Explosive growth in the size of spatial databases has highlighted the need for spatial data mining techniques to mine the interesting but implicit spatial patterns within these large databases. This book explores computational structure of the exact and approximate spatial autoregression (SAR) model solutions. Estimation of the parameters of the SAR model using Maximum Likelihood (ML) theory is computationally very expensive because of the need to compute the logarithm of the determinant (log-det) of a large matrix in the log-likelihood function. The second part of the book introduces theory on SAR model solutions. The third part of the book applies parallel processing techniques to the exact SAR model solutions. Parallel formulations of the SAR model parameter estimation procedure based on ML theory are probed using data parallelism with load-balancing techniques. Although this parallel implementation showed scalability up to eight processors, the exact SAR model solution still suffers from high computational complexity and memory requirements. These limitations have led the book to investigate serial and parallel approximate solutions for SAR model parameter estimation. In the fourth and fifth parts of the book, two candidate approximate-semi-sparse solutions of the SAR model based on Taylor's Series expansion and Chebyshev Polynomials are presented. Experiments show that the differences between exact and approximate SAR parameter estimates have no significant effect on the prediction accuracy. In the last part of the book, we developed a new ML based approximate SAR model solution and its variants in the next part of the thesis. The new approximate SAR model solution is called the Gauss-Lanczos approximated SAR model solution. We algebraically rank the error of the Chebyshev Polynomial approximation, Taylor's Series approximation and the Gauss-Lanczos approximation to the solution of the SAR model and its variants. In other words, we established a novel relationship between the error in the log-det term, which is the approximated term in the concentrated log-likelihood function and the error in estimating the SAR parameter for all of the approximate SAR model solutions.
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This book is the second edited compilation of selected, refereed papers submitted to ERTEP 2007. The book is organized into 10 chapters along four of the key themes that were discussed at the conference: Environmental Health Management; Mining and Environment; Environmental Monitoring and Policy Development; and Susta- ability and Social Responsibility. It is hoped that the contents of the book will p- vide an insight into some of the environmental and health management challenges confronting the developing world and the steps being taken to address them. The ?rst three chapters under the Environmental Health and Management theme discusses issues related to food security and related environmental distress in sub- Saharan Africa. Chapter 1 argues that pervasive poverty and low agricultural p- ductivity are important factors in understanding food insecurity in the region, and broader global processes are examined. This chapter maintains that while poverty undermines individual and household access to suf?cient food through market p- chase, land inequalities, corruption, structural adjustment programs, civil con?ict, HIV/AIDS and the role of the World Trade Organization Agreement on Agric- ture are decisive. The authors argue that achieving food security in sub-Saharan Africa requires policies and actions that are integrated with efforts to reduce poverty, enhance livelihoods and incomes and increase agricultural output, while also paying attention to underlying structural factors that bear on agriculture in the region.
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<p>The volume aims at providing a comprehensive review of the diverse efforts covering the gap existing between the two main perspectives on the topic of ontologies for multi-agent systems, namely: How ontologies should be modelled and represented in order to be effectively used in agent systems, and on the other hand, what kind of capabilities should be exhibited by an agent in order to make use of ontological knowledge and to perform efficient reasoning with it. The volume collects the most significant papers of the AAMAS 2002 and AAMAS 2003 workshop on ontologies for agent systems, and the EKAW 2002 workshop on ontologies for multi-agent systems.</p>
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The market for corporate control had been the playfield of bust-up artists and speculators seeking short-time profits during the 1980s. This had also encouraged many innovations in the art of hostile takeover defence. Until today anti-takeover defence has reached a very sophisticated level and most companies have erected formidable defences to counter aggressive corporate raiders. With her book Jeanette Gorzala provides a global perspective on hostile take-over defence during the latest merger wave. The focus lies on firstly determining the most common anti-takeover defence strategies and then in a second step evaluating their effectiveness to ward off corporate raiders. For this purpose the underlying concepts of the formal theory are presented in order to serve as a fundamental basis for an empirical study. In order to underline the theory with empirical evidence a sample of 335 hostile takeover bids launched in the timeframe from January 1, 2003 to December 31, 2008 has been analyzed. The key findings of the study are presented along two vital research questions reflecting the purpose of this book.
