Statistical Graphics Procedures by Example

The goal of machine learning is to program computers to use example data or pastexperience to solve a given problem. Many successful applications of machine learning exist already,including systems th

In this volume, leading philosophers of psychiatry examine psychiatric classificationsystems, including the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders(DSM), asking whether current systems a

The future is not what it used to be because we can no longer rely on the comfortingassumption that it will resemble the past. Past abundance of fuel, for example, does not implyunending abundance. In

The goal of machine learning is to program computers to use example data or past experience to solve a given problem. Many successful applications of machine learning exist already, including systems

North American policy responses to global climate change are complex and sometimes contradictory and reach across multiple levels of government. For example, the U.S. federal government rejected the

Our intuition tells us that we, our conscious selves, cause our own voluntary acts. Yet scientists have long questioned this; Thomas Huxley, for example, in 1874 compared mental events to a steam whi

We live with a lot of stuff. The average kitchen, for example, is home to stuff galore, and every appliance, every utensil, every thing, is compound—composed of tens, hundreds, even thousands o

The minimum description length (MDL) principle is a powerful method of inductive inference, the basis of statistical modeling, pattern recognition, and machine learning. It holds that the best explan

These who condemn the treatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo have blamed U.S. military procedures and abuses of executive powers. But in The Story of Cruel and Unusual, Colin Dayan argues

With A Theory of General Ethics Warwick Fox both defines the field of General Ethics and offers the first example of a truly general ethics. Specifically, he develops a single, integrated approach to

With A Theory of General Ethics Warwick Fox both defines the field of General Ethics and offers the first example of a truly general ethics. Specifically, he develops a single, integrated approach to

Mathematical forms rendered visually can give aesthetic pleasure; certain works of art—Max Bill's Moebius band sculpture, for example—can seem to be mathematics made visible. This collect

Our intuition tells us that we, our conscious selves, cause our own voluntary acts. Yet scientists have long questioned this; Thomas Huxley, for example, in 1874 compared mental events to a steam whi

Mathematical forms rendered visually can give aesthetic pleasure; certain works of art - Max Bill's Moebius band sculpture, for example - can seem to be mathematics made visible. This collection of es

The goal of machine learning is to program computers to use example data or past experience to solve a given problem. Many successful applications of machine learning exist already, including systems

This monograph addresses the problem of "real-time" curve fitting in the presence of noise, from the computational and statistical viewpoints. It examines the problem of nonlinear regression, where ob

A detailed statistical case study of job changing in a New England city with diversified industries, citing the economic, geographical, social, and psychological factors conducive to worker stability

In this book, Peter Diamond analyzes social security as a particular example of optimal taxation theory. Assuming a world of incomplete markets and asymmetric information, he uses a variety of simple

An analysis of current findings on mortgage-lending discrimination and suggestions for new procedures to improve its detection. In 2000, homeownership in the United States stood at an all-time high

An analysis of current findings on mortgage-lending discrimination and suggestions for new procedures to improve its detection. In 2000, homeownership in the United States stood at an all-time high

"Lost flower of the Andes is blooming in Britain." This headline in the "Daily Telegraph" celebrated the last remaining example of "Passiflora lourdesae," a Venezuelan herbaceous climber that was rais

A thoroughly modern, comprehensive treatment of the probability and statistical foundations of econometrics with special emphasis on the linear regression model. The standard introductory texts to m

This book gives a tutorial overview of Goedel, presents example programs, provides a formal definition of the syntax and semantics of the language, and covers background material on logic.Goedel is a

The focus of this volume is nothing less than the entire set of social indicators-statistics, statistical series, and all other forms of evidence-that enable us to assess where we stand and where we a

Explains Swedish managerial attitudes and approaches, types and problems of collective bargaining, the foreman's role, the operation of labor-management committees, and personnel procedures; also comp

Stories from the ER: a doctor shows how empathy, creativity, and imagination are the cornerstones of clinical care.To be an emergency room doctor is to be a professional listener to stories. Each patient presents a story; finding the heart of that story is the doctor’s most critical task. More technology, more tests, and more data won’t work if doctors get the story wrong. Empathy, creativity, and imagination are the cornerstones of clinical care. In Tornado of Life, ER physician Jay Baruch offers a series of short, powerful, and affecting essays that capture the stories of ER patients in all their complexity and messiness. Patients come to the ER with lives troubled by scales of misfortune that have little to do with disease or injury. ER doctors must be problem-finders before they are problem-solvers. Cheryl, for example, whose story is a chaos narrative of “and this happened, and then that happened, and then, and then and then and then,” tells Baruch she is "stuck in a tornado of li

Stories of long-lived animal species―from thousand-year-old tubeworms to 400-year-old sharks―and what they might teach us about human health and longevity.Opossums in the wild don’t make it to the age of three; our pet cats can live for a decade and a half; cicadas live for seventeen years (spending most of them underground). Whales, however, can live for two centuries and tubeworms for several millennia. Meanwhile, human life expectancy tops out around the mid-eighties, with some outliers living past 100 or even 110. Is there anything humans can learn from the exceptional longevity of some animals in the wild? In Methusaleh’s Zoo, Steven Austad tells the stories of some extraordinary animals, considering why, for example, animal species that fly live longer than earthbound species and why animals found in the ocean live longest of all. Austad―the leading authority on longevity in animals―argues that the best way we will learn from these long-lived animals is by studying them in the wi

