Zadeh's Centenary

This is the introductory paper in a special issue on fuzzy logic dedicated to the centenary of the birth of Lotfi A. Zadeh published by International Journal of Computers Communications & Control (IJCCC). In 1965, Lotfi A. Zadeh published in the journal „Information and Control” the article titled „Fuzzy sets”, which today reaches over 117 thousand citations. The total sum of citations for all his papers is above 253 thousand. Based on the notion of fuzzy sets, fuzzy logic and the concept of soft computing emerged, bringing extremely important implications to the field of Artificial Intelligence (AI). In 2017, I published, whith F.G. Filip and M.J. Manolescu, a 42-page long paper in the IJCCC about the life and masterwork of Lotfi A. Zadeh, from which I will use some information in this material [15]

New Method for Real Option Valuation Using Fuzzy Numbers

Real option analysis offers interesting insights on the value of assets and on the profitability of investments, which has made real options a growing field of academic research and practical application. Real option valuation is, however, often found to be difficult to understand and to implement due to the quite complex mathematics involved. Recent advances in modeling and analysis methods have made real option valuation easier to understand and to implement. This paper presents a new method for real option valuation using fuzzy numbers that is based on findings from earlier real option valuation methods and from fuzzy real option valuation. The method is intuitive to understand and far less complicated than any previous real option valuation model to date.Real Options, Fuzzy Numbers, New Method

Fuzzy Transfer Pricing World: On the Analysis of Transfer Pricing with Fuzzy Logic Techniques

The arm’s length analysis of international transfer prices of multinational firms lacks sound methodological approach of the so-called function and risk analysis. In practice, such analyses are descriptive. Derived from Zadeh’s mathematical theory of fuzzy sets, this paper investigates a quantitative approach to identify the function and risk pattern of related parties of multinational companies. We illustrate our fuzzy logic approach with a simple case.

The posterity of Zadeh's 50-year-old paper: A retrospective in 101 Easy Pieces – and a Few More

International audienceThis article was commissioned by the 22nd IEEE International Conference of Fuzzy Systems (FUZZ-IEEE) to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of Lotfi Zadeh's seminal 1965 paper on fuzzy sets. In addition to Lotfi's original paper, this note itemizes 100 citations of books and papers deemed “important (significant, seminal, etc.)” by 20 of the 21 living IEEE CIS Fuzzy Systems pioneers. Each of the 20 contributors supplied 5 citations, and Lotfi's paper makes the overall list a tidy 101, as in “Fuzzy Sets 101”. This note is not a survey in any real sense of the word, but the contributors did offer short remarks to indicate the reason for inclusion (e.g., historical, topical, seminal, etc.) of each citation. Citation statistics are easy to find and notoriously erroneous, so we refrain from reporting them - almost. The exception is that according to Google scholar on April 9, 2015, Lotfi's 1965 paper has been cited 55,479 times

Challenging the Sustainable Social Progress

The Presentation held at the ceremony for granting the title of Doctor Honoris Causa of The West University in Timisoara is based on a paper which presents a synthetic view on some economic and financial issues of our times, considering especially the crisis of the last period, and mentioning a few remarkable ideas about the mentality of humankind. The author takes into consideration in a large view, regarding economy, some aspects of physics and of other fields of modern science, such as philosophy, including irreversibility of time, suitable for our full of uncertainty and complex reality, wishing to achieve goals related to solving the economic issues and to social progress.

An input relaxation model for evaluating congestion in fuzzy DEA

This paper develops a BCC input relaxation model for identifying input congestion as a severe form of inefficiency of decision-making units in fuzzy data envelopment analysis. The possibility approach is presented to obtain the models equivalent to fuzzy models. We use a one-model approach to determine input congestion based on the BCC input relaxation model. A numerical example is given to illustrate the proposed model and identify the congestion with precise and imprecise data. The proposed model is also used to determine the congestion in 16 hospitals using four fuzzy inputs and two fuzzy outputs with a symmetrical triangular membership function

A Possibilistic and Probabilistic Approach to Precautionary Saving

This paper proposes two mixed models to study a consumer's optimal saving in the presence of two types of risk.Comment: Panoeconomicus, 201

Integrating multi-criteria models and Geographical information system for cemetery site selection (a case study of the Sanandaj city, Iran)

The ever increasing urban population growth has created many implications in land use planning in the most of developing countries. Traditional methods of spatial planning are still useful, but they need to be upgraded according to new methodological, technological possibilities and full complexity of spatial planning. The factors which influence the urban structure and its socio-economic life are countless, and so to deal with a huge set of data, Geographic information system (GIS) techniques can help to organize and control the impact of different problems. Urban utilities are the vital elements to provide comfort and amenity for the residents. Clearly in many cases the inappropriate sitting of urban infrastructures has decreased the efficiency and sustainability of the cities. Today GIS as powerful processing means can provide different alternatives for land use planning. One of the most socio-religious urban land uses in Iran is cemetery. Traditionally cemeteries are located in the vicinity of a holy shrine or specified by the local authorities. However, these sites are suitable by the view of people and religious groups but they impose many physical problems such as poor health conditions or accessibility due to the rapid expansion of the city by the population increase.  This paper attempts to select a right site for a new cemetery in town Sanandaj, as the old one now has no empty space. The paper applies GIS and Analytic hierarchy process (AHP) techniques to find an appropriate area. The results show that the integrated GIS and AHP model has a high potential to compare different alternatives by investigating multi-criteria models and different factors which are involved in an urban utility site selection

Fuzzy Logic Is Not Fuzzy: World-renowned Computer Scientist Lotfi A. Zadeh

In 1965 Lotfi A. Zadeh published "Fuzzy Sets", his pioneering and controversial paper, that now reaches almost 100,000 citations. All Zadeh’s papers were cited over 185,000 times. Starting from the ideas presented in that paper, Zadeh founded later the Fuzzy Logic theory, that proved to have useful applications, from consumer to industrial intelligent products. We are presenting general aspects of Zadeh’s contributions to the development of Soft Computing(SC) and Artificial Intelligence(AI), and also his important and early influence in the world and in Romania. Several early contributions in fuzzy sets theory were published by Romanian scientists, such as: Grigore C. Moisil (1968), Constantin V. Negoita & Dan A. Ralescu (1974), Dan Butnariu (1978). In this review we refer the papers published in "From Natural Language to Soft Computing: New Paradigms in Artificial Intelligence" (2008, Eds.: L.A. Zadeh, D. Tufis, F.G. Filip, I. Dzitac), and also from the two special issues (SI) of the International Journal of Computers Communications & Control (IJCCC, founded in 2006 by I. Dzitac, F.G. Filip & M.J. Manolescu; L.A. Zadeh joined in 2008 to editorial board). In these two SI, dedicated to the 90th birthday of Lotfi A. Zadeh (2011), and to the 50th anniversary of "Fuzzy Sets" (2015), were published some papers authored by scientists from Algeria, Belgium, Canada, Chile, China, Hungary, Greece, Germany, Japan, Lithuania, Mexico, Pakistan, Romania, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Spain, Taiwan, UK and USA