Russell e Bradley concordem neste ponto, a análise da experiência imediata apresentada pelo primeiro é muito diferente da do segundo. Na medida em que se pode falar duma tese exegética positiva neste artigo, dir-se-ia que a análise russelliana da experiência imediata, contida na sua doutrina do 'conhecimento por experiência directa' dos particulares na sensação, é formulada especificamente (a) para ser compatível com a existência dum universo pluralista de particulares externamente relacionados e (b) para permitir uma versão da teoria de correspondência da verdade. Por outras palavras, a análise russelliana do juízo empírico, implicando necessàriamente um 'conhecimento por experiência directa' dos particulares na sensação, foi formulada especìficamente para evitar as consequências que, tanto Bradley como Russell, viram seeguir-se da análise idealista do juízo. Isto ilustra uma diferença fundamental entre o método filosófico de Russell e o de Bradley. Bradley aceita o monismo, a irrealidade das relações externas, e a teoria de coerência da verdade como consequência da sua teoria inicial do juízo. Russell, por outro lado, pensa que estas consequências se tornaram inaceitáveis perante a prática e as descobertas da ciência empírica; e tenta, por isso, construir uma teoria do juízo compatível com o tipo de metafísica e com a teoria da verdade, que lhe parece serem exigidos pela ciência empírica. (Resumo do Autor. Trad. A. M.). (shrink)

Die Reihe formaler Sprachen, die im Verständnis von M.J. Cresswell "sinnvoll" als Modelle für natüriiche Sprachen anzusehen sind und die dabei auch semantische Vagheiten zu erfassen gestatten, nämlich die dreiwertige Logik (U. Blau), die Superbewertung (B.C. van Fraassen, K. Fine, M. Pinkal, J. Ballweg) und die unscharfe Logik (L.A. Zadeh), legt nahe, daß bei der Sprachanalyse Zadehs "Prinzip der Inkompatibilität" gilt: Hohe Präzision ist inkompatibel mit hoher Komplexität. Je komplexer man das Vagheitsproblem angeht, desto verschwommener wird der benutzbare Geltungswert. Zudem (...) wird die Sprachanalyse auf Empirie verwiesen: Die Superbewertung erfordert eine Beschreibung von Kontexten, die unscharfe Logik eine sprachempirische Untersuchung aller Geltungswerte. (shrink)

Die Reihe formaler Sprachen, die im Verständnis von M.J. Cresswell "sinnvoll" als Modelle für natüriiche Sprachen anzusehen sind und die dabei auch semantische Vagheiten zu erfassen gestatten, nämlich die dreiwertige Logik (U. Blau), die Superbewertung (B.C. van Fraassen, K. Fine, M. Pinkal, J. Ballweg) und die unscharfe Logik (L.A. Zadeh), legt nahe, daß bei der Sprachanalyse Zadehs "Prinzip der Inkompatibilität" gilt: Hohe Präzision ist inkompatibel mit hoher Komplexität. Je komplexer man das Vagheitsproblem angeht, desto verschwommener wird der benutzbare Geltungswert. Zudem (...) wird die Sprachanalyse auf Empirie verwiesen: Die Superbewertung erfordert eine Beschreibung von Kontexten, die unscharfe Logik eine sprachempirische Untersuchung aller Geltungswerte. (shrink)

Both fairness and efficiency are important considerations in market design and regulation, yet many regulators have neither defined nor measured these concepts. We develop an evidencebased policy framework in which these are both defined and measured using a series of empirical proxies. We then build a systems estimation model to examine the 2003–2011 explosive growth in algorithmic trading on the London Stock Exchange and NYSE Euronext Paris. Our results show that greater AT is associated with increased transactional efficiency and (...) reduced information leakage in top quintile stocks. For less liquid stocks, manipulation at the close declines. We also document the tradeoff between reduced spreads and increased manipulation or information leakage following the introduction of MiFID1. (shrink)

