Of the many proposals for inferring genetic regulatory structure from microarray measurements of mRNA transcript hybridization, several aim to estimate regulatory structure from the associations of gene expression levels measured in repeated samples. The repeated samples may be from a single experimental condition, or from several distinct experimental conditions; they may be “equilibrium” measurements or time series; the associations may be estimated by correlation coefficients or by conditional frequencies (for discretized measurements) or by some other statistic. This paper describes two (...) elementary statistical difficulties for all such procedures, no matter whether based on Bayesian updating, conditional independence testing, or other machine learning procedures such as simulated annealing or neural net pruning. One difficulty obtains if large numbers of cells are aggregated in a measurement of expression levels from a common population of cells; the other obtains if small numbers of cells are aggregated or if samples are separately aggregated over different populations of cells. (shrink)
This article studies the effects of social institutions on organizational corruption at the societal level by focusing on the possible interactions between the institutional pillars that have been identified in past research. Based on these three institutional aspects or pillars, this article tests the interactive effects of social institutions among societies throughout the world. The results suggest that the three institutional pillars have significant interactive effects on organizational corruption at the societal level. A discussion of the implications of the research (...) findings for researchers and practitioners is given. (shrink)
This essay is a critical theological and pastoral study of the Working Document of the Second African Synod. The article engages the articles in the document which deal with the theme of reconciliation. This essay begins by exploring the Christological and ecclesiological foundations for an African theology of reconciliation as found in the working document. While engaging the significant aspects of the working document which relate to articulating an African theology of reconciliation, this essay shows the limitations of the document (...) in its historical and cultural analysis of the situation in Africa. Drawing from a phenomenological hermeneutical engagement with African history, cultural grammar, and Christ-centered African Christian imagination, the essay widens the scope of theological engagement with the task of reconciliation in Africa. It does a theological aesthetics of reconciliation in Africa, by integrating diverse cultural, ontological, and Christological symbols within the African world on vital participation and vital union. Through the inculturation of vital participation as analogous to Trinitarian Communion, the essay shows how the Church in Africa can deal with the ever-revolving cycle of violence, conflicts, and divisions in the churches and political institutions which have all hampered the mission of building relationship and God's kingdom in Africa. The essay concludes by recommending four pastoral approaches through which the Catholic Church in Africa can be both a reconciled community and an instrument for reconciliation in Africa. (shrink)
In the Chinese stock market, special treatment (ST) firms are the firms listed as facing imminent danger of delisting, unless they return to profitability after reporting two consecutive annual losses. Some ST firms voluntarily pay substantial fees to their external auditors to conduct interim audits, which are not required by regulations. In this study, we investigate and find that ST firms that pay for voluntary interim audits report greater discretionary accrued earnings, higher non-operating earnings, and higher returns on assets in (...) ensuing annual reports. As a result, these firms are more likely to return to profitability and reduce their delisting risk. Our results, which contribute to the current debate on auditor independence, appear to be consistent with the possibility that ST firms “buy” external auditors’ cooperation to manipulate earnings when faced with the threat of delisting. (shrink)
Houston, Texas, is a major U.S. city with, like many, a growing aging population. The purpose of this study and ultimate book chapter is to explore the views and perceptions of long-term care (LTC) residents, family members and health care providers. Individuals primarily in independent living and group residential settings were interviewed and studied. Questions emphasized the concepts of personal autonomy, dignity, quality and location of care and decision making. Although a small sample of participants were involved, consistency was noted. (...) Keeping the elderly in caring and loving home situations (theirs or family) was most preferred. Personal choice and independence were emphasized by residents, but family members needed to act as advocates. We also noted that the legal system emphasizes family control over individual decision making as competency declines with aging. Optimal personal decision making in the residents' best interest also became more difficult with loss of individual mental capacity. (shrink)
