Roots and (re)sources of value (in)definiteness versus contextuality. A contribution to the Pitowsky Volume in memory of Itamar Pitowsky (1950--2010)

In Itamar Pitowsky's reading of the Gleason and the Kochen-Specker theorems, in particular, his Logical Indeterminacy Principle, the emphasis is on the value indefiniteness of observables which are not within the preparation context. This is in stark contrast to the prevalent term {\em contextuality} used by many researchers in informal, heuristic yet omni-realistic and potentially misleading ways. This paper discusses both concepts and argues in favor of value indefiniteness in all but a continuum of contexts intertwining in the vector representing a single pure (prepared) state. Even more restrictively, and inspired by operationalism but not justified by Pitowsky's Logical Indeterminacy Principle or similar, one could identify with a "quantum state" a single quantum context -- aka the respective maximal observable, or, in terms of its spectral decomposition, the associated orthonormal basis - from the continuum of intertwining context, as per the associated maximal observable actually or implicitly measured.Comment: 11 pages, revised and polished, discussion on joint probabilities of observables in different contexts adde

From first-order logic to assertional logic

First-Order Logic (FOL) is widely regarded as one of the most important foundations for knowledge representation. Nevertheless, in this paper, we argue that FOL has several critical issues for this purpose. Instead, we propose an alternative called assertional logic, in which all syntactic objects are categorized as set theoretic constructs including individuals, concepts and operators, and all kinds of knowledge are formalized by equality assertions. We first present a primitive form of assertional logic that uses minimal assumed knowledge and constructs. Then, we show how to extend it by definitions, which are special kinds of knowledge, i.e., assertions. We argue that assertional logic, although simpler, is more expressive and extensible than FOL. As a case study, we show how assertional logic can be used to unify logic and probability, and more building blocks in AI

Marketing Education and the Missing P: Evidence from Australia

Some educators in the field of commerce and management quite rightly justify the worth of their courses on the basis of industry value. For instance, “the entertainment industry is a $500 billion industry and therefore understanding this industry is of considerable importance to marketers”. If industry value is the key driver of course importance then none could be more important than a course in pricing – a US$60 trillion industry based on global income (World Bank, 2008). Yet in Australia, no such courses exist at tertiary level and pricing is often given only cursory treatment in the commerce and management curriculum, somewhat consistent with other countries such as the US (Maxwell 1998; McCaskey and Brady 2007). This article highlights the need for greater attention to pricing education in the commerce and management curriculum and makes recommendations as to why pricing is not incorporated in the curriculum, and how it could be incorporated into the curriculum