The ‘Kantian ideal’ is often misunderstood as invoking individual autonomy rather than rational self-legislation. Le Morvan and Stock’s otherwise insightful discussion of ‘Medical learning curves and the Kantian ideal’, for example, draws the mistaken inference that that ideal is inconsistent with the realities of medical practice. But it is not. Rationally to be a patient entails accepting its necessary conditions, one of which is the ineliminable existence of medical learning curves. Their rational necessity, therefore, offers no grounds against a (...) Kantian understanding of how morality might function in the practgice of medicine. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine various popular notions concerning the ethics of investing. I first consider and reject the absolutist view that it is always wrong to invest in evil companies and the view that what makes investments in evil companies morally objectionable is the fact that by making such investments, investors are taking steps to benefit from the wrongdoing of others. I then defend the view that what makes certain investments morally objectionable is the fact that by making such (...) investments, investors enable others to do wrong. According to this view, when weighing the purchase of a certain company's stock, investors should ask themselves the following question: Would this sort of investment, if made by many people, enable others to do wrong? If the answer to this question is yes, and if an investor nevertheless makes the investment in question, he can justifiably be accused of moral wrongdoing. (shrink)

Financial relationships in academic research can create institutional conflicts of interest because the financial interests of the institution or institutional officials may inappropriately influence decision-making. Strategies for dealing with institutional COIs include establishing institutional COI committees that involve the board of trustees in conflict review and management, developing policies that shield institutional decisions from inappropriate influences, and establishing private foundations that are independent of the institution to own stock and intellectual property and to provide capital to start-up companies.

Issues of social justice underlie the clamour for greater gender balance in top-management. The present study reveals that pursuit of such social justice is also value-enhancing in relation to the longer-run performance of initial public offerings stocks, especially where female board members are unencumbered by family-connection with other directors. This study examines the economic benefits of board gender diversity for state- and privately controlled firms in the Hong Kong IPO market. Gender board diversity is much less common in state-run IPO (...) firms. Within the subset of privately controlled IPO firms, distinction exists between entities that accommodate family-connected board officers and those that do not. Specifically, this study focuses on family-ties between board members. This issue allows for finer-grained assessment of family influence on firm performance. Stronger post-listing stock, return-on-assets and sales-on-assets performance arise in privately controlled firms without family-connected board members and in state-run entities. Gender diversity thus serves as a positive, but only when female director presence is untrammelled by family associations between directors. However, there is little evidence of a link between female board representation and IPO underpricing. Relative to state-backed issuers, privately controlled firm boards accommodate more women, younger officers and a broader mix of nationalities, but appear more-inclined to unify CEO and chair positions. Board duality, the fraction of independent directors and directors’ age and nationality exhibit little relation with initial and aftermarket stock returns. In prescriptive terms, minority investors gain from the inclusion of female directors, especially when IPO firm directors are unencumbered by family-affiliation with other board members. Results therefore add to the clarion of calls for greater female board presence. (shrink)

Although the word 'sustainability' is used broadly, scientific approaches to sustainability fall into one of two competing paradigms. Following the influential Brundtland report of 1987. some theorists identify sustainability with some form of resource availability, and develop indicators for sustainability that stress capital depletion. This approach has spawned debates about the intersubstitutivity of capitals, with many environmental theorists arguing that at some point, depletion of natural capital cannot be offset by increases in human or social capital. The alternative approach is (...) grounded in stock and flow systems systems modeling, and defines sustainability through indicators that determine whether the system structure is robust (e.g. resists perturbation), resilient (recovers after disruption) and adaptive (capable of change in response to external conditions). Both paradigms have applications in economics and ecology. (shrink)

Corporations, which in the past have been hesitant to contribute to conversations regarding political and social issues, are increasingly speaking out on current issues such as race, sexual orientation, gender, immigration, and environmental issues. Despite this trend, limited academic research has focused on how corporate sociopolitical activism (CSA) efforts impact firm value. In addition, extant studies have not fully identified the extent to which the firm and their message influence the outcomes of this approach. The current study explores how sociopolitical (...) stances communicated on Twitter affect firms’ stock prices. Results from an event study of 260 incidents of CSA show that CSA efforts decrease firm value by an average of 0.22%, indicating that wading into social or political issues is a risky strategy. However, further analysis highlights the importance of clearly articulating stances on social issues that align with the firm’s core values. (shrink)