Following a government campaign run by the Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) in 1994, many Hong Kong companies and trade associations adopted written codes of conduct. The research study reported here examines how and why companies responded, and assesses the impact of code adoption on the moral climate of code adopters. The research involved (a) initial questionnaire surveys to which 184 organisations replied, (b) longitudinal questionnaire-based assessments of moral ethos and conduct in a focal sample of 17 code adopting companies, (...) (c) interviews with 33 managers in the focal companies examining the adoption and impact of the codes, and (d) content analysis of 41 company codes of conduct, including those of most focal companies, plus the ICAC model code.While a mixture of prudential and altruistic reasons were given for code adoption, content analysis suggested that the prime motive was corporate self-defence. The prevailing themes were bribery, conflict of interest, insider information, gambling, moonlighting, accuracy of records and misuse of corporate assets. Wider social responsibility tended to be neglected. Companies appeared to have imposed their codes top-down, emphasising disciplinary procedures rather than ethics training, and appointing neither ethics counsellors nor ombuds-people. The longitudinal study over a seven month period suggested that while moral ethos may have declined, overall standards of perceived conduct had not changed. (shrink)
Motivation: One approach to inferring genetic regulatory structure from microarray measurements of mRNA transcript hybridization is to estimate the associations of gene expression levels measured in repeated samples. The associations may be estimated by correlation coefficients or by conditional frequencies (for discretized measurements) or by some other statistic. Although these procedures have been successfully applied to other areas, their validity when applied to microarray measurements has yet to be tested. Results: This paper describes an elementary statistical difficulty for all such (...) procedures, no matter whether based on Bayesian updating, conditional independence testing, or other machine learning procedures such as simulated annealing or neural net pruning. The difficulty obtains if a number of cells from a common population are aggregated in a measurement of expression levels. Although there are special cases where the conditional associations are preserved under aggregation, in general inference of genetic regulatory structure based on conditional association is unwarranted. Contact: tchu@andrew.cmu.edu.. (shrink)
We describe a unification of old and recent ideas for formulating graphical models to explain time series data, including Granger causality, semi-automated search procedures for graphical causal models, modeling of contemporaneous influences in times series, and heuristic generalized additive model corrections to linear models. We illustrate the procedures by finding a structure of exogenous variables and mediating variables among time series of remote geospatial indices of ocean surface temperatures and pressures. The analysis agrees with known exogenous drivers of the indices, (...) not assumed in the analysis. Automated search applied to the residuals after regressing each series on its lags and the lags of its Granger causes yields a graphical model of “comtemporaneous” causal relations identical with the qualitative graphical relations from the time series. A similar analysis produces reasonable results when applied to candidate climate indices obtained by a clustering method from sea surface temperature and sea level pressure data. (shrink)
We investigate the use of coalgebra to represent quantum systems, thus providing a basis for the use of coalgebraic methods in quantum information and computation. Coalgebras allow the dynamics of repeated measurement to be captured, and provide mathematical tools such as final coalgebras, bisimulation and coalgebraic logic. However, the standard coalgebraic framework does not accommodate contravariance, and is too rigid to allow physical symmetries to be represented. We introduce a fibrational structure on coalgebras in which contravariance is represented by indexing. (...) We use this structure to give a universal semantics for quantum systems based on a final coalgebra construction. We characterize equality in this semantics as projective equivalence. We also define an analogous indexed structure for Chu spaces, and use this to obtain a novel categorical description of the category of Chu spaces. We use the indexed structures of Chu spaces and coalgebras over a common base to define a truncation functor from coalgebras to Chu spaces. This truncation functor is used to lift the full and faithful representation of the groupoid of physical symmetries on Hilbert spaces into Chu spaces, obtained in our previous work, to the coalgebraic semantics. (shrink)
