Program explanations and causal relevance

Frank Jackson and Philip Pettit have defended a non-reductive account of causal relevance known as the ‘program explanation account’. Allegedly, irreducible mental properties can be causally relevant in virtue of figuring in non-redundant program explanations which convey information not conveyed by explanations in terms of the physical properties that actually do the ‘causal work’. I argue that none of the possible ways to spell out the intuitively plausible idea of a program explanation serves its purpose, viz., defends non-reductive physicalism against Jaegwon Kim’s Causal Exclusion Argument according to which non-reductive physicalism is committed to epiphenomenalism because irreducible mental properties are ‘screened off’ from causal relevance by their physical realizers. Jackson and Pettit’s most promising explication of a program explanation appeals to the idea of invariance of effect under variation of realization, but I show that invariance of effect under variation of realization is neither necessary nor sufficient for causal relevance.     

前缘弯掠斜流转子叶顶间隙流动特性数值分析

本文对前缘弯掠斜流转子叶顶间隙内的流动特性进行了数值分析。结果表明:叶顶间隙气流与主流发生卷吸而生成泄漏涡。泄漏涡作用的区域具有较低的压力分布。在叶片通道内,泄漏涡沿着与转子旋向相反的方向朝相邻叶片的压力面移动。大间隙时的泄漏涡比小间隙时强烈。低流量时泄漏涡的作用区域比高流量时大。在各种流量特性下,叶顶尾缘近吸力面区域都存在着二次间隙流。     

“神龙一号”注入器研制

“神龙一号”注入器是直线感应加速器的束流源，它采用了感应叠加的高压加载方式，包括脉冲功率系统、感应腔、阴阳极杆、绝缘支撑、二极管和束流传输系统等子系统. 在研制中采用了径向绝缘支撑、对中支撑调节系统、类Pierce阴极等先进技术，以及二极管线圈内置和外径为800mm的铁氧体大环等创新. 参数测试显示，3.5MeV注入器达到了世界先进水平.     

Order restricted randomized designs for control versus treatment comparison

We develop a method of randomizing units to treatments that relies on subjective judgement or on possible coarse modeling to produce restrictions on the randomization. The procedure thus fits within the general framework of ranked set sampling. However, instead of selecting a single unit from each set for full measurement, all units within a set are used. The units within a set are assigned to different treatments. Such an assignment translates the positive dependence among units within a set into a reduction in variation of contrasting features of the treatments. A test for treatment versus control comparison, with controlled familywise error rate, is developed along with the associated confidence intervals. The new procedure is shown to be superior to corresponding procedures based on completely randomized or ranked set sample designs. The superiority appears both in asymptotic relative efficiency and in power for finite sample sizes. Importantly, this test does not rely on perfect rankings; rather, the information in the data on the quality of rankings is exploited to maintain the level of the test when rankings are imperfect. The asymptotic relative efficiency of the test is not affected by estimation of the quality of rankings, and the finite sample performance is only mildly affected.     

When should you sack a football manager? Results from a simple model applied to the English Premiership

What strategy should a football (soccer, in American parlance) club adopt when deciding whether to sack its manager? This paper introduces a simple model assuming that a club's objective is to maximize the number of league points that it scores per season. The club's strategy consists of three choices: the length of the honeymoon period during which it will not consider sacking a new manager, the level of the performance trapdoor below which the manager get the sack, and the weight that it will give to more recent games compared to earlier ones. Some data from the last six seasons of the English Premiership are used to calibrate the model. At this early stage of the research, the best strategy appears to have only a short honeymoon period of eight games (much less than the actual shortest period of 12 games), to set the trapdoor at 0.74 points per game, and to put 47% of the weight on the last five games. A club adopting this strategy would obtain on average 56.8 points per season, compared to a Premiership average of 51.8 points.     

车前子中多糖含量的测定

采用蒽酮-硫酸法比色测定，用精制车前子多糖测得车前子多糖对葡萄糖的换算因子，对我国同属不同品种的车前子不同采集时间及炮制前后其多糖含量进行了比较研究。结果表明：此测定方法简便可行。供试液在8h内显色稳定，重现性较好，平均回收率为97．8％，RSD=1．41％(n=5)。江西吉安产大粒车前子生品多糖含量在9．15％～9．83％之间，炮制后其多糖含量在6．29％～6.81％之间；南昌新祺周车前GAP标准基地的大粒车前子生品多糖含量为7.85％～8．38％，炮制后其多糖含量为6．01％～6．64％；东北产的小粒车前子生品多糖含量为6．61％，炮制后其多糖含量为6．45％。     

On Bayes and unbiased estimators of loss

We consider estimation of loss for generalized Bayes or pseudo-Bayes estimators of a multivariate normal mean vector, θ. In 3 and higher dimensions, the MLEX is UMVUE and minimax but is inadmissible. It is dominated by the James-Stein estimator and by many others. Johnstone (1988, On inadmissibility of some unbiased estimates of loss,Statistical Decision Theory and Related Topics, IV (eds. S. S. Gupta and J. O. Berger), Vol. 1, 361–379, Springer, New York) considered the estimation of loss for the usual estimatorX and the James-Stein estimator. He found improvements over the Stein unbiased estimator of risk. In this paper, for a generalized Bayes point estimator of θ, we compare generalized Bayes estimators to unbiased estimators of loss. We find, somewhat surprisingly, that the unbiased estimator often dominates the corresponding generalized Bayes estimator of loss for priors which give minimax estimators in the original point estimation problem. In particular, we give a class of priors for which the generalized Bayes estimator of θ is admissible and minimax but for which the unbiased estimator of loss dominates the generalized Bayes estimator of loss. We also give a general inadmissibility result for a generalized Bayes estimator of loss. Research supported by NSF Grant DMS-97-04524.