How the Alternative Explanation Affects Satisfaction with the Target Explanation

On parsimonious paternity and scientific rigor: a reply to Madsen

Geomagnetic South Atlantic Anomaly and global sea level rise: A direct connection?

Hybrids and hybrid zones

The Quirigua Project is nearing the completion of a five year program of archaeological research at the lowland Maya site of Quirigua, Guatemala. The investigations are centered at the site of Quirigua proper and within the surrounding lower Motagua valley. This research has provided a wealth of data that, when combined with the historical information deciphered from the hieroglyphic inscriptions at Quirigua, allow a unique interpretation as to the origins, growth, and demise of a Classic Maya site.Several alternative explanations of Quirigua's origins are proposed. The archaeological evidence demonstrates that construction at the site began several centuries before the first historically-identified ruler at Quirigua, Cauac Sky, assumed power at about 723 A.C. The historical record indicates that Cauac Sky's reign lasted some 61 years, during which Quirigua appears to have gained complete political autonomy. Quirigua's growth in prestige and power during Cauac Sky's reign seems to have been based ...

Inorganic synthesis of organic molecules is a significant step for the primordial life. Generally, inorganic synthesis of methane necessitates, in addition to catalyst, a high-temperature and high-pressure environment. Here we will show that such an environment could be locally and instantly realized in the channels of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) even under room temperature and ultrahigh vacuum conditions just by a visible-light flash, owing to the ultra-photothermal effect of nanomaterials. As a result, methane signals were definitely detected by using a quadrupole mass spectrometer and an optical fiber spectrometer. The mechanisms were interpreted as Fischer-Tropsch synthesis. Our results provide an alternative explanation of abiogenic methane origin.

Chapter 23 - Multi-attribute decision-making problem in medical diagnosis using neutrosophic probabilistic distance measures

Teaching children to comprehend propositions conjoined by “before” and “after”

Medical approach to patients is a fundamental step to get the correct diagnosis. The aim of this paper is to analyze some aspects of the reasoning process inherent in medical diagnosis in our era. Pathologic signs (anamnestic data, symptoms, semiotics, laboratory and strumental findings) represent informative phenomena to be integrated for inferring a diagnosis. Thus, diagnosis begins with “signs” and finishes in a probability of disease. The abductive reasoning process is the generation of a hypothesis to explain one or more observations (signs) in order to decide between alternative explanations searching the best one. This process is iterative during the diagnostic activity while collecting further observations and it could be creative generating new knowledge about what has not been experienced before. In the clinical setting the abductive process is not only theoretical, conversely the physical exploitation of the patient (palpation, percussion, auscultation) is always crucial. Through this manipulative abduction, new and still unexpressed information is discovered and evaluated and physicians are able “to think through doing” to get the correct diagnosis. Abductive inferential path originates with an emotional reaction (discovery of the signs), step by step explanations are formed and it ends with another emotional reaction (diagnosis). Few bedside instruments are allowed to physicians to amplify their ability to search for signs. Stethoscope is an example. Similarities between ultrasound exploration and percussion can be found. Bedside ultrasonography can be considered an external amplifier of signs, a particular kind of percussion and represents a valid example of abductive manipulation. In this searching for signs doctors act like detectives and sometimes the discovering of a strategic, unsuspected sign during abductive manipulation could represent the key point for the correct diagnosis. This condition is called serendipity. Ultrasound is a powerful tool for detecting soft, hidden, unexpected and strategic signs.

Further studies are needed to assess the competing therapies for neck pain

Whole-genome analysis of a putative rare and complex interchromosomal reciprocal insertion: thorough investigations for a straightforward interpretation

Kowalski and Sergot's (1986) Event Calculus (EC) is a simple temporal formalism that, given a set of event occurrences, derives the maximal validity intervals (MVIs) over which properties initiated or terminated by these events hold. We extend this calculus to give a semantic foundation to our Quantifiers and Connectives Event Calculus (QCEC). In particular, we extend the range of queries accepted by EC, which has so far been limited to Boolean combinations of MVI verification or computation requests, to admit arbitrary quantification over events and properties. We demonstrate the added expressive power by encoding a medical diagnosis problem as a case study. Moreover, we give a /spl lambda/Prolog implementation of this formalism and analyze the computational complexity of the extended calculus.