Rozprawy doktorskie na temat „Belief systems”

This thesis is concerned with the problem of construction of the logical structure of a persuasive discourse. A persuasive discourse can be defined as a monodirectional form of communication, generated by a speaker in order to convince a hearer about the validity (or fallacy) of a specific belief The construction of the structure of a persuasive discourse is realized, in this work, through the adoption of two basic elements: a belief system and a planning system. The planning system is used as a tool for the automatic generation of the discourse structure (or plan), obtained through the decomposition of the assigned (communicative) goals of persuasion, aimed at producing specific effects on the hearer’s beliefs. The belief system is adopted in order to endow the planning process with a formal language of beliefs for the representation of such goals, and with the mechanisms which govern the propagation of their (expected) effects on the rest of the hearer's belief state. The main results presented consist of the formalization of a paradigm for specification of belief systems, and of a method — whose correctness is formally proved — for their integration with planning systems. The formalization of a belief system for discourse structure representation (defined in accordance with the theoretical paradigm) is also given, together with the description of its implementation and integration with a specific planner, which resulted in the actual completion of a system for the automatic generation of persuasive discourse plans.

The goal of this thesis is twofold: first, we want to present the distributed belief accommodation and revision model for multi-agent systems that has been developed and, second, we wish to show its applicability to an appropriate domain. The Distributed Belief Accommodation & Revision model, called DeBAteR model, was developed for co-operative heterogeneous multi-agent systems used to model inherently dynamic distributed problems. In these systems, although the agents are able to detect changes both in the environment and in the problem specifications, each agent has only a partial view of the global picture. As a result the information that represents the current state of affairs is dynamic, incomplete and sometimes uncertain. This non-monotonic kind of data is called beliefs ? a belief is a piece of data that is held as correct as long as no contradicting evidence is found or presented. Each agent is expected to include an assumption based truth maintenance module for representing properly this type of data. Our main effort was concentrated on the task of maintaining the system's information, which consists of updating, revising and accommodating the represented beliefs. Belief updating is necessary for including the changes detected by the agents both in the environment and/or in the problem specifications. Belief revision is essential for solving the inconsistencies detected among the represented beliefs. Belief accommodation and revision is crucial for integrating the multiple disparate perspectives regarding the same data items, which may occur whenever there is overlap of expertise domains between the agents. In order to solve the information conflicts that result from the detection of inconsistencies between distinct beliefs or within multi-perspective beliefs we conceived the DeBATeR model. The DeBAteR is fully distributed, provides individual belief autonomy and is made of two methodologies: the pro-active belief accommodation and revision methodology and the delayed belief revision methodology. Whilst the first methodology is used to solve domain independent conflicts, the second methodology was devised for solving domain dependent conflicts. Both methodologies use argumentation for, in the case of the domain independent conflicts, choosing the most credible perspective between the existing multiple perspectives of a belief, and, in the case of the domain dependent conflicts, finding the best alternative belief support set for the affected concepts. These methodologies are distributed and their scope may be internal or collective. The DeBAteR model main contributions are: (i) the pro-active methodology conceived for solving domain independent conflicts and (ii) the capability, not only to represent and maintain individual beliefs and joint beliefs, but also to accommodate, rationally maintain and make use of multi-perspective beliefs. Finally, we describe the developed decision support multi-agent system for choosing adequate project locations, called DIPLOMAT ? Dynamic and Interactive Project Location Test bed, which has the ability of accommodating and revising the represented beliefs according to the DeBAteR model methodologies.
