A new explanation of the origins of World War I ?

The author reviews two important books which have recently been published on the origins of World War I: The Sleepwalkers. How Europe Went to War in 1914 by Cambridge University profes-sor Christopher Clark, and The War that Ended Peace: The Road to 1914 by Oxford University historian Margaret MacMilla

On the List-Decodability of Random Linear Codes

For every fixed finite field \F_q, $p \in (0,1-1/q)$ and $\epsilon > 0$, we prove that with high probability a random subspace $C$ of \F_q^n of dimension $(1-H_q(p)-\epsilon)n$ has the property that every Hamming ball of radius $pn$ has at most $O(1/\epsilon)$ codewords. This answers a basic open question concerning the list-decodability of linear codes, showing that a list size of $O(1/\epsilon)$ suffices to have rate within $\epsilon$ of the "capacity" $1-H_q(p)$. Our result matches up to constant factors the list-size achieved by general random codes, and gives an exponential improvement over the best previously known list-size bound of $q^{O(1/\epsilon)}$. The main technical ingredient in our proof is a strong upper bound on the probability that $\ell$ random vectors chosen from a Hamming ball centered at the origin have too many (more than $\Theta(\ell)$) vectors from their linear span also belong to the ball.Comment: 15 page

Super-polylogarithmic hypergraph coloring hardness via low-degree long codes

We prove improved inapproximability results for hypergraph coloring using the low-degree polynomial code (aka, the 'short code' of Barak et. al. [FOCS 2012]) and the techniques proposed by Dinur and Guruswami [FOCS 2013] to incorporate this code for inapproximability results. In particular, we prove quasi-NP-hardness of the following problems on $n$-vertex hyper-graphs: * Coloring a 2-colorable 8-uniform hypergraph with $2^{2^{\Omega(\sqrt{\log\log n})}}$ colors. * Coloring a 4-colorable 4-uniform hypergraph with $2^{2^{\Omega(\sqrt{\log\log n})}}$ colors. * Coloring a 3-colorable 3-uniform hypergraph with $(\log n)^{\Omega(1/\log\log\log n)}$ colors. In each of these cases, the hardness results obtained are (at least) exponentially stronger than what was previously known for the respective cases. In fact, prior to this result, polylog n colors was the strongest quantitative bound on the number of colors ruled out by inapproximability results for O(1)-colorable hypergraphs. The fundamental bottleneck in obtaining coloring inapproximability results using the low- degree long code was a multipartite structural restriction in the PCP construction of Dinur-Guruswami. We are able to get around this restriction by simulating the multipartite structure implicitly by querying just one partition (albeit requiring 8 queries), which yields our result for 2-colorable 8-uniform hypergraphs. The result for 4-colorable 4-uniform hypergraphs is obtained via a 'query doubling' method. For 3-colorable 3-uniform hypergraphs, we exploit the ternary domain to design a test with an additive (as opposed to multiplicative) noise function, and analyze its efficacy in killing high weight Fourier coefficients via the pseudorandom properties of an associated quadratic form.Comment: 25 page

Ripple effects for the future : study of lasting value creation for the case of North Norway

Current studies as well as popular opinion have shown ripple effects from oil and gas projects in North Norway to be inadequate. Questions about how to amend these shortcomings have been heavily discussed both in governmental circles, as well as popular media. Furthermore, opinions about methods to create permanent ripple effects have been expressed. The US has implemented various pieces of legislation to amend similar problems, and this thesis gathers and analyzes the ripple effects and their potential sustainability that these legislation examples have promoted. Furthermore, North Norwegian stakeholders were interviewed to gain their perspective on what ripple effects are desired in North Norway. In the discussion, the analysis results of US ripple effects were compared to analysis outcome of ripple effects that are desired by North Norwegian stakeholders, to see whether similar policies may or may not be implemented in North Norway as an attempt to achieve similar results. The study then proceeds with a discussion over who is responsible for creating, obtaining, and even maintaining these effects in North Norway. Based on the results, the researchers recommend that similar policies are implemented in Norway, with shared responsibility among government, stakeholders and petroleum companies, to achieve a balance of effects that is desired by all stakeholders involved in further sustainable development of North Norway