[1] You have a crystal ball. Unfortunately, it’s defective. Rather than predicting the future, it gives you the chances of future events. Is it then of any use? It certainly seems so. You may not know for sure whether the stock market will crash next week; but if you know for sure that it has an 80% chance of crashing, then you should be 80% confident that it will—and you should plan accordingly. More generally, given that the chance of (...) a proposition A is x%, your conditional credence in A should be x%. This is a chance-credence principle: a principle relating chance (objective probability) with credence (subjective probability, degree of belief). Let’s call it the Minimal Principle (MP). (shrink)

Simple Heuristics That Make Us Smart invites readers to embark on a new journey into a land of rationality that differs from the familiar territory of cognitive science and economics. Traditional views of rationality tend to see decision makers as possessing superhuman powers of reason, limitless knowledge, and all of eternity in which to ponder choices. To understand decisions in the real world, we need a different, more psychologically plausible notion of rationality, and this book provides it. It is about (...) fast and frugal heuristics--simple rules for making decisions when time is pressing and deep thought an unaffordable luxury. These heuristics can enable both living organisms and artificial systems to make smart choices, classifications, and predictions by employing bounded rationality. But when and how can such fast and frugal heuristics work? Can judgments based simply on one good reason be as accurate as those based on many reasons? Could less knowledge even lead to systematically better predictions than more knowledge? Simple Heuristics explores these questions, developing computational models of heuristics and testing them through experiments and analyses. It shows how fast and frugal heuristics can produce adaptive decisions in situations as varied as choosing a mate, dividing resources among offspring, predicting high school drop out rates, and playing the stock market. As an interdisciplinary work that is both useful and engaging, this book will appeal to a wide audience. It is ideal for researchers in cognitive psychology, evolutionary psychology, and cognitive science, as well as in economics and artificial intelligence. It will also inspire anyone interested in simply making good decisions. (shrink)

Wage inequality and land and labor insecurity are critical barriers to sustainable palm oil production among those employed in Indonesia’s small-farm sector. Palm oil contract farming, a pre-harvest agreement between palm oil farmers and transnational processors and traders, facilitates smallholder participation in global agro-commodities markets, improves smallholder livelihoods, and promotes local economic development in rural communities. But negative externalities in contract farming can emerge depending on whether corporate guarantors of contract-farm assets manage farmer assets equitably. This study explores how contract (...) farming agreements between smallholder farmers of palm oil and futures traders of palm stocks impact the long-term economic development of smallholder palm oil farming in Indonesia. We examined the relative impact of transnational palm oil corporations on smallholder assets in the Indonesian palm oil industry using annual financial data (2003–2019) from Indonesian commodities trading firms. Temporal trends indicated that oligopolistic market conditions were strongly associated with a growing comparative advantage in palm oil, the asymmetric accumulation of land resources by transnational firms, and excessive firm revenues from palm farmer activities. Our regression modelling results suggested that the comparative advantage in Indonesian palm oil was driven by state-oriented policies such that benefit palm traders but disadvantage smallholder farmers. And, through non-metric multidimensional scaling, we demonstrated that smallholder farmers were inefficiently used by firms to produce palm oil, but that smallholder assets were a significant driver to firm revenue growth. Notwithstanding the adverse consequences on palm farmers, these results indicate a set of unique effects of palm oil contract farming on land and labor security in Southeast Asia. The paper reasons that a system of inequitable contract farming is operating in the Indonesian palm oil industry, whereby smallholder palm oil farmers are trapped by transnational firms into socio-economic farming schemes of low oil yield and non-market activity, thus providing palm firms with lucrative non-market revenue streams. Large transnational trading firms are thereby implicated in the long-run commodification of smallholder land for marginal fruit production while exploiting a farmer’s non-market advantages through the manipulation of farmer assets. (shrink)