O objectivo desta dissertação é duplo: por um lado, pretendemos dar a conhecer o modelo de revisão e acomodação de crenças para sistemas multi-agente por nós desenvolvido e, por outro, procuramos ilustrar a sua validade descrevendo a aplicação que realizámos. O modelo, designado DeBAteR ? Distributed Belief Accommodation & Revision, destina-se a sistemas multi-agente cooperativos e heterogéneos que modelam problemas inerentemente distribuídos e dinâmicos. Neste tipo de sistemas, a informação que representa o ambiente é dinâmica (os agentes possuem a capacidade de constatar alterações no ambiente e/ou nas condições do problema) e, muitas vezes, incompleta (os agentes possuem visões parcelares da realidade) e/ou incerta. Este tipo de informação, de carácter não definitivo, designa-se por crenças ? uma crença é uma convicção tida como correcta enquanto não for posta em causa por alguma evidência. Cada agente, a fim de representar e manipular crenças, foi enriquecido com um módulo específico de manutenção de consistência baseado em suposições. O nosso esforço concentrou-se na tarefa de manutenção (actualização, revisão e acomodação) da informação do sistema. A actualização de crenças é essencial para incorporar as alterações que os agentes detectam no ambiente e/ou nas condições do problema. A revisão de crenças é indispensável para resolver inconsistências (conflitos) entre as crenças representadas. A acomodação e revisão simultânea de crenças é imprescindível para a integração das múltiplas perspectivas díspares que surgem em relação a um mesmo item de informação (crenças pluri-perspectiva) quando existe sobreposição de domínios de especialidade entre os agentes. Para tentar solucionar estes conflitos entre crenças concebemos um modelo distribuído que assegura autonomia individual de crença. O modelo de acomodação e revisão de crenças DeBAteR é composto por duas metodologias: a metodologia pró-activa de acomodação e revisão de crenças pluri-perspectiva e a metodologia retardada de revisão de crenças. A primeira, destina-se a resolver conflitos independentes do domínio e a segunda destina-se à resolução de conflitos dependentes do domínio. Estas metodologias são suportadas quase integralmente por um sistema de argumentação que procura, no caso dos conflitos independentes do domínio, escolher a perspectiva mais credível e, no caso dos conflitos dependentes do domínio, encontrar o melhor conjunto alternativo de suporte para os conceitos afectados. Esta actividade é descentralizada e pode decorrer quer no âmbito intra-agente, quer no âmbito inter-agente. É ainda de realçar: (i) o carácter pró-activo da resolução dos conflitos independentes do domínio (crenças pluri-perspectiva) e (ii) a capacidade de, não só, representar e manter crenças de âmbito individual (crenças suportadas por apenas um agente) e crenças conjuntas (crenças suportadas por vários agentes), mas também, de sintetizar, manter racionalmente e utilizar crenças pluri-perspectiva. Por último, descrevemos o sistema multi-agente de apoio à decisão no domínio da localização de empreendimentos desenvolvido, denominado DIPLOMAT ? Dynamic and Interactive Project Location Test bed, o qual possui a capacidade de acomodar e rever crenças de acordo com as metodologias concebidas no âmbito do modelo DeBAteR.

This study compares spiritualist belief systems found in Africa, China and the United States. The purpose is to determine the functions these belief systems serve for their adherents and to isolate the features common to all three systems and find possible explanations for the similarities.Original fieldwork was conducted at Camp Chesterfield, Chesterfield, Indiana to obtain data for the chapter on the United States. The fieldwork and data of other scholars was utilized for the chapters on China and Africa.Belief systems from these three culture areas are described in terms of history, social and economic environment, cosmology, and ritual. Similarities in cosmology and ritual are then discussed. Functions, ritual aspects, and cosmology common to all three areas are identified. Diffusion as a possible cause of the similarities is eliminated in favor of psychological/physiological experiences with are universally possible, even if never actualized, to all human beings.

A rapidly growing number of Americans are embracing life outside the bounds of organized religion. Although America has long been viewed as a fervently religious Christian nation, survey data shows that more and more Americans are identifying as “not religious.” There are more non-religious Americans than ever before, yet social scientists have not adequately studied or typologized secularities, and the lived reality of secular individuals in America has not been astutely analyzed. American Secularism documents how changes to American society have fueled these shifts in the non-religious landscape and examines the diverse and dynamic world of secular Americans. This volume offers a theoretical framework for understanding secularisms. It explores secular Americans’ thought and practice to understand secularisms as worldviews in their own right, not just as negations of religion. Drawing on empirical data, the authors examine how people live secular lives and make meaning outside of organized religion. Joseph O. Baker and Buster G. Smith link secularities to broader issues of social power and organization, providing an empirical and cultural perspective on the secular landscape. In so doing, they demonstrate that shifts in American secularism are reflective of changes in the political meanings of “religion” in American culture. American Secularism addresses the contemporary lived reality of secular individuals, outlining forms of secular identity and showing their connection to patterns of family formation, sexuality, and politics, providing scholars of religion with a more comprehensive understanding of worldviews that do not include traditional religion.