Strategic Delegation and Voting Rules

When making collective decisions, principals (voters or districts) typically benefit by strategically delegating their bargaining and voting power to representatives different from themselves. There are conflicting views in the literature, however, of whether such a delegate should be "conservative" (status quo biased) or instead "progressive" relative to his principal. I show how the answer depends on the political system in general, and the majority requirement in particular. A larger majority requirement leads to conservative delegation, but "sincere" delegation is always achieved by the optimal voting rule.Strategic delegation, collective decisions, voting rules

Klipsun Magazine, 2016 - Winter

There exists a value intrinsic to the decisions and actions that we make. A force to promote change and move us forward, into the future. Decisions lead to acts lead to events and events shape our views of the world. Our frame of reference expands and we are within the human experience. Please, take a moment and a deep breath. May you be delivered, now and always, to a sense of purpose.https://cedar.wwu.edu/klipsun_magazine/1185/thumbnail.jp

Klipsun Magazine, 2016, Volume 46, Issue 03 - Spring

The flowering cherry tree has long symbolized the cyclical nature of life and death. Its blossoms arrive in the spring, delivering their beauty for only a short time. There is a transcendent quality to them, a sense of magic. The Japanese tradition of Hanami has celebrated these trees for more than a millennium and invites people to leave their home or workplace to admire the blossoms and watch them fall. This act is one of honor and regard for the ephemerality of life. It is a practice calling for recognition that as all things begin, thus they too shall end. The trees and the tradition they foster represent the fleetingness of life – nature’s one true promise.https://cedar.wwu.edu/klipsun_magazine/1248/thumbnail.jp

Adaptive Regret Minimization in Bounded-Memory Games

Online learning algorithms that minimize regret provide strong guarantees in situations that involve repeatedly making decisions in an uncertain environment, e.g. a driver deciding what route to drive to work every day. While regret minimization has been extensively studied in repeated games, we study regret minimization for a richer class of games called bounded memory games. In each round of a two-player bounded memory-m game, both players simultaneously play an action, observe an outcome and receive a reward. The reward may depend on the last m outcomes as well as the actions of the players in the current round. The standard notion of regret for repeated games is no longer suitable because actions and rewards can depend on the history of play. To account for this generality, we introduce the notion of k-adaptive regret, which compares the reward obtained by playing actions prescribed by the algorithm against a hypothetical k-adaptive adversary with the reward obtained by the best expert in hindsight against the same adversary. Roughly, a hypothetical k-adaptive adversary adapts her strategy to the defender's actions exactly as the real adversary would within each window of k rounds. Our definition is parametrized by a set of experts, which can include both fixed and adaptive defender strategies. We investigate the inherent complexity of and design algorithms for adaptive regret minimization in bounded memory games of perfect and imperfect information. We prove a hardness result showing that, with imperfect information, any k-adaptive regret minimizing algorithm (with fixed strategies as experts) must be inefficient unless NP=RP even when playing against an oblivious adversary. In contrast, for bounded memory games of perfect and imperfect information we present approximate 0-adaptive regret minimization algorithms against an oblivious adversary running in time n^{O(1)}.Comment: Full Version. GameSec 2013 (Invited Paper

Optimal Depth, Very Small Size Circuits for Symmetrical Functions in AC0

AbstractIt is well known which symmetric Boolean functions can be computed by constant depth, polynomial size, unbounded fan-in circuits, i.e., which are contained in the complexity class AC0. This result is sharpened. Symmetric Boolean functions in AC0 can be computed by unbounded fan-in circuits with the following properties. If the optimal depth of AC0-circuits is d, the depth is at most d + 2, the number of wires is almost linear, namely n logO(1)n, and the number of gates is subpolynomial (but superpolylogarithmic), namely 2O(logδn) for some δ < 1

A New Approximate Min-Max Theorem with Applications in Cryptography

We propose a novel proof technique that can be applied to attack a broad class of problems in computational complexity, when switching the order of universal and existential quantifiers is helpful. Our approach combines the standard min-max theorem and convex approximation techniques, offering quantitative improvements over the standard way of using min-max theorems as well as more concise and elegant proofs