Assessing the Effectiveness of Farm Supply Cooperatives: A Comparison of Farmer and Manager Viewpoints

This paper reports the results of a survey of attitudes of commercial farmers and supply cooperative managers about agricultural supply cooperatives. Cooperative managers and farmers frequently made significantly different responses to questionnaire statements. With a few expectations, farm size and farmer age did not appear to influence perceptions about supply cooperatives. Whether a farmer was a cooperative member was important in some cases. Lower prices in lieu of easy credit and patronage refunds were found to be acceptable to farmers, but not at the expense of good service. Managers placed great importance on member loyalty to the supply cooperative without regard to price consideration.Agribusiness,

THE CONSEQUENCES OF AN OPEN FIELD BURNING BAN ON THE U.S. KENTUCKY BLUEGRASS SEED INDUSTRY

An econometric model of the U.S. Kentucky bluegrass seed industry in the Pacific Northwest is specified and estimated in order to evaluate the short and long run consequences of yield reductions associated with a ban on open field burning of grass residues. While results differ among regions, model simulations of short run effects of reduced yields attributed to the burning ban indicate price increases for grass seed ranging from 0 to 69 percent and long run effects indicate increased acreage of grass seed production due to producers responses to higher prices.Crop Production/Industries,

FREE WILL, DETERMINISM, LIBERTARIANISM AND AUSTRIAN ECONOMICS

В тази статия се изразява твърдението, че позицията на свободната воля е правилна, а тази на детерминизма е неправилна, и че либертарианството и австрийската икономика са съвместими с първо споменатата, но не и с последната позиция. This paper makes the claim that the free will position is correct, that of determinism incorrect, and that libertarianism and Austrian economics are compatible with the former but not the latter

On the Nature of the Strong Emission-Line Galaxies in Cluster Cl 0024+1654: Are Some the Progenitors of Low Mass Spheroidals?

We present new size, line ratio, and velocity width measurements for six strong emission-line galaxies in the galaxy cluster, Cl 0024+1654, at redshift z~0.4. The velocity widths from Keck spectra are all narrow (30<sigma<120 km/s), with three profiles showing double peaks. Four galaxies have low masses (M<10^{10} Mo). Whereas three galaxies were previously reported to be possible AGNs, none exhibit AGN-like emission line ratios or velocity widths. Two or three appear as very blue spirals with the remainder more akin to luminous H-II galaxies undergoing a strong burst of star formation. We propose that after the burst subsides, these galaxies will transform into quiescent dwarfs, and are thus progenitors of some cluster spheroidals (We adopt the nomenclature suggested by Kormendy & Bender (1994), i.e., low-density, dwarf ellipsoidal galaxies like NGC 205 are called `spheroidals' instead of `dwarf ellipticals') seen today.Comment: 14 pages + 2 figures + 1 table, LaTeX, Acc. for publ. in ApJL also available at http://www.ucolick.org/~deep/papers/papers.htm

Comment on "Zeeman-Driven Lifshitz Transition: A Model for the Experimentally Observed Fermi-Surface Reconstruction in YbRh2Si2"

In Phys. Rev. Lett. 106, 137002 (2011), A. Hackl and M. Vojta have proposed to explain the quantum critical behavior of YbRh2Si2 in terms of a Zeeman-induced Lifshitz transition of an electronic band whose width is about 6 orders of magnitude smaller than that of conventional metals. Here, we note that the ultra-narrowness of the proposed band, as well as the proposed scenario per se, lead to properties which are qualitatively inconsistent with the salient features observed in YbRh2Si2 near its quantum critical point.Comment: 3 page