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This thesis is about logical models of belief (and knowledge) representation and belief change. This means that we propose logical systems which are intended to represent how agents perceive a situation and reason about it, and how they update their beliefs about this situation when events occur. These agents can be machines, robots, human beings. . . but they are assumed to be somehow autonomous. The way a fixed situation is perceived by agents can be represented by statements about the agents� beliefs: for example �agent A believes that the door of the room is open� or �agent A believes that her colleague is busy this afternoon�. �Logical systems� means that agents can reason about the situation and their beliefs about it: if agent A believes that her colleague is busy this afternoon then agent A infers that he will not visit her this afternoon. We moreover often assume that our situations involve several agents which interact between each other. So these agents have beliefs about the situation (such as �the door is open�) but also about the other agents� beliefs: for example agent A might believe that agent B believes that the door is open. These kinds of beliefs are called higher-order beliefs. Epistemic logic [Hintikka, 1962; Fagin et al., 1995; Meyer and van der Hoek, 1995], the logic of belief and knowledge, can capture all these phenomena and will be our main starting point to model such fixed (�static�) situations. Uncertainty can of course be expressed by beliefs and knowledge: for example agent A being uncertain whether her colleague is busy this afternoon can be expressed by �agent A does not know whether her colleague is busy this afternoon�. But we sometimes need to enrich and refine the representation of uncertainty: for example, even if agent A does not know whether her colleague is busy this afternoon, she might consider it more probable that he is actually busy. So other logics have been developed to deal more adequately with the representation of uncertainty, such as probabilistic logic, fuzzy logic or possibilistic logic, and we will refer to some of them in this thesis (see [Halpern, 2003] for a survey on reasoning about uncertainty). But things become more complex when we introduce events and change in the picture. Issues arise even if we assume that there is a single agent. Indeed, if the incoming information conveyed by the event is coherent with the agent�s beliefs then the agent can just add it to her beliefs. But if the incoming information contradicts the agent�s beliefs then the agent has somehow to revise her beliefs, and as it turns out there is no obvious way to decide what should be her resulting beliefs. Solving this problem was the goal of the logic-based belief revision theory developed by Alchourrón, Gärdenfors and Makinson (to which we will refer by the term AGM) [Alchourrón et al., 1985; Gärdenfors, 1988; Gärdenfors and Rott, 1995]. Their idea is to introduce �rationality postulates� that specify which belief revision operations can be considered as being �rational� or reasonable, and then to propose specific revision operations that fulfill these postulates. However, AGM does not consider situations where the agent might also have some uncertainty about the incoming information: for example agent A might be uncertain due to some noise whether her colleague told her that he would visit her on Tuesday or on Thursday. In this thesis we also investigate this kind of phenomenon. Things are even more complex in a multi-agent setting because the way agents update their beliefs depends not only on their beliefs about the event itself but also on their beliefs about the way the other agents perceived the event (and so about the other agents� beliefs about the event). For example, during a private announcement of a piece of information to agent A the beliefs of the other agents actually do not change because they believe nothing is actually happening; but during a public announcement all the agents� beliefs might change because they all believe that an announcement has been made. Such kind of subtleties have been dealt with in a field called dynamic epistemic logic (Gerbrandy and Groeneveld, 1997; Baltag et al., 1998; van Ditmarsch et al., 2007b]. The idea is to represent by an event model how the event is perceived by the agents and then to define a formal update mechanism that specifies how the agents update their beliefs according to this event model and their previous representaton of the situation. Finally, the issues concerning belief revision that we raised in the single agent case are still present in the multi-agent case. So this thesis is more generally about information and information change. However, we will not deal with problems of how to store information in machines or how to actually communicate information. Such problems have been dealt with in information theory [Cover and Thomas, 1991] and Kolmogorov complexity theory [Li and Vitányi, 1993]. We will just assume that such mechanisms are already available and start our investigations from there. Studying and proposing logical models for belief change and belief representation has applications in several areas. First in artificial intelligence, where machines or robots need to have a formal representation of the surrounding world (which might involve other agents), and formal mechanisms to update this representation when they receive incoming information. Such formalisms are crucial if we want to design autonomous agents, able to act autonomously in the real world or in a