Compositional Vector Space Models for Knowledge Base Completion

Knowledge base (KB) completion adds new facts to a KB by making inferences from existing facts, for example by inferring with high likelihood nationality(X,Y) from bornIn(X,Y). Most previous methods infer simple one-hop relational synonyms like this, or use as evidence a multi-hop relational path treated as an atomic feature, like bornIn(X,Z) -> containedIn(Z,Y). This paper presents an approach that reasons about conjunctions of multi-hop relations non-atomically, composing the implications of a path using a recursive neural network (RNN) that takes as inputs vector embeddings of the binary relation in the path. Not only does this allow us to generalize to paths unseen at training time, but also, with a single high-capacity RNN, to predict new relation types not seen when the compositional model was trained (zero-shot learning). We assemble a new dataset of over 52M relational triples, and show that our method improves over a traditional classifier by 11%, and a method leveraging pre-trained embeddings by 7%.Comment: The 53rd Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics and The 7th International Joint Conference of the Asian Federation of Natural Language Processing, 201

Absence of photoemission from the Fermi level in potassium intercalated picene and coronene films: structure, polaron or correlation physics?

The electronic structure of potassium intercalated picene and coronene films has been studied using photoemission spectroscopy. Picene has additionally been intercalated using sodium. Upon alkali metal addition core level as well as valence band photoemission data signal a filling of previously unoccupied states of the two molecular materials due to charge transfer from potassium. In contrast to the observation of superconductivity in K_xpicene and K_xcoronene (x ~ 3), none of the films studied shows emission from the Fermi level, i.e. we find no indication for a metallic ground state. Several reasons for this observation are discussed.Comment: 15 pages, 6 figure

Academic Culture, Business Culture, and Measuring Achievement Differences: Internal Auditing Views

ABSTRACT ACADEMIC CULTURE, BUSINESS CULTURE, AND MEASURING ACHIEVEMENT DIFFERENCES: INTERNAL AUDITING VIEWS by Benjamin Sterling Roth This study explored whether university internal audit directors’ views of culture and measuring achievement differences between their institutions and a business were related to how they viewed internal auditing priorities and uses. The Carnegie Classification system’s 283 Doctorate-granting Universities were the target population. Directors for 144 institutions (51%) returned questionnaires providing their views of academic culture and measuring achievement differences; the importance of internal auditor attributes, and types, subject areas, and determinants of internal auditing work; and whether operational audits of research, teaching, and public service were appropriate. Data collected included directors’ age, gender, race and ethnicity, education, certifications, and work experience and information on their reporting officials, boards/audit committees, audit departments, and institutions. Chi-square tests of independence, p ≤ .05, determined statistically significant relationships, and Cramer’s V, effect size. Dichotomous categories of “businesslike” and “distinct” were used to label views from the university’s perspective. Fifty-six percent viewed university culture distinct; 65% viewed measuring achievement businesslike. Thirty-eight percent viewed both businesslike; 30%, both distinct; 26%, culture distinct and measuring achievement businesslike; and 6%, culture businesslike and measuring achievement distinct. Culture views were related to measuring achievement views with medium effect, and with large effect for respondent subsets, such as older (≥ 50 years) males, certified internal auditors (CIAs), and directors at schools with higher research funding and/or a medical school. Also, with small effects, a distinct culture view favored awareness of culture and missions; a businesslike culture view favored operational audits; and a businesslike measuring achievement view favored operational audits in research, teaching, and public service. Older males had the highest percentages viewing culture businesslike and both culture and measuring achievement businesslike. CIAs had highest percentages viewing culture distinct and both culture and measuring achievement distinct. With culture and measuring achievement views related, internal auditor awareness of university culture and missions might warrant greater emphasis. Businesslike views favoring operational audits might encourage management practices historically decried by scholars as ill-fitting an academy, or might conserve resources to make more available to enhance academic practices and outcomes

LADAR Performance Simulations with a High Spectral Resolution Atmospheric Transmittance and Radiance Model- LEEDR

In this study of atmospheric effects on Geiger Mode laser ranging and detection (LADAR), the parameter space is explored primarily using the Air Force Institute of Technology Center for Directed Energy\u27s (AFIT/CDE) Laser Environmental Effects Definition and Reference (LEEDR) code. The LADAR system is assessed at operationally representative wavelengths of 1.064, 1.56 and 2.039 μm with several up and down looking engagement geometries at locations worldwide. Results computed with LEEDR are compared to standard atmosphere and Fast Atmospheric Signature Code (FASCODE) assessments. Results show significant climate dependence, but large variances between climatological and standard atmosphere assessments. An overall average absolute mean difference ratio of 1.03 is found when climatological signal to noise ratios at forty locations are compared to their equivalent standard atmosphere assessment. Atmospheric transmission is shown to not always correlate with signal to noise ratios between different atmosphere profiles. Allowing aerosols to swell with relative humidity proves to be significant especially for up looking geometries reducing the signal to noise ratio several orders of magnitude. Turbulence blurring shows that the up looking LADAR system has little capability at a 50km range yet has little impact at a 3km range

