Predictive Probabilities In Employee Drug-Testing

Substance abuse in the U.S. has been estimated to cost $99 billion annually through lower productivity. Yet the authors urge caution in attempting to reduce these costs and health and safety Risks. In doing so, they cite commonly high frequencies of false negatives and false positives in employee drug tests - the latter having the potential to do great injustice to many drug-free employees

Performance Indicator Analysis of Proficiency Criteria in the Drug-Testing-Laboratory Certification Process of the DHHS

The authors highlight and propose remedies for problems in the proficiency criteria used in certifying laboratories for drug testing federal employees in the United States

Illuminating Exclusion: Constructions of National Identity in the Washington National Cathedral\u27s Stained Glass Windows

The Washington National Cathedral in Washington, D.C. offers itself as a national monument and spiritual center for the American people. Thousands of tourists and worshipers visit the Cathedral every year to admire its Neo-Gothic style architecture, stained glass windows, hand-carved sculpture and the general splendor of the massive medieval-inspired structure. I argue that the imagery and iconography of this ornamentation presents American national identity as white and Christian, an ideal that is cultivated through the exclusion and domination of minority racial groups and alternative belief systems in the Cathedral’s decorative program, through the stained glass windows. In order to shed light on the ideological underpinning of the Cathedral’s decorative program, I carefully analyze three of the Cathedral’s most historically provocative and beautiful windows: the Religious Freedom in Maryland window, the Servants of God window, and the three stained glass windows of the War Memorial Chapel (Sacrifice for Freedom, Freedom I, and Freedom II). The contemporary construction of the Cathedral allowed for careful documentation of all aspects of the building. Archival research of these documents, as well as a comprehensive study of related theories yields insights into the creative process, iconographic decisions, and the intended messages of many of the windows housed in the national monument. My analysis discusses the historical, social and visual elements of the window designs that complicate the message of inclusivity constantly reiterated in texts generated by the National Cathedral. Analysis of the imagery of the stained glass windows suggests a particularly exclusive and idealized notion of American national identity. The iconography and specific depictions of concepts, people, and ideas imply the superiority or dominate role of Anglo heritage and Christianity in the U.S. These implications are particularly clear when illuminated by a closer inspection of the discrepancy between American history as it is imagined in the Cathedral’s decorative program and as is told by scholars. Christian symbolism, ideology and history construct and control the representations of U.S. history and cultural narrative depicted throughout the edifice. With the use of selective historical memory, the Cathedral sponsors a message of Anglo dominance through a national mythology that belittles and essentially negates the historical tradition of non-white American citizens. In addition, the very existence of a “national” cathedral challenges and even erases boundaries separating the bodies of Church and State, and the Cathedral’s encouragement and support of a codependent relationship between the two entities. My study of the Washington National Cathedral is one of the first to critically analyze the ideological program of the windows in terms of its cultural impact within our society. Through the conscious recognition of cultivated cultural hierarchy, particularly within a national monument, we can better understand the obstacles of tolerance necessary for social change

Probabilistic Knowledge Base Validation

Our work develops a new methodology and tool for the validation of probabilistic knowledge bases throughout their lifecycle. The methodology minimizes user interaction by automatically modifying incorrect knowledge; only the occurrence of incomplete knowledge involves interaction. These gains are realized by combining and modifying techniques borrowed from rule-based and artificial neural network validation strategies. The presented methodology is demonstrated through BVAL, which is designed for a new knowledge representation, the Bayesian Knowledge Base. This knowledge representation accommodates incomplete knowledge while remaining firmly grounded in probability theory

A Bayesian Analogue of Gleason's Theorem

We introduce a novel notion of probability within quantum history theories and give a Gleasonesque proof for these assignments. This involves introducing a tentative novel axiom of probability. We also discuss how we are to interpret these generalised probabilities as partially ordered notions of preference and we introduce a tentative generalised notion of Shannon entropy. A Bayesian approach to probability theory is adopted throughout, thus the axioms we use will be minimal criteria of rationality rather than ad hoc mathematical axioms.Comment: 14 pages, v2: minor stylistic changes, v3: changes made in-line with to-be-published versio

