Elsevier bv aug 2007 (5 resultados)

Buch. Condición: Neu. Neuware - The Handbooks in Finance are intended to be a definitive source for comprehensive and accessible information in the field of finance. Each individual volume in the series presents an accurate self-contained survey of a sub-field of finance, suitable for use by finance and economics professors and lecturers, professional researchers, graduate students and as a teaching supplement. It is fitting that the series Handbooks in Finance devotes a handbook to Asset and Liability Management. Volume 2 focuses on applications and case studies in asset and liability management.The growth in knowledge about practical asset and liability modeling has followed the popularity of these models in diverse business settings. This volume portrays ALM in practice, in contrast to Volume 1, which addresses the theories and methodologies behind these models. In original articles practitioners and scholars describe and analyze models used in banking, insurance, money management, individual investor financial planning, pension funds, and social security. They put the traditional purpose of ALM, to control interest rate and liquidity risks, into rich and broad-minded frameworks. Readers interested in other business settings will find their discussions of financial institutions both instructive and revealing.…

Buch. Condición: Neu. Neuware - Scientists use concepts and principles that are partly specific for their subject matter, but they also share part of them with colleagues working in different fields. Compare the biological notion of a 'natural kind' with the general notion of 'confirmation' of a hypothesis by certain evidence. Or compare the physical principle of the 'conservation of energy' and the general principle of 'the unity of science'. Scientists agree that all such notions and principles aren't as crystal clear as one might wish. An important task of the philosophy of the special sciences, such as philosophy of physics, of biology and of economics, to mention only a few of the many flourishing examples, is the clarification of such subject specific concepts and principles. Similarly, an important task of 'general' philosophy of science is the clarification of concepts like 'confirmation' and principles like 'the unity of science'. It is evident that clarfication of concepts and principles only makes sense if one tries to do justice, as much as possible, to the actual use of these notions by scientists, without however following this use slavishly. That is, occasionally a philosopher may have good reasons for suggesting to scientists that they should deviate from a standard use. Frequently, this amounts to a plea for differentiation in order to stop debates at cross-purposes due to the conflation of different meanings. While the special volumes of the series of Handbooks of the Philosophy of Science address topics relative to a specific discipline, this general volume deals with focal issues of a general nature. After an editorial introduction about the dominant method of clarifying concepts and principles in philosophy of science, called explication, the first five chapters deal with the following subjects. Laws, theories, and research programs as units of empirical knowledge (Theo Kuipers), various past and contemporary perspectives on explanation (Stathis Psillos), the evaluation of theories in terms of their virtues (Ilkka Niiniluto), and the role of experiments in the natural sciences, notably physics and biology (Allan Franklin), and their role in the social sciences, notably economics (Wenceslao Gonzalez). In the subsequent three chapters there is even more attention to various positions and methods that philosophers of science and scientists may favor: ontological, epistemological, and methodological positions (James Ladyman), reduction, integration, and the unity of science as aims in the sciences and the humanities (William Bechtel and Andrew Hamilton), and logical, historical and computational approaches to the philosophy of science (Atocha Aliseda and Donald Gillies).The volume concludes with the much debated question of demarcating science from nonscience (Martin Mahner) and the rich European-American history of the philosophy of science in the 20th century (Friedrich Stadler).…