virtual world (such as on the internet). Indeed, the representation of the surrounding world is essential for a robot in order to reason about the world, plan actions in order to achieve goals... and it must be able to update and revise its representation of the world itself in order to cope autonomously with unexpected events. Second in game theory (and consequently in economics), where we need to model games involving several agents (players) having beliefs about the game and about the other agents� beliefs (such as agent A believes that agent B has the ace of spade, or agent A believes that agent B believes that agent A has the ace of heart...), and how they update their representation of the game when events (such as showing privately a card or putting a card on the table) occur. Third in cognitive psychology, where we need to model as accurately as possible epistemic state of human agents and the dynamics of belief and knowledge in order to explain and describe cognitive processes. The thesis is organized as follows. In Chapter 2, we first recall epistemic logic. Then we observe that representing an epistemic situation involving several agents depends very much on the modeling point of view one takes. For example, in a poker game the representation of the game will be different depending on whether the modeler is a poker player playing in the game or the card dealer who knows exactly what the players� cards are. In this thesis, we will carefully distinguish these different modeling approaches and the. different kinds of formalisms they give rise to. In fact, the interpretation of a formalism relies quite a lot on the nature of these modeling points of view. Classically, in epistemic logic, the models built are supposed to be correct and represent the situation from an external and objective point of view. We call this modeling approach the perfect external approach. In Chapter 2, we study the modeling point of view of a particular modeler-agent involved in the situation with other agents (and so having a possibly erroneous perception of the situation). We call this modeling approach the internal approach. We propose a logical formalism based on epistemic logic that this agent uses to represent �for herself� the surrounding world. We then set some formal connections between the internal approach and the (perfect) external approach. Finally we axiomatize our logical formalism and show that the resulting logic is decidable. In Chapter 3, we first recall dynamic epistemic logic as viewed by Baltag, Moss and Solecki (to which we will refer by the term BMS). Then we study in which case seriality of the accessibility relations of epistemic models is preserved during an update, first for the full updated model and then for generated submodels of the full updated model. Finally, observing that the BMS formalism follows the (perfect) external approach, we propose an internal version of it, just as we proposed an internal version of epistemic logic in Chapter 2. In Chapter 4, we still follow the internal approach and study the particular case where the event is a private announcement. We first show, thanks to our study in Chapter 3, that in a multi-agent setting, expanding in the AGM style corresponds to performing a private announcement in the BMS style. This indicates that generalizing AGM belief revision theory to a multi-agent setting amounts to study private announcement. We then generalize the AGM representation theorems to the multi-agent case. Afterwards, in the spirit of the AGM approach, we go beyond the AGM postulates and investigate multi-agent rationality postulates specific to our multi-agent setting inspired from the fact that the kind of phenomenon we study is private announcement. Finally we provide an example of revision operation that we apply to a concrete example. In Chapter 5, we follow the (perfect) external approach and enrich the BMS formalism with probabilities. This enables us to provide a fined-grained account of how human agents interpret events involving uncertainty and how they revise their beliefs. Afterwards, we review different principles for the notion of knowledge that have been proposed in the literature and show how some principles that we argue to be reasonable ones can all be captured in our rich and expressive formalism. Finally, we extend our general formalism to a multi-agent setting. In Chapter 6, we still follow the (perfect) external approach and enrich our dynamic epistemic language with converse events. This language is interpreted on structures with accessibility relations for both beliefs and events, unlike the BMS formalism where events and beliefs are not on the same formal level. Then we propose principles relating events and beliefs and provide a complete characterization, which yields a new logic EDL. Finally, we show that BMS can be translated into our new logic EDL thanks to the converse operator: this device enables us to translate the structure of the event model directly within a particular axiomatization of EDL, without having to refer to a particular event model in the language (as done in BMS). In Chapter 7 we summarize our results and give an overview of remaining technical issues and some desiderata for future directions of research. Parts of this thesis are based on publication, but we emphasize that they have been entirely rewritten in order to make this thesis an integrated whole. Sections 4.2.2 and 4.3 of Chapter 4 are based on [Aucher, 2008]. Sections 5.2, 5.3 and 5.5 of Chapter 5 are based on [Aucher, 2007]. Chapter 6 is based on [Aucher and Herzig, 2007].

