Despite 180 years of theory on magnetism, it appears that the practice of calculating forces on magnetic media is ambiguous, as illustrated by a recent article by Casperson [1]. Potentially troubling issues include: Which field B or H should be used? Should the total field be used, or only the external field? And if the latter, what is meant by “external”? Can/should effects of magnetization cu...

Service Level Agreements (SLAs) are the de facto method of managing IT Outsourcing (ITO) contracts. Negotiated during pursuit (pre-sales) phase and then used as a dashboard for performance management during delivery the SLA ultimately becomes both the lever and the measurable for revenue and margin performance on a contract. That SLAs should be meaningful, both for customers and vendors as defi...

This paper studies some classic cases of the fallacy of begging the question based on appeals to testimony containing circular reasoning. For example, suppose agents a, b and c vouch for d’s credentials, and agents b, d, and e vouch for a’s credentials. Such a sequence of reasoning is circular because a is offering testimony for d but d is offering testimony for a. The paper formulates and eval...

Forensic science standards often require the analyst to report in categorical terms. Categorical reporting without reference strength of evidence, or threshold that must be met sustain justify decision, obscures decision-making process, and allows for inconsistency bias. Standards promote probabilistic terms evidence offering a conclusive interpretation evidence. Probabilistic is based on likel...