“Last-chance” sales: what makes them credible?

This paper analyzes the firms’ standard practice of announcing clearance or “last-chance” sales, namely advertising that a particular product is not going to be available in the market anymore. In the context of a two-period signaling game, prices and advertising decisions of firms are analyzed. Then, the set of separating and pooling equilibria is characterized, so that the above usual advertising techniques can be better understood as equilibria of this model for certain parameter values. In particular, this paper shows that, when the firm which continues in the business knows that few of their current customers will come back in future periods, the set of separating equilibria shrinks. That is, fewer future prospects induce all types of firms to compete for current consumers, leading to pooling equilibria in which all firms announce a “last-chance” sale, even if some of them know they will remain in the industry next period.signaling, advertising, separating equilibria, information transmission

Feature selection for microarray gene expression data using simulated annealing guided by the multivariate joint entropy

In this work a new way to calculate the multivariate joint entropy is presented. This measure is the basis for a fast information-theoretic based evaluation of gene relevance in a Microarray Gene Expression data context. Its low complexity is based on the reuse of previous computations to calculate current feature relevance. The mu-TAFS algorithm --named as such to differentiate it from previous TAFS algorithms-- implements a simulated annealing technique specially designed for feature subset selection. The algorithm is applied to the maximization of gene subset relevance in several public-domain microarray data sets. The experimental results show a notoriously high classification performance and low size subsets formed by biologically meaningful genes.Postprint (published version

La rehabilitación del mundo emocional en la modernidad. Los predecesores de la ética cartesiana. El estoicismo moderno

La ética cartesiana se constituye como una nueva propuesta moral cuyo objetivo es el fortalecimiento del sujeto sobre la rehabilitación de la dignidad de la dimensión emocional del hombre. Conocer y controlar las pasiones tiene como consecuencia la auténtica felicidad del sujeto y el desplazamiento del otro a un segundo plano. La modernidad de esta propuesta se asienta sobre la influencia de autores que reflexionaron previamente sobre ellas y las rehabilitaron. Entre ellos, los estoicos modernos, Justo Lipsio, Guillaume du Vair y Pierre Charron reforman en profundidad el ideal apático heredado.Cartesian Ethics is made up as a new moral proposal whose aim is to strengthen the self supported by the rehabilitation of the dignity of the human emotional dimension. The consequence of knowing and controlling passions is the individual’s true happiness and the displacement of the fellow man into the background. The modernity of this proposal is set up by the influence of some authors that previously reflected on them and rehabilitated them. Amongst these authors, the modern stoics, Justus Lipsius, Guillaume du Vair and Pierre Charron, reformed the inherited apathetic ideal

La literatura en la clase de lengua extranjera: ¿Una presencia incómoda?.

Sin resume