КРИТИЧНИ БЕЛЕЖКИ ОТНОСНО ДЕФИНИЦИИТЕ В ОБЛАСТТА НА ИКОНОМИКАТА ОТ АВСТРИЙСКА ГЛЕДНА ТОЧКА: МИКРОИКОНОМИКА

In the physical sciences, it goes without saying that all practitioners use words in the same manner. A mere verbal dispute would be anathema in this arena of intellectual discourse. There is no dispute, , as to the means of words such as “gravity,” “mass,” “genus,” “species,” “oxygen,” “x-ray,” etc. Matters are not as salutary in the social sciences. The present paper is an attempt to place economics, the queen of the social sciences, on a par with physics, chemistry, biology, etc., or at least to make an attempt in this direction. Systematic knowledge, the sine qua non of science, requires good communication. But this, in turn, can only be achieved, if its necessary condition is attained: precise definitions. In the present paper, we discuss in this regard the microeconomic concepts of entrepreneurship, monopoly, derps, indifference, development and rent seeking. Няма нужда да се споменава, че в областта на физическите науки всички практикуващи използват думите по същия начин. Чисто словесният диспут би бил анатема на тази арена на интелектуален дискурс. Няма спор, що се отнася до значението на думи като "гравитация", "маса", "род", "вид", "кислород", "рентгенови лъчи" и т.н. Материалните въпроси не са толкова благотворни в областта на социалните науки. В настоящата статия се прави опит да се постави икономиката, кралицата на социалните науки, на равна нога с физиката, химията, биологията и т.н., или поне се правят стъпки в тази насока. Системните знания, задължителното условие на науката, изисква добра комуникация. Но това, от своя страна, може да се постигне само ако се изпълни необходимото условие: точни определения. В тази връзка, в настоящата статия ние обсъждаме микроикономическите концепции за предприемачество, монопол, безразличие, разработване и наемотърсен

Influence of local surface albedo variability and ice crystal shape on passive remote sensing of thin cirrus

Airborne measurements of solar spectral radiance reflected by cirrus are performed with the HALO-Solar Radiation (HALO-SR) instrument onboard the High Altitude and Long Range Research Aircraft (HALO) in November 2010. The data are used to quantify the influence of surface albedo variability on the retrieval of cirrus optical thickness and crystal effective radius. The applied retrieval of cirrus optical properties is based on a standard two-wavelength approach utilizing measured and simulated reflected radiance in the visible and near-infrared spectral region. Frequency distributions of the surface albedos from Moderate resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) satellite observations are used to compile surface-albedo-dependent lookup tables of reflected radiance. For each assumed surface albedo the cirrus optical thickness and effective crystal radius are retrieved as a function of the assumed surface albedo. The results for the cirrus optical thickness are compared to measurements from the High Spectral Resolution Lidar (HSRL). The uncertainty in cirrus optical thickness due to local variability of surface albedo in the specific case study investigated here is below 0.1 and thus less than that caused by the measurement uncertainty of both instruments. It is concluded that for the retrieval of cirrus optical thickness the surface albedo variability is negligible. However, for the retrieval of crystal effective radius, the surface albedo variability is of major importance, introducing uncertainties up to 50%. Furthermore, the influence of the bidirectional reflectance distribution function (BRDF) on the retrieval of crystal effective radius was investigated and quantified with uncertainties below 10%, which ranges below the uncertainty caused by the surface albedo variability. The comparison with the independent lidar data allowed for investigation of the role of the crystal shape in the retrieval. It is found that if assuming aggregate ice crystals, the HSRL observations fit best with the retrieved optical thickness from HALO-SR

190Pt-186Os geochronometer reveals open system behaviour of 190Pt-4He isotope system

Platinum Group Minerals are typically dated using the 187Re-187Os and 190Pt-186Os isotope systems and more recently using the 190Pt-4He geochronometer. The 187Re-187Os and 190Pt-186Os compositions of Pt-alloys from the Kondyor Zoned Ultramafic Complex (ZUC) analysed here reveal overprinting for both geochronometers except in one alloy exhibiting the most unradiogenic 187Os/188Os and most radiogenic 186Os/188Os signatures. These signatures argue for an Early Triassic mineralisation, when silicate melts/fluids derived from the partial melting of an Archean mantle crystallised to form the Kondyor ZUC while the 190Pt-4He chronometer supports an Early Cretaceous mineralisation. We propose that Kondyor ZUC represents the root of an alkaline picritic volcano that constitutes the remnants of an Early Triassic island arc formed during the subduction of the Mongol-Okhotsk ocean seafloor under the Siberia craton. After the Early Cretaceous collision of Siberia with the Mongolia-North China continent, the exhumation of deep-seated structures - such as the Kondyor ZUC - allowed these massifs to cool down below the closure temperatures of the Pt-He and K-Ar, Rb-Sr isotope systems, explaining their Early to Late Cretaceous ages for the Kondyor ZUC