Since the 1970s, the application of microprocessor in industrial machinery and the development of computer systems have transformed the manufacturing landscape. The rapid integration and automation of production systems have outpaced the development of suitable human design criteria, creating a deepening gap between humans and systems in which human was seen as an important source of errors and disruptions. Today, the situation seems different: the scientific and public debate about the concept of Industry 4.0 has raised awareness about the central (...) role humans have to play in manufacturing systems, the design of which must be considered from the very beginning. The future of industrial systems, as represented by Industry 4.0, will rely on the convergence of several research fields such as Intelligent Manufacturing Systems (IMS), Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS), Internet of Things (IoT), but also socio-technical fields such as social approaches within technical systems. This article deals with different human social dimensions associated with CPS and IoT and focuses on their conceptual evolution regarding automated production systems’ sociability, notably by bringing humans back in the loop. Hereby, this paper aims to take stock of current research trends to show the importance of integrating human operators as a part of a socio-technical system based autonomous and intelligent products or resources. Consequently, different models of sociability as a way to integrate humans in the broad sense and/or the develop future automated production systems have been identified from the literature and analysed. (shrink)

The enormous destructive power of present stocks of nuclear weapons poses the greatest threat to public health in human history. Technical changes in weapons design are leading to an increased emphasis on the ability to fight a nuclear war, eroding the concept of deterrence based on mutually assured destruction and increasing the risk of nuclear war. Medical planning and civil defence preparations for nuclear war have recently been increased in several countries although there is little evidence that they will be (...) of significant value in the aftermath of a nuclear conflict. These developments have raised new ethical dilemmas for those in health professions. If there is any risk of use of weapons of mass destruction, then support for deterrence with these weapons as a policy for national or global security appears to be incompatible with basic principles of medical ethics and international law. The primary medical responsibility under such circumstances is to participate in attempts to prevent nuclear war. (shrink)

How does a country achieve a public capital market in which firms can raise capital from investors? In seeking clues and hypotheses, this article looks back to the dawn of the public corporation in the United States. The battles for control of the Erie Railroad, known as the "Scarlet Woman of Wall Street," a reference to its ill repute, stand at the symbolic center of these developments. The battles for control, which waxed and waned between 1868 and 1872, involved: the (...) titan of the transportation age, Cornelius Vanderbilt; the brilliant and notorious stock market manipulator and takeover entrepreneur, Jay Gould; the largest and most powerful railroad of the era, the Pennsylvania; control over rail transportation to New York City; and the politics and courts of New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. It was played out in the securities markets, the courts, the legislatures, and the newspapers and attracted the attention, and condemnation, of some of the leading commentators of the day. Rereading this history from the vantage point of the end of the twentieth century, several features are striking. First, the battles are remarkably familiar: they are recognizably modern battles for control over a widely-held corporation. Second, many of the tactics utilized are now illegal. Finally, surprising connections emerge between antitrust, federalism, and the emergence of public capital markets. (shrink)

Black and Gilson have argued that “venture capital can flourish especially – and perhaps only – if the venture capitalist can exit from a successful portfolio company through an initial public offering, which requires an active stock market.” But nothing in the Black and Gilson analysis requires that the exit option be a domestic capital market. In this article, I use the phenomenon of Israeli hi-tech companies going public on the Nasdaq as a case study to explore the connection (...) between a venture capital industry and domestic capital markets in a world of global capital and product markets. (shrink)

Both fairness and efficiency are important considerations in market design and regulation, yet many regulators have neither defined nor measured these concepts. We develop an evidencebased policy framework in which these are both defined and measured using a series of empirical proxies. We then build a systems estimation model to examine the 2003–2011 explosive growth in algorithmic trading on the London Stock Exchange and NYSE Euronext Paris. Our results show that greater AT is associated with increased transactional efficiency and (...) reduced information leakage in top quintile stocks. For less liquid stocks, manipulation at the close declines. We also document the tradeoff between reduced spreads and increased manipulation or information leakage following the introduction of MiFID1. (shrink)