How Hansel and Gretel, Sherlock Holmes, the movie Groundhog Day, Harry Potter, and other familiar stories illustrate the concepts of computing.Picture a computer scientist, staring at a screen and clicking away frantically on a keyboard, hacking into a system, or perhaps developing an app. Now delete that picture. In Once Upon an Algorithm, Martin Erwig explains computation as something that takes place beyond electronic computers, and computer science as the study of systematic problem solving. Erwig points out that many daily activities involve problem solving. Getting up in the morning, for example: You get up, take a shower, get dressed, eat breakfast. This simple daily routine solves a recurring problem through a series of well-defined steps. In computer science, such a routine is called an algorithm. Erwig illustrates a series of concepts in computing with examples from daily life and familiar stories. Hansel and Gretel, for example, execute an algorithm to get home from the fore

A concise introduction to content and the content industry, from the early internet to the Instagram egg.From the time we roll out of bed to check overnight updates to our last posts, likes, and views of the previous day, we're consuming and producing content. But what does the term “content” even mean? When did it become ubiquitous? And at what cost? In this volume in the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series, Kate Eichhorn offers a concise introduction to content and the content industry, examining the far-reaching effects content has on culture, politics, and labor in a digital age. Eichhorn traces the evolution of our current understanding of content from the early internet to the current social mediaverse. The quintessential example of content, she says, is the Instagram egg―an image that imparted no information or knowledge and circulated simply for the sake of circulation. Eichhorn explores what differentiates user-generated content from content produced by compensated (althoug

A concise illustrated introduction to the history and physics of supernovae, the brilliant explosions of stars; with striking color illustrations. Supernovae are the explosions of stars. They are some of the most energetic phenomena in the Universe, rivaling the combined light of billions of stars. Supernovae have been studied for centuries, and they have also made appearances in popular culture: a glimpse of a supernova in a painting provides Sherlock Holmes with a crucial clue, for example. In this volume in the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series, astrophysicist Or Graur offers a concise and accessible introduction to these awe-inspiring astronomical phenomena. Graur explains that a deep observational understanding of supernovae―why and how they shine and how their brightness changes over time―allows us to use them as tools for experiments in astrophysics and physics. A certain type of supernova, for example, brightens and fades in such a predictable manner that we can measure

An introduction to computational modeling for cognitive neuroscientists, covering both foundational work and recent developments. Cognitive neuroscientists need sophisticated conceptual tools to make sense of their field’s proliferation of novel theories, methods, and data. Computational modeling is such a tool, enabling researchers to turn theories into precise formulations. This book offers a mathematically gentle and theoretically unified introduction to modeling cognitive processes. Theoretical exercises of varying degrees of difficulty throughout help readers develop their modeling skills. After a general introduction to cognitive modeling and optimization, the book covers models of decision making; supervised learning algorithms, including Hebbian learning, delta rule, and backpropagation; the statistical model analysis methods of model parameter estimation and model evaluation; the three recent cognitive modeling approaches of reinforcement learning, unsupervised learning, and

How conflicting ideas of nature threaten to fracture America's identity.Amber waves of grain, purple mountain majesties: American invest much of their national identity in sites of natural beauty. And yet American lands today are torn by conflicts over science, religion, identity, and politics. Creationists believe that the Biblical flood carved landscapes less than 10,000 years ago; environmentalists protest pipelines; Western states argue that the federal government's land policies throttle free enterprise; Native Americans demand protection for sacred sites. In this book, David Nye looks at Americans' irreconcilably conflicting ideas about nature.A landscape is conflicted when different groups have different uses for the same location—for example, when some want to open mining sites that others want to preserve or when suburban development impinges on agriculture. Some landscapes are so degraded from careless use that they become toxic “anti-landscapes.” Nye traces these conflicts t

Architectural Graphic Standards by Charles George Ramsey and Harold Reeve Sleeper, first published in 1932 (and now in its eleventh edition), is a definitive technical reference for architects - the o

This collection of essays presents an up-to-date overview of research in the minimalist program of linguistic theory. The book includes a new essay by Noam Chomsky as well as original contributions fr

Programming by demonstration (PBD) is a remarkable method that allows end users to create, customize, and extend programs by demonstrating what the program should do. This volume, which grew out of a

Divisible by 2 documents an architectural experiment by John Whiteman that articulates the preoccupations and concerns of the current generation of architectural and cultural theorists and practitione

An introduction to game theory that offers not only theoretical tools but also the intuition and behavioral insights to apply these tools to real-world situations.This introductory text on game theory provides students with both the theoretical tools to analyze situations through the logic of game theory and the intuition and behavioral insights to apply these tools to real-world situations. It is unique among game theory texts in offering a clear, formal introduction to standard game theory while incorporating evidence from experimental data and introducing recent behavioral models. Students will not only learn about incentives, how to represent situations as games, and what agents “should” do in these situations, but they will also be presented with evidence that either confirms the theoretical assumptions or suggests a way in which the theory might be updated.Features:Each chapter begins with a motivating example that can be run as an experiment and ends with a discussion of the beh

An expert offers a guide to where we should use artificial intelligence―and where we should not.Before we know it, artificial intelligence (AI) will work its way into every corner of our lives, making decisions about, with, and for us. Is this a good thing? There’s a tendency to think that machines can be more “objective” than humans―can make better decisions about job applicants, for example, or risk assessments. In Awkward Intelligence, AI expert Katharina Zweig offers readers the inside story, explaining how many levers computer and data scientists must pull for AI’s supposedly objective decision making. She presents the good and the bad: AI is good at processing vast quantities of data that humans cannot―but it’s bad at making judgments about people. AI is accurate at sifting through billions of websites to offer up the best results for our search queries and it has beaten reigning champions in games of chess and Go. But, drawing on her own research, Zweig shows how inac