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Religion und Tourismus, zwei auf den ersten Blick unterschiedliche menschliche Daseinsäußerungen, weisen bei näherer Betrachtung viele Parallelen auf. Gemein ist beiden Phänomenen vor allem die Bedeutung für Dritte-Welt-Ländern und deren wirtschaftlicher Entwicklung. Während der Tourismus häufig als Motor für wirtschaftliches Wachstum erachtet wird, haben sich auch moderne Missionsstationen dem Ziel einer Verbesserung der Lebensbedingungen in Ländern des Globalen Südens verschrieben. Die vorliegende Studie beschäftigt sich daher kritisch mit der Frage, ob eine Bündelung religiöser und touristischer Anstrengungen in Form einer touristischen Nutzung von Missionsstationen sinnvoll wäre und wo die Potentiale und Risiken einer solchen Entwicklung lägen. Zur exemplarischen Darstellung der Ergebnisse dient Kenia, ein Entwicklungsland das von großem touristischen Interesse und intensiver Missionsarbeit gekennzeichnet ist. Eine mit dem Werk verbundene Forschungsreise und zahlreiche qualitative Interviews mit Akteuren aus dem Tourismus und der Missionsarbeit Kenias führen zu Erkenntnissen aus erster Hand.
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Extrait : HERMOGIDE. Tous les chefs sont d'accord, et dans ce jour tranquille, Argos attend un roi de la main d'Eriphyle : Nous verrons si le sort, qui m'outrage et me nuit, De vingt ans de travaux m'arrachera le fruit. EUPHORBE. A ce terme fatal Eriphyle amenée, Ne peut plus reculer son second hyménée ; Argos l'en sollicite, et la vois de nos dieux Soutient la voix du peuple et parle avec nos vœux." <br> <br>À PROPOS DES ÉDITIONS LIGARAN : <br> <br>Les éditions LIGARAN proposent des versions numériques de grands classiques de la littérature ainsi que des livres rares, dans les domaines suivants : <br> <br>• Fiction : roman, poésie, théâtre, jeunesse, policier, libertin. <br>• Non fiction : histoire, essais, biographies, pratiques.
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<p><i>Close Encounters of Art and Physics</i> is a voyage in time through the abstract ideas harboured in the minds of humans, starting from the graffiti art of cave dwellers and extending to the street art of contemporary men and women. In seeking parallels with science, the author looks far back to the first geometric ideas of our ancestors as well as ahead to the contemporary science of present-day physicists. The parallelism and analogies between these two fields bear witness to a real entanglement in the human brain. </p> <p>The second part of the book contains about 25 colour images showing the author's stunning glass artwork representing ideas such as dark matter, quantum entanglement, cellular automata and many others that are almost impossible to capture in words. Furthermore, many of the physicists who have themselves made major contributions in these fields provide their comments and analysis of the works. </p> <p>The book provides entertaining and informative reading, not only for practicing artists and physicists, but also anyone curious about art and physics.</p> <p><br></p> <p><br></p>
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<div> Critically evaluating and synthesizing all the previous research on the phenomenology of Czech philosopher Jan Patočka, the book brings a new voice into contemporary philosophical discussions. It elucidates the development of Patočka’s phenomenology and offers a critical appropriation of his work by connecting it with non-phenomenological approaches. </div> <div> <br> </div> <div> The first half of the book offers a succinct, and systematizing, overview of Patočka’s phenomenology throughout its development to help readers appreciate the motives behind and grounds for its transformations. The second half systematically explicates, critically examines and creatively develops Patočka’s concept of the movement of existence as the most promising part of his asubjective phenomenology. </div> <div> <br> </div> <div> The book appeals to new readers of Patočka as well as his scholars, and to students and researchers of contemporary philosophy concerned with topics such as embodiment, personal identity, intersubjectivity, sociality, or historicity. By re-assessing Patočka’s philosophy of history and his civilizational analysis, it also helps to better articulate the question of the place of Europe in the post-European world. </div>
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