Hiddleston’s Causal Modeling Semantics and the Distinction between Forward-Tracking and Backtracking Counterfactuals

Some cases show that counterfactual conditionals (‘counterfactuals’ for short) are inherently ambiguous, equivocating between forward-tracking and backtracking counterfactu- als. Elsewhere, I have proposed a causal modeling semantics, which takes this phenomenon to be generated by two kinds of causal manipulations. (Lee 2015; Lee 2016) In an important paper (Hiddleston 2005), Eric Hiddleston offers a different causal modeling semantics, which he claims to be able to explain away the inherent ambiguity of counterfactuals. In this paper, I discuss these two semantic treatments and argue that my (bifurcated) semantics is theoretically more promising than Hiddleston’s (unified) semantics

Knowledge and Pragmatic Factors

The stakes-shifting cases suggest that pragmatic factors such as stakes play an important role in determining our intuitive judgments of whether or not S knows that p. This seems to be in conflict with intellectualism, according to which pragmatic factors in general should not be taken into account, when considering whether or not S knows that p. This paper develops a theory of judgments of knowledge status that reconciles intellectualism with our intuitive judgments regarding the stakes-shifting cases. I argue that pragmatic factors affect only our epistemic perspectives, i.e., the ways in which we evaluate S’s epistemic position. Therefore, pragmatic factors only have an indirect impact on our judgments of knowledge status

A Quantum Rosetta Stone for Interferometry

Heisenberg-limited measurement protocols can be used to gain an increase in measurement precision over classical protocols. Such measurements can be implemented using, e.g., optical Mach-Zehnder interferometers and Ramsey spectroscopes. We address the formal equivalence between the Mach-Zehnder interferometer, the Ramsey spectroscope, and the discrete Fourier transform. Based on this equivalence we introduce the ``quantum Rosetta stone'', and we describe a projective-measurement scheme for generating the desired correlations between the interferometric input states in order to achieve Heisenberg-limited sensitivity. The Rosetta stone then tells us the same method should work in atom spectroscopy.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figure

The creation of large photon-number path entanglement conditioned on photodetection

Large photon-number path entanglement is an important resource for enhanced precision measurements and quantum imaging. We present a general constructive protocol to create any large photon number path-entangled state based on the conditional detection of single photons. The influence of imperfect detectors is considered and an asymptotic scaling law is derived.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figure

Precipitation of amorphous ferromagnetic semiconductor phase in epitaxially grown Mn-doped Ge thin films

We investigated the origin of ferromagnetism in epitaxially grown Mn-doped Ge thin films. Using low-temperature molecular beam epitaxy, Mn-doped Ge films were successfully grown without precipitation of ferromagnetic Ge-Mn intermetallic compounds, such as Mn5Ge3. Magnetic circular dichroism measurements revealed that the epitaxially grown Mn-doped Ge films exhibited clear ferromagnetic behavior, but the Zeeman splitting observed at the critical points was not induced by the s,p-d exchange interactions. High-resolution transmission electron microscopy and energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy analyses show phase separation of amorphous Ge1-xMnx clusters with high Mn content from a Mn-free monocrystalline Ge matrix. Since amorphous Ge1-xMnx was characterized as a homogeneous ferromagnetic semiconductor, the precipitation of the amorphous Ge1-xMnx clusters is the origin of the ferromagnetic semiconductor behavior of the epitaxially grown Mn-doped Ge films.Comment: 12pages, 4figure

Seasonal Occurrence of the Durian Fruit Borer, Mudaria Magniplaga Walker (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae)

The durian fruit borer, Mudaria magniplaga Walker, is the most important insect pest of durian (Durio zibethinus Murray) in Malaysia. Since the larva of M. magniplaga is known to feed only on durian fruit which are in season once or twice a year, it is necessary to understand how the phenology of the pest is related to that of the host's. Studies were carried out to: (l) determine the species of Mudaria infesting durian, (2) examine the phenological relationship between M magniplaga and durian, (3) investigate diapause in M magniplaga. For the taxonomic study, moths were obtained from light traps and by rearing from infested durian fruit and flower buds. Based on the forewing size and pattern, and dissection of the male genitalia two species of Mudaria were identified of which one was M. magniplaga and the other an unknown (probably new) species of Mudaria. Of the specimens from the light traps, 230 were M magniplaga and 5 were Mudaria sp.; all 823 specimens from fruit were M magniplaga; and from the flower buds 5 were M magniplaga and 91 were Mudaria sp. From the results it was concluded that: (1) besides fruit M magniplaga also infests the flower bud of durian, (2) the Mudaria sp. found infesting flower buds does not infest durian fruit, (3) the high proportion of Mudaria sp. may indicate either an adaptation by this species to durian flower buds or that the phenology of M magniplaga was not in synchrony with that of the buds during the study period

Studies Of Convective Drying Using Numerical Analysis On Local Hardwood

In wood industry, drying of wood is the most energy extensive process that incurs a lot of cost and time. Pengering kayu adalah salah satu proses yang menggunakan tenaga yang banyak dalam industri pembalakan

Monte Carlo Bayesian Reinforcement Learning

Bayesian reinforcement learning (BRL) encodes prior knowledge of the world in a model and represents uncertainty in model parameters by maintaining a probability distribution over them. This paper presents Monte Carlo BRL (MC-BRL), a simple and general approach to BRL. MC-BRL samples a priori a finite set of hypotheses for the model parameter values and forms a discrete partially observable Markov decision process (POMDP) whose state space is a cross product of the state space for the reinforcement learning task and the sampled model parameter space. The POMDP does not require conjugate distributions for belief representation, as earlier works do, and can be solved relatively easily with point-based approximation algorithms. MC-BRL naturally handles both fully and partially observable worlds. Theoretical and experimental results show that the discrete POMDP approximates the underlying BRL task well with guaranteed performance.Comment: Appears in Proceedings of the 29th International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML 2012

Human resource management practices, affective commitment and perception towards corruption and bribery in Royal Malaysia Police

The main purpose of this study was to investigate the Human Resource Management practices (training and development, career development, salary and benefits and performance appraisal) and the perception towards corruption and bribery in the Royal Malaysian Police. Specifically, it was aim to investigate the mediating effect of affective commitment between Human Resource Management practices (training and development, career development, salary and benefits and performance appraisal) and perception towards corruption and bribery in the Royal Malaysian Police. The motivation for this study was driven by the inconsistent findings in literature concerning the relationships between the Human Resource Management practices (training and development, career development, salary and benefits and performance appraisal) and the perception towards corruption and bribery. Accordingly, this study has integrated the Herzberg’s Two Factor Theory to map and position the possible relationships between the variables in the research framework. The study utilises a survey questionnaire which was randomly distributed to 700 Royal Malaysian Police officers and staffs from 5,647 in Penang. Out of 412 returned questionnaires, 386 (55%) were found to be completed and was used in the analysis. Correlation and regression analysis was used to analyse the relationship between the related variables in the study. The results revealed that career development, salary and benefits and affective commitment are positive determinants of perception towards corruption and bribery while career development, salary and benefits and performance appraisal are positive determinants with affective commitment. Moreover, a partial mediating effect of affective commitment on the relationships between Human Resource Management practices and perception towards corruption and bribery was confirmed by the findings. Finally, contributions and limitations of the study as well as suggestions for future research were discussed