Includes bibliographical references
This thesis explores the beliefs of mathematics teachers working in a rural school in South Africa. This is premised on the argument that understanding the beliefs of teachers is a necessary, even if insufficient, prerequisite to designing effective teacher development programmes. I postulate that take-up rates of new content and teaching methods are low due to unmanaged cognitive conflict with pre-existing beliefs about the nature of teaching. A broad review of the literature on beliefs as a concept is conducted to establish theoretical grounding for the study of beliefs as an abstract object of analysis (Green, 1971; Nespor, 1987; Pajares, 1992). I particularly refer to Ernest's (1989) models of mathematics epistemology, and Adler's (2001) dilemmas of teaching mathematics in multilingual classrooms. Multiple studies of mathematics teachers' beliefs are drawn upon to relate beliefs to classroom practice. Qualitative data on two mathematics teachers working in a rural school in the Eastern Cape was gathered over the period of a month, using ethnographic methods as outlined by Thompson (1992) for gathering evidence of beliefs. Primary data, which consisted of pre-interviews, multiple lesson observations and stimulated-recall post-interviews, was analysed for evidence of teacher beliefs. Secondary data, in the form of a researcher journal and socio-economic information about the school, was also gathered to provide rich context data in which to situate the teachers' work. Particular attention was paid to teacher beliefs about teaching and learning, mathematics and language. Further evidence for beliefs was then obtained through close examination of an observation extract using classroom discourse analysis. The main finding of this thesis was that not only does a school's context provide logistical constraints to curriculum implementation and pedagogical change, but that the worldviews of teachers affect their interpretation of the curriculum (Chapman, 2002). Significantly, a relationship between the mathematics epistemology a teacher holds and their ability to admit language as a critical pedagogical factor is suggested. I conclude that detailed understanding of what teachers believe may provide a productive approach for teacher development programmes that aim to effect change.

The world needs entrepreneurs now more than ever; fresh thinkers, who spot opportunities and apply their talents to overcome obstacles to make their ideas happen. Entrepreneurs need to reframe the recession as an area of business opportunity for all. They must unleash their innovative ideas around the world and inspire solutions that will tackle issues ranging from poverty, unemployment and climatic change. It is the fundamental precept of the Christian faith that God calls not only ministers and other spiritual workers, but everyone to specific roles in his kingdom. Christian Entrepreneurs must realise that their calling to establish and lead business organisations that are designed to achieve results in the secular world. Christian Entrepreneur Organisations differ from secular businesses because they do business while being led by the Holy Spirit. Christian Entrepreneurship is the return of unfulfilled business leaders to the sense of "calling" enjoyed by fellow laity in the U.S.A. and Western Europe prior to the 20th Century. The goal is to develop a business that blends business excellence and entrepreneurship with Christian Biblical and theological perspectives. This exploratory study investigated the role of the Christian faith in Entrepreneurship and in Entrepreneurial businesses. The study identified some of the Christian business practices and introduced the reader to the different approaches this group of entrepreneurs have to that of the secular business equivalent.

