Term Structure and the Estimated Monetary Policy Rule in the Eurozone

Published as an article in: Spanish Economic Review, 2008, vol. 10, issue 4, pages 251-277.

James's rule and causes and consequences of a latitudinal cline in the demography of John's Snapper (Lutjanus johnii) in coastal waters of Australia

Demographic parameters were derived from sectioned otoliths of John’s Snapper (Lutjanus johnii) from 4 regions across 9° of latitude and 23° of longitude in northern Australia. Latitudinal variation in size and growth rates of this species greatly exceeded longitudinal variation. Populations of John’s Snapper farthest from the equator had the largest body sizes, in line with James’s rule, and the fastest growth rates, contrary to the temperature-size rule for ectotherms. A maximum age of 28.6 years, nearly 3 times previous estimates, was recorded and the largest individual was 990 mm in fork length. Females grew to a larger mean asymptotic fork length (L∞) than did males, a finding consistent with functional gonochorism. Otolith weight at age and gonad weight at length followed the same latitudinal trends seen in length at age. Length at maturity was ~72–87% of L∞ and varied by ~23% across the full latitudinal gradient, but age at first maturity was consistently in the range of 6–10 years, indicating that basic growth trajectories were similar across vastly different environments. We discuss both the need for complementary reproductive data in age-based studies and the insights gained from experiments where the concept of oxygen- and capacity-limited thermal tolerance is applied to explain the mechanistic causes of James’s rule in tropical fish species.

Symmetry and optical transition rule for low-dimensional semiconductor system with spin-orbit interaction and magnetic field

Starting from effective mass Hamiltonian, we systematically investigate the symmetry of low-dimensional structures with spin-orbit interaction and transverse magnetic field. The position-dependent potentials are assumed to be space symmetric, which is ever-present in theory and experiment research. By group theory, we analyze degeneracy in different cases. Spin-orbit interaction makes the transition between Zeeman sub-levels possible, which is originally forbidden within dipole approximation. However, a transition rule given in this paper for the first time shows that the transition between some levels is forbidden for space symmetric potentials. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Data-driven fuzzy rule generation and its application for student academic performance evaluation

K. Rasmani and Q. Shen. Data-driven fuzzy rule generation and its application for student academic performance evaluation. Applied Intelligence, 25(3):305-319, 2006.

Subsethood-based Fuzzy Rule Models and their Application to Student Performance

K. Rasmani and Q. Shen. Subsethood-based Fuzzy Rule Models and their Application to Student Performance Classification. Proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Fuzzy Systems, pages 755-760, 2005.

Rule Extraction, Fuzzy ARTMAP, and Medical Databases

This paper shows how knowledge, in the form of fuzzy rules, can be derived from a self-organizing supervised learning neural network called fuzzy ARTMAP. Rule extraction proceeds in two stages: pruning removes those recognition nodes whose confidence index falls below a selected threshold; and quantization of continuous learned weights allows the final system state to be translated into a usable set of rules. Simulations on a medical prediction problem, the Pima Indian Diabetes (PID) database, illustrate the method. In the simulations, pruned networks about 1/3 the size of the original actually show improved performance. Quantization yields comprehensible rules with only slight degradation in test set prediction performance.

The Golden Rule Ethic, its Measurement, and Relationships with Well-Being and Prosocial Values Across Four Religions in India

As a psychological principle, the golden rule represents an ethic of universal empathic concern. It is, surprisingly, present in the sacred texts of virtually all religions, and in philosophical works across eras and continents. Building on the literature demonstrating a positive impact of prosocial behavior on well-being, the present study investigates the psychological function of universal empathic concern in Indian Hindus, Christians, Muslims and Sikhs.

I develop a measure of the centrality of the golden rule-based ethic, within an individual’s understanding of his or her religion, that is applicable to all theistic religions. I then explore the consistency of its relationships with psychological well-being and other variables across religious groups.

Results indicate that this construct, named Moral Concern Religious Focus, can be reliably measured in disparate religious groups, and consistently predicts well-being across them. With measures of Intrinsic, Extrinsic and Quest religious orientations in the model, only Moral Concern and religiosity predict well-being. Moral Concern alone mediates the relationship between religiosity and well-being, and explains more variance in well-being than religiosity alone. The relationship between Moral Concern and well-being is mediated by increased preference for prosocial values, more satisfying interpersonal relationships, and greater meaning in life. In addition, across religious groups Moral Concern is associated with better self-reported physical and mental health, and more compassionate attitudes toward oneself and others.

Two additional types of religious focus are identified: Personal Gain, representing the motive to use religion to improve one’s life, and Relationship with God. Personal Gain is found to predict reduced preference for prosocial values, less meaning in life, and lower quality of relationships. It is associated with greater interference of pain and physical or mental health problems with daily activities, and lower self-compassion. Relationship with God is found to be associated primarily with religious variables and greater meaning in life.

I conclude that individual differences in the centrality of the golden rule and its associated ethic of universal empathic concern may play an important role in explaining the variability in associations between religion, prosocial behavior and well-being noted in the literature.

Discovering keys to explain social policies within the social and democratic rule-of-law sate

There is a collective worldview on social policies that is expressed and understood by university professionals. However, it takes students time to construct this knowledge. Here, we provide fundamental ideas and a dynamic to facilitate learning of social policies. The preparation of a brief dictionary of significant terms is to be constructed as a group, alongside the maieutic work to be carried out by the teacher. The goal is to discover keys to understand the meaning of social policies and the underlying values that sustain a social and democratic rule-of-law state such as the one proposed in the Spanish Constitution of 1978. Attention is focused on the structure of the mixed welfare state. This is an integral proposal and comprises three dimensions. First, it considers the state and its possible welfare agents: business, market, the Church and civil society. The attitudes with which universal and inclusive social action is promoted, breaking radically with the aid-based meaning contained in other systems, are then addressed. Finally, we examine human dignity as a principle and aim of intervention, a basis for understanding other concepts such as human, social, labour and political rights. It is to be hoped that these pages prove useful for both teaching staff and students.