Narrative, understanding, and the self: Heidegger and the interpretation of lived experience

Since work by Alasdair MacIntyre, Charles Taylor, and Paul Ricoeur, there has been sustained interest among philosophers in the view that narrative plays an essential role in how we understand our lives and selves or--more radically--in how we constitute ourselves as full persons. At one extreme, MacIntyre and Taylor argue that our desires and commitments are hierarchically organized, in the best case unifying our lives into narrative quests. At the other extreme, Galen Strawson has attacked narrativity as far from universal, as well as spurious when taken as an ideal. Thinkers such as Marya Schechtman, Peter Goldie, Daniel Dennett, and David Velleman defend conceptions between these extremes. After examining this background in detail, my dissertation offers an interpretation of Heidegger that supports a revised conception of narrative's role in self-understanding. Whereas existing theories are driven by master metaphors of the self as author, the self as a character, or of lives as stories, I argue that the relationship between the self and narrative is better understood through a notion of reading. Heidegger scholars disagree as to whether the notions of authenticity and historicality put forward in Being and Time support a narrative conception of the self. In my view, Heideggerian "everydayness"--how we are, prior to any reckoning with authenticity--amounts already to a version of the narrative self. Just as readers mid-story understand characters by projecting where they are going, we understand who we are by projecting provisional plotlines for our futures. Such understanding is made explicit in textual narratives, which preserve the structure of lived experience better than any other form of description. Literary narratives, especially certain kinds of experimental rather than "realist" ones, most accurately represent the structure of existential possibilities. Heidegger's notion of truth as disclosing provides a frame which makes the anti-naturalist implications of narrativity more coherent. By bracketing Heidegger's controversial notion of authenticity, conversation with recent work in Anglo-American philosophy on narrative and the self is facilitated. My revised conception of the narrative self establishes a basis for further work on how we use narrative to understand and organize our lives

Deciduous Broadleaf Bidirectional Scattering Distribution Function (BSDF): Measurements, Modeling, and Impacts on Waveform Lidar Forest Assessments

Lidar (light detection and ranging) remote sensing has proven high accuracy/precision for quantification of forest biophysical parameters, many of which are needed for operational and ecological management. Although the significant effect of Bidirectional Scattering Distribution Functions (BSDF) on remote sensing of vegetation is well known, current radiative transfer simulations, designed for the development of remote sensing systems for ecological observation, seldom take leaf BSDF into account. Moreover, leaf directional scattering measurements are almost nonexistent, particularly for transmission. Previous studies have been limited in their electromagnetic spectrum extent, lacked validated models to capture all angles beyond measurements, and did not adequately incorporate transmission scattering. Many current remote sensing simulations assume leaves with Lambertian reflectance, opaque leaves, or apply purely Lambertian transmission, even though the validity of these assumptions and the effect on simulation results are currently unknown. This study captured deciduous broadleaf BSDFs (Norway Maple (Acer platanoides), American Sweetgum (Liquidambar styraciflua), and Northern Red Oak (Quercus rubra)) from the ultraviolet through shortwave infrared spectral regions (350-2500 nm), and accurately modeled the BSDF for extension to any illumination angle, viewing zenith, or azimuthal angle. Relative leaf physical parameters were extracted from the microfacet models delineating the three species. Leaf directional scattering effects on waveform lidar (wlidar) signals and their dependence on wavelength, lidar footprint, view angle, and leaf angle distribution (LAD) were explored using the Digital Imaging and Remote Sensing Image Generation (DIRSIG) model. The greatest effects, compared to Lambertian assumptions, were observed at visible wavelengths, small wlidar footprints, and oblique interrogation angles relative to the mean leaf angle. These effects were attributed to (i) a large specular component of the BSDF in the visible region, (ii) small footprints having fewer leaf angles to integrate over, and (iii) oblique angles causing diminished backscatter due to forward scattering. Opaque leaf assumptions were seen to have the greatest error for near-infrared (NIR) wavelengths with large footprints, due to the increased multi-scatter contribution at these configurations. Armed with the knowledge from this study, researchers are able to select appropriate sensor configurations to account for or limit BSDF effects in forest lidar data