Buch. Condición: Neu. Neuware - The present volume of the Handbook of the History of Logic brings together two of the most important developments in 20th century non-classical logic. These are many-valuedness and non-monotonicity. On the one approach, in deference to vagueness, temporal or quantum indeterminacy or reference-failure, sentences that are classically non-bivalent are allowed as inputs and outputs to consequence relations. Many-valued, dialetheic, fuzzy and quantum logics are, among other things, principled attempts to regulate the flow-through of sentences that are neither true nor false. On the second, or non-monotonic, approach, constraints are placed on inputs (and sometimes on outputs) of a classical consequence relation, with a view to producing a notion of consequence that serves in a more realistic way the requirements of real-life inference. Many-valued logics produce an interesting problem. Non-bivalent inputs produce classically valid consequence statements, for any choice of outputs. A major task of many-valued logics of all stripes is to fashion an appropriately non-classical relation of consequence.The chief preoccupation of non-monotonic (and default) logicians is how to constrain inputs and outputs of the consequence relation. In what is called 'left non-monotonicity', it is forbidden to add new sentences to the inputs of true consequence-statements. The restriction takes notice of the fact that new information will sometimes override an antecedently (and reasonably) derived consequence. In what is called 'right non-monotonicity', limitations are imposed on outputs of the consequence relation. Most notably, perhaps, is the requirement that the rule of or-introduction not be given free sway on outputs. Also prominent is the effort of paraconsistent logicians, both preservationist and dialetheic, to limit the outputs of inconsistent inputs, which in classical contexts are wholly unconstrained.In some instances, our two themes coincide. Dialetheic logics are a case in point. Dialetheic logics allow certain selected sentences to have, as a third truth value, the classical values of truth and falsity together. So such logics also admit classically inconsistent inputs. A central task is to construct a right non-monotonic consequence relation that allows for these many-valued, and inconsistent, inputs.The Many Valued and Non-Monotonic Turn in Logic is an indispensable research tool for anyone interested in the development of logic, including researchers, graduate and senior undergraduate students in logic, history of logic, mathematics, history of mathematics, computer science, AI, linguistics, cognitive science, argumentation theory, and the history of ideas.…

Buch. Condición: Neu. Neuware - New Frontiers in Biomagnetism contains selected papers based on presentations at the 15th International Conference on Biomagnetism (Biomag 2006), held in Vancouver between the 20th and 26th of August, 2006. The conference brought together over 500 scientists and specialists from around the world to present the latest scientific and technological developments in the field of Biomagnetism - the measurement of magnetic signals produced by electric currents in the human body. The study of the minute magnetic fields resulting from heart and muscle contraction, signal conduction in the nervous system, or by the magnetization of biological tissue has grown steadily since the 5th World Conference on Biomagnetism that was held in Vancouver in August of 1984. Although the conference covered many facets of biomagnetism research, the focus for this year's conference was on new frontiers in biomagnetism - the development of new applications and areas of research. One emphasis was on the application of Magnetoencephalography (MEG) to the study of human development and its potential to help understand the physiological underpinnings of language and cognitive development in children, including neurodevelopmental disorders, such as Down Syndrome, autism and language impairment. There were also many exciting contributions on the latest techniques for the precise localization of brain activity using MEG, and related methods for the study of brain dynamics and distributed networks of neural activity. These novel approaches to the study of human brain function promise to provide new insights into the organization of neural systems underlying motor planning, perception, memory and cognition. Other areas of rapid development discussed in New Frontiers in Biomagnetism include the application of biomagnetic measures in the diagnosis and treatment of epilepsy, psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia, and the use of MEG for presurgical functional mapping. Special sessions were also dedicated to the latest developments in Magnetocardiography (MCG) for the assessment of cardiovascular disease and associated disorders of the electrical activity of the heart. This year's conference also held a special symposium in honour of the late Sam Williamson, with presentations from his former colleagues and students that reviewed his life's work and contributions to the field of neuromagnetism.New Frontiers in Biomagnetism aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the latest developments in the field of Biomagnetism and its application to the study of human biological systems. The many new developments and breakthroughs presented at Biomag 2006 made a significant contribution to the advancement of the understanding of brain and cardiac function and provided new tools for clinical applications of this new knowledge.…

Buch. Condición: Neu. This item is printed on demand - it takes 3-4 days longer - Neuware -Regularly reviewing the 'state-of-the-art' developments in the antiviral drug research field, this latest volume spans the conceptual design and chemical synthesis of new antiviral compounds. It discusses their structure-activity relationship, mechanism and targets of action, pharmacological behavior, antiviral activity spectrum, and therapeutic potential for clinical use. 264 pp. Englisch.…