The debate over whether human nature is good or bad and how this is related to self-cultivation was central in the minds of traditional Chinese thinkers. This essay analyzes the interrelationship between the key concepts of xing 性 (human nature), qing 情 (human emotions/feelings), and xin 心 (heart-mind) in the Guodian text of the Xing Zi Ming Chu 性自命出 (Nature Derives from Mandate) discovered in 1993 in Hubei province. The intellectual engagements evident in this Guodian text emerge as more syncretic (...) and dynamic than those that can be found in the discourse of any single tradition, such as Gaozi, Mencius, or Xunzi. Its thesis on human nature and moral cultivation reveals the existence of a possibly more diverse intellectual discourse from which the different foci of philosophical debate represented by later thinkers developed. (shrink)
In both content and historical position, the “ Xing Zi Ming Chu ” is of obvious significance for understanding the development of classical Chinese philosophy, particularly Confucian moral psychology. This article aims to clarify one aspect of the text, namely, its account of human motivation. This account can be divided into two parts. The first describes human motivation primarily in passive terms of response to external forces, as emotions arise from our nature when stimulated by things in the world. The (...) second comes from the role of the heart, which takes a more active role in shaping our responses to the world. This article focuses on the role of the heart. At stake is the status of human agency, in particular, the degree to which the heart, through the formation of a stable intention, allows us to go beyond being simply pulled along by external forces. (shrink)
Yang Chu is a shadowy figure in classical China brought under philosophical scrutiny. By providing a physical definition of human nature, Yang Chu freed the Chinese elite from the public roles and relationships that defined them, making possible new nonpublic, nonritual forms of individual self-awareness and self-cultivation. The Yangists valorized private and family life at the expense of public, court life.
A theorem obtained by van Benthem for preservation of formulas under Chu transforms between Chu spaces is strengthened and derived from a general many-sorted interpolation theorem. The latter has been established both by proof-theoretic and model-theoretic methods; there is some discussion as to how these methods compare and what languages they apply to. In the conclusion, several further questions are raised.
This comparative study argues that both Aristotle and the Ch'eng-Chu School deny that a weak-willed person truly and clearly knows what is best at the time of action, but their analyses of a weak-willed person's knowledge are rather different. It is shown that both Aristotle and the Ch'eng-Chu School believe that practical knowledge presupposes repeatedly acting on it and thus that the defect of the weak-willed person's knowledge cannot be overcome by purely cognitive training.
Recognized as one of the greatest philosophers in classical China, Chu Hsi (1130-1200) is known in the West primarily through translations of one of his many works, the Chin-ssu Lu. In this book, Julia Ching offers the first book-length examination of Chu Hsi's religious thought, based on extensive reading of both primary and secondary sources. Ching begins by providing an introduction to Chu's twelfth-century intellectual context. She then examines Chu's natural philosophy, looking in particular at the ideas of the Great (...) Ultimate and at spirits and deities and the rituals that honor them. Next, Ching considers Chu's interpretation of human nature and the emotions, highlighting the mystical thrust of the theoretical and practical teachings of spiritual cultivation and meditation. She discusses Chu's philosophical disputes with his contemporariesin particular Lu Chiu-yuanand examines his relationship to Buddhism and Taoism. In the final chapters, Ching looks at critiques of Chu during his lifetime and after and evaluates the relevance of his thinking in terms of contemporary needs and problems. This clearly written and highly accessible study also offers translations of some of Chu's most important philosophical poems, filling a major gap in the fields of both Chinese philosophy and religion. (shrink)
The discovery of Hengxian and the formation of the category of hengxian are an important recapitulation and creative integration of the theory of the ontological Dao (Tao) in the Pre-Qin period. The cosmology of “self-creating and self-functioning” in Hengxian and the theory of “self-creating and self-evolving” in Liezi and Zhuangzi can be mutually interpreted. It indicates that the theory of transformation of qi entered a quite mature state in the Warring States Period.
I believe the material should be utilized as supplemental data for exploring Ch'en Liang's intellectual development.Ch'en's thought evolved through a tao-hsueh ...
