Decision makers best choice: a comparative investigation into the efficiency of search strategies based on ranks

Series: Working Papers on Information Systems, Information Business and Operation

Does Integrated Information Lack Subjectivity

I investigate the status of subjectivity in Integrated Information Theory. This leads me to examine if Integrated Information Theory can answer the hard problem of consciousness. On itself, Integrated Information Theory does not seem to constitute an answer to the hard problem, but could be combined with panpsychism to yield a more satisfying theory of consciousness. I will show, that even if Integrated Information Theory employs the metaphysical machinery of panpsychism, Integrated Information would still suffer from a different problem, not being able to account for the subjective character of consciousness

A framework for tropical mirror symmetry

Applying tropical geometry a framework for mirror symmetry, including a mirror construction for Calabi-Yau varieties, was proposed by the author. We discuss the conceptual foundations of this construction based on a natural mirror map identifying deformations and divisors. We show how the construction specializes to that by Batyrev for hypersurfaces and its generalization by Batyrev and Borisov to complete intersections. Based on an explicit example we comment on the implementation in the Macaulay2 package SRdeformations.Comment: 15 pages, no figure

Nucleation scaling in jigsaw percolation

Jigsaw percolation is a nonlocal process that iteratively merges connected clusters in a deterministic "puzzle graph" by using connectivity properties of a random "people graph" on the same set of vertices. We presume the Erdos--Renyi people graph with edge probability p and investigate the probability that the puzzle is solved, that is, that the process eventually produces a single cluster. In some generality, for puzzle graphs with N vertices of degrees about D (in the appropriate sense), this probability is close to 1 or small depending on whether pD(log N) is large or small. The one dimensional ring and two dimensional torus puzzles are studied in more detail and in many cases the exact scaling of the critical probability is obtained. The paper settles several conjectures posed by Brummitt, Chatterjee, Dey, and Sivakoff who introduced this model.Comment: 39 pages, 3 figures. Moved main results to the introduction and improved exposition of section

Tracking patterns of body mass index and triceps skinfold thickness from childhood to young adulthood: a 12-year prospective cohort study in Slovenia

OBJECTIVE: To examine tracking patterns of body mass index (BMI), triceps skinfold thickness (TSF), height and weight from childhood to young adulthood in a rapidly developing society.DESIGN: Prospective 12-year cohort study of the Slovenian children, born during 1990-1991.SUBJECTS: A subsample of 4 833 Slovenian children from the 1990-1991 national cohort (n = 21 777) who were included in the SLOFIT monitoring system from 1997 to 2008, with complete data at age 7 and 18 y.MEASUREMENTS: Height, weight and TSF were measured at ages 7, 11, 14 and 18 y. The IOTF BMI cutoff points were used to identify overweight and obesity. RESULTS: Height, weight, and BMI at age 18 y were well predicted from childhood and grew more predictable with age, while TSF was not. Obese and overweight children had the greatest risk of becoming overweight or obese young adults, since tracking of overweight and obesity showed that 53.9% of overweight and 77.7% of obese 7-y old males remained overweight or obese at age 18 y in comparison with 32.1% of overweight and 62% of obese 7-y old females. History of obese 18-y olds showed that 40% of males and 48.6% of females had been obese already at age 7 y. CONCLUSION: The study confirmed the tracking of BMI from childhood to young adulthood. Overweight or obese Slovenian children are very likely to become overweight or obese adolescents and young adults, which calls for the need of early prevention and treatment of overweight and obesity