Rationality principles are the bedrock of normative theories of decision-making in biology and microeconomics, but whereas in microeconomics, consistent choice underlies the notion of utility; in biology, the assumption of consistent selective pressures justifies modelling decision mechanisms as if they were designed to maximize fitness. In either case, violations of consistency contradict expe...

It is often assumed that decisions are made by rank-ordering and thus comparing the available choice options based on their subjective values. Rank-ordering requires that the alternatives' subjective values are mentally represented at least on an ordinal scale. Because one alternative cannot be at the same time better and worse than another alternative, choices should satisfy transitivity (if a...

INVARIANT SUBSPACES OF ABSTRACT MULTIPLICATION OPERATORS by Hermann Flaschka We describe a class of operators on a Banach space ft whose members behave, in a sense, like multiplication operators, and consequently leave invariant a proper closed subspace of IB. One of the sufficient conditions for an operator to be such an "abstract multiplication" bears a striking resemblence to an assumption m...

The rock-paper-scissors game and its generalizations with S>3 species are well-studied models for cyclically interacting populations. Four is, however, the minimum number of species that, by allowing other interactions beyond the single, cyclic loop, breaks both the full intransitivity of the food graph and the one-predator, one-prey symmetry. Lütz et al. [J. Theor. Biol. 317, 286 (2013)] have ...

The Philippine-style Austronesian voice system (AVS), which serves to identify a single privileged argument leading to the Subject-Only Restriction, is well-known for its highly articulated nature. While the synchronic status of the AVS has been explored extensively, its diachronic development is less clear. This paper fills the gap in our understanding of the development of the AVS while simul...

The last few years have seen a number of new and important publications in moral theory. Arguably none more important than Larry S. Temkin’s Rethinking the Good: Moral Ideals and the Nature of Practical Reasoning. This fascinating work highlights and explores in depth a seemingly fundamental inconsistency in our own axiological beliefs. Put roughly, the inconsistency arises given our general wi...

Now the notion of domination on which we rely is, indeed, not transitive. [.. . ] This lack of transitivity, especially in the above formalistic presentation, may appear to be an annoying complication and it may even seem desirable to make an effort to rid the theory of it. Yet the reader who takes another look at the last paragraph will notice that it really contains only a circumlocution of a...

Multiple equilibria in a coupled ocean–atmosphere–sea ice general circulation model (GCM) of an aquaplanet with many degrees of freedom are studied. Three different stable states are found for exactly the same set of parameters and external forcings: a cold state in which a polar sea ice cap extends into the midlatitudes; a warm state, which is ice free; and a completely sea ice–covered ‘‘snowb...

The language of folklore is peculiar. It has distinctive features at each linguistic and structural level. grammar works oral also its specifics. vocabulary the should have an expressive direction. vocabulary, or register part dictionary, must contain grammatical information about word. almost impossible to provide all a lexeme entered into dictionary register. Compilers lexicographical always ...

Biological networks are complex and involve several kinds of molecules. For proper biological function it is important for these biomolecules to act at an individual level and act at the level of interaction of these molecules. In this paper some of the logical impossibilities that may arise in the biological networks and their possible solutions are discussed. It may be important to understand...