Desirability to characterize process capability

Over the past few years continuously new process capability indices have been developed, most of them with the aim to add some feature missed in former process capability indices. Thus, for nearly any thinkable situation now a special index exists which makes choosing a certain index as difficult as interpreting and comparing index values correctly. In this paper we propose the use of the expected value of a certain type of function, the so-called desirability function, to assess the capability of a process. The resulting index may be used analogously to the classical indices related to Cp, but can be adapted to nearly any process and any specification. It even allows a comparison between different processes regardless of their distribution and may be extended straightforwardly to multivariate scenarios. Furthermore, its properties compare favorably to the properties of the ?classical? indices. --

The Theory of Fuzzy Logic and its Application to Real Estate Valuation

Fuzzy logic is based on the central idea that in fuzzy sets each element in the set can assume a value from 0 to 1, not just 0 or 1, as in classic set theory. Thus, qualitative characteristics and numerically scaled measures can exhibit gradations in the extent to which they belong to the relevant sets for evaluation. This degree of membership of each element is a measure of the element’s "belonging" to the set, and thus of the precision with which it explains the phenomenon being evaluated. Fuzzy sets can be combined to produce meaningful conclusions, and inferences can be made, given a specified fuzzy input function. The article demonstrates the application of fuzzy logic to an income-producing property, with a resulting fuzzy set output.

Team 3: Exploring the relationship of systems research to systems literacy

In this paper, the Systems Research Team (SRT) details the activities and outcomes of the 2016 IFSR Conversation in Linz, Austria. The 2016 SRT includes: Mary Edson (team leader), Pam Buckle Henning, Tim Ferris, Andreas Hieronymi, Ray Ison, Gary Metcalf, George Mobus, Nam Nguyen, David Rousseau, and Shankar Sankaran, with guest team member, Peter Tuddenham, anchoring the endeavor in Systems Literacy. While the 2014 SRT’s focus was answering the question, “What distinguishes Systems Research from other types of research?” an internal focus intended to provide grounding for researchers new to the Systems Sciences, the 2016 SRT’s focus is on reaching out to a broader community in order to provide a foundation for Systems Literacy. The team’s Conversation revolved around the question, “How can Systems Research be in service to Systems Literacy?” The team’s discussions were directed into two essential aspects, separate and integrated, of this question. First, Systems Research serves Systems Literacy by providing a credible foundation for the principles and practices of Systems Science and Systems Thinking in both systematic and systemic modes. Second, Systems Research provides a neutral frame for development of ethical applications of those principles and practices. The SRT recognizes the exigency in providing foundational principles that can be effectively adopted and disseminated through Systems Literacy. The team’s narrative begins with an understanding the urgency for application of Systems Sciences and Systems Thinking to critical issues. Systems research, as with other types of research, is typically a slow generation of results; however, the body of knowledge gained through this process can be confidently used to address complexity in timely ways. The criticality of the need for salient approaches to complexity is shown in a graphic representation of some possible trajectories of applying or not applying these Systems principles in practice. The choice of how we respond to these issues relates to a process model that can be applied. Through understanding the relationship of the process model to the trajectory, the team directed its focus to developing a MindMap (Eppler, 2006) of eight essential aspects or features of how Systems Research can support Systems Literacy. These include: Systems Science knowledge base, roles and personas, maturity models, role profile, ontology/vocabulary, perspective/framing choice, frameworks, and political ecology. Each of these eight has its own process of unpacking, which was demonstrated to the Conversation participants by delving more deeply into the aspect of knowledge base. The eight relate to unpacking the Systems landscape in a coherent but loosely coupled investment portfolio (economic, social, and relational) for building systemic sensibility in such a way as to be dis/aggregated for different audiences. The week’s work culminated in a plan for “Looking Ahead,” which outlines the intentions of the SRT to continue its activities in support of Systems Literacy in the upcoming months. An example of this continued work is a workshop, “Toward Systems Literacy, the Role of Systems Research,” that was conducted at the 60th Meeting of the International Society for the Systems Sciences in Boulder, July 25, 2016

Roving vehicle motion control Quarterly report, 1 Mar. - 31 May 1967

System and subsystem requirements for remote control of roving space vehicle motio

Measures of Gross National Happiness

Happiness is rising on the political agenda and this calls for measures of how well nations perform in creating great happiness for a great number, analogous to measures of success in creating wealth, such as GDP. Happiness is defined as subjective enjoyment of one’s life as-a-whole and this can be measured using self-reports. Question on happiness are currently used in large scale surveys of the general population in nations. As a result we have now comparable data on happiness in 95 contemporary nations and time-series of 25 years and longer on 11 developed nations. These data can be aggregated in different ways: If the aim is simply greater happiness for a greater number of citizens, Average happiness (AH) is an appropriate measure. If the focus is on enduring happiness, it is better to combine average happiness with longevity in an index of Happy Life Years (HLY). If the aim is to reduce disparity among citizens a relevant indicator is the Inequality of Happiness (IH) in the nations as measured with the standard deviation. Average and dispersion can also be combined in an index of Inequality-Adjusted Happiness (IAH). Comparison across nations shows sizable differences on all these measures of gross national happiness and these differences correspond with societal characteristics that can be influenced by policy makers, such as freedom and justice. Comparison over time shows major improvement during the last decade.utilitarianism, happiness, cross-national, progress

Linking objective and subjective modeling in engineering design through arc-elastic dominance

Engineering design in mechanics is a complex activity taking into account both objective modeling processes derived from physical analysis and designers’ subjective reasoning. This paper introduces arc-elastic dominance as a suitable concept for ranking design solutions according to a combination of objective and subjective models. Objective models lead to the aggregation of information derived from physics, economics or eco-environmental analysis into a performance indicator. Subjective models result in a confidence indicator for the solutions’ feasibility. Arc-elastic dominant design solutions achieve an optimal compromise between gain in performance and degradation in confidence. Due to the definition of arc-elasticity, this compromise value is expressive and easy for designers to interpret despite the difference in the nature of the objective and subjective models. From the investigation of arc-elasticity mathematical properties, a filtering algorithm of Pareto-efficient solutions is proposed and illustrated through a design knowledge modeling framework. This framework notably takes into account Harrington’s desirability functions and Derringer’s aggregation method. It is carried out through the re-design of a geothermal air conditioning system

(WP 2018-01) Ethics \u3cem\u3eand\u3c/em\u3e Economics: A Complex Systems Approach

This chapter examines the nature of ethics and economics as a single subject of investigation, and uses a complex systems approach to characterize the nature of that subject. It then distinguishes mainstream economic and social economic visions of it, where the former assumes that market processes encompass social processes, and the latter assumes that market processes are embedded in social processes. For each vision, strong and weak theses are compared. Both visions are first explained in terms of their respective views of the positive-normative distinction, then in terms of a central normative principle, and then in terms of their policy strategies. The chapter closes with comments on the future status of ethics and economics as a single subject of investigation

Freedom, Opportunity and Wellbeing

This paper reexamines key results from the measurement of opportunity freedom, or the extent to which a set of options offers a decision maker real opportunities to achieve. Three cases are investigated: no preferences, a single preference, and plural preferences. The three co the cardinality relation, the indirect utility relation, and the effective freedom relation variations are considered within a common axiomatic framework. Special attention is given to representations of freedom rankings, with the goal of providing practical approaches for measuring opportunity freedom and the extent of capabilities.