Small Business Drug-Testing Strategy: Implications of Pre-Employment Testing

This paper identifies problems in drug testing accuracy that may arise in small business environments in which job applicants are subjected to drug tests, and suggests a method for dealing with the problems. Relevant concepts of drug-test accuracy are  reviewed  These concepts are incorporated in Bayesian analyses of data from specific workplace-applicant populations, and accuracy levels  to  be  expected  in  testing  of applicants  in  such  workplaces are identified The conclusion of this analysis is that seemingly accurate tests for abused drugs  can  be  inaccurate  to  a  disturbingly  high  degree,  particularly    under  circumstances   likely to be present in many small business drug-testing programs. A method by which these inaccuracies can be avoided is suggested

Remote Sensing of River Discharge: A Review and a Framing for the Discipline

Remote sensing of river discharge (RSQ) is a burgeoning field rife with innovation. This innovation has resulted in a highly non-cohesive subfield of hydrology advancing at a rapid pace, and as a result misconceptions, mis-citations, and confusion are apparent among authors, readers, editors, and reviewers. While the intellectually diverse subfield of RSQ practitioners can parse this confusion, the broader hydrology community views RSQ as a monolith and such confusion can be damaging. RSQ has not been comprehensively summarized over the past decade, and we believe that a summary of the recent literature has a potential to provide clarity to practitioners and general hydrologists alike. Therefore, we here summarize a broad swath of the literature, and find after our reading that the most appropriate way to summarize this literature is first by application area (into methods appropriate for gauged, semi-gauged, regionally gauged, politically ungauged, and totally ungauged basins) and next by methodology. We do not find categorizing by sensor useful, and everything from un-crewed aerial vehicles (UAVs) to satellites are considered here. Perhaps the most cogent theme to emerge from our reading is the need for context. All RSQ is employed in the service of furthering hydrologic understanding, and we argue that nearly all RSQ is useful in this pursuit provided it is properly contextualized. We argue that if authors place each new work into the correct application context, much confusion can be avoided, and we suggest a framework for such context here. Specifically, we define which RSQ techniques are and are not appropriate for ungauged basins, and further define what it means to be ‘ungauged’ in the context of RSQ. We also include political and economic realities of RSQ, as the objective of the field is sometimes to provide data purposefully cloistered by specific political decisions. This framing can enable RSQ to respond to hydrology at large with confidence and cohesion even in the face of methodological and application diversity evident within the literature. Finally, we embrace the intellectual diversity of RSQ and suggest the field is best served by a continuation of methodological proliferation rather than by a move toward orthodoxy and standardization

Evolution of Preprofessional Pharmacy Curricula

Objectives. To examine changes in preprofessional pharmacy curricular requirements and trends, and determine rationales for and implications of modifications. Methods. Prerequisite curricular requirements compiled between 2006 and 2011 from all doctor of pharmacy (PharmD) programs approved by the Accreditation Council of Pharmacy Education were reviewed to ascertain trends over the past 5 years. An online survey was conducted of 20 programs that required either 3 years of prerequisite courses or a bachelor’s degree, and a random sample of 20 programs that required 2 years of prerequisites. Standardized telephone interviews were then conducted with representatives of 9 programs. Results. In 2006, 4 programs required 3 years of prerequisite courses and none required a bachelor’s degree; by 2011, these increased to 18 programs and 7 programs, respectively. Of 40 programs surveyed, responses were received from 28 (70%), 9 (32%) of which reported having increased the number of prerequisite courses since 2006. Reasons given for changes included desire to raise the level of academic achievement of students entering the PharmD program, desire to increase incoming student maturity, and desire to add clinical sciences and experiential coursework to the pharmacy curriculum. Some colleges and schools experienced a temporary decrease in applicants. Conclusions. The preprofessional curriculum continues to evolve, with many programs increasing the number of course prerequisites. The implications of increasing prerequisites were variable and included a perceived increase in maturity and quality of applicants and, for some schools, a temporary decrease in the number of applicants