The specific aims of the study were to determine: (1) whether significant differences in frequency of type of response to a questionnaire concerned with religious beliefs occur between pupils classified according to state, location, sex, age, religion, denomination and social class; (2) whether significant differences in frequency of type of response to a questionnaire concerned with moral attitudes, human relationships and certain religious orientations occur between pupils classified according to state, location, sex, age, religion, denomination and social class; (3) whether significant differences in self-esteem occur between pupils classified according to state, location, sex, age, religion, denomination and social class. These specific aims can be expressed in the form of the following broad null hypothesis, viz. that state membership, location, sex, age, religion, denomination and socio-economic class of pupils do not influence significantly religious beliefs, moral attitudes, views on human relationships, religious orientations and self-esteem of pupils in the secondary school range. viii The sample composed 500 Nigerian secondary school pupils in the age range 11-18+ years. There were 268 boys and 232 girls drawn from various states, locations, socioeconomic classes, religions and denominations. Data were collected via two detailed self-constructed questionnaires pertaining to religious beliefs, moral views, human relationships and religious orientations and practices, and also by employing the Coopersmith Self-Esteem Inventory.

Bibliography: p. 103-114.
The motivation for this research was twofold. The first was to explore measures of information system success. The second, to investigate the influence of user variables, specifically attitude, belief and levels of user involvement, on information system success. Although researchers agree that the aggregate organisational benefit derived from an information system is the best measure of success, no practical instrument has been employed to measure this benefit. Rather, a number of surrogate measures, specifically system use and user information satisfaction have been employed. This research explores a new measure, the "fit to objectives", as an appropriate and practical measure for information system success. It also uses this measure to establish the relationship between information system success and user involvement. User attitude, user belief and levels of user involvement have all been examined by previous research and are postulated to be positively associated to information system success. However, in testing the above postulations previous research has achieved mixed results. The major constraints in verifying the above has been a lack of accepted definitions, inappropriate measures, and poor methodologies. With the growth in the importance of the user in information systems development, a better understanding of the behavioural influences relating to the user is required. In examining these user influences, this research employs tested and proven measures based on past research from the information systems, organisational behaviour, and psychological disciplines. The research is both exploratory and empirical in nature. A focus throughout has been on the practical application of constructs and instruments and providing contributions to both information system practitioners and researchers alike.

Natural disasters disrupt our daily life and cause many sufferings. Among the various natural disasters, flood is one of the most catastrophic. Assessing flood risk helps to take necessary precautions and can save human lives. The assessment of risk involves various factors which can not be measured with hundred percent certainty. Therefore, the present methods of flood risk assessment can not assess the risk of flooding accurately.  This research rigorously investigates various types of uncertainties associated with the flood risk factors. In addition, a comprehensive study of the present flood risk assessment approaches has been conducted. Belief Rule Base expert systems are widely used to handle various of types of uncertainties. Therefore, this research considers BRBES’s approach to develop an expert system to assess the risk of flooding. In addition, to facilitate the learning procedures of BRBES, an optimal learning algorithm has been proposed. The developed BRBES has been applied taking real world case study area, located at Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. The training data has been collected from the case study area to obtain the trained BRB and to develop the optimal learning model. The BRBES can generate different "What-If" scenarios which enables the analysis of flood risk of an area from various perspectives which makes the system robust and sustainable. This system is said to be intelligent as it has knowledge base, inference engine as well as the learning capability.

Increasingly, cultural workers and artists from many disciplines are finding themselves involved in the creation of public and private rituals, ceremonies and celebrations. Focusing on ritual and celebration in Australian contexts, this thesis posits a new categorisation of the types of event that might be encountered, grouping and examining them according to their action upon participants with the aim of enabling a more practical methodology of design in contemporary societal conditions. Existing categories, which have defined these age-old activities in terms of anthropological observation or social intention, must now be regarded as obsolete because they take no account of rapid and widespread changes in degrees of adherence to traditional belief systems, in social orientation and in Western cultural practices. There is a need to reappraise why individuals and communities might continue to hold rituals and celebrations, and how these can be designed, managed and operated most effectively. The thesis identifies four major categories of ritual: Transformation, Reinforcement, Transcendence and Catharsis. It argues that, by recognising the differences between how each category operates for participants and also certain commonalities across categories, effectiveness of design is facilitated. In developing parameters for each category and giving examples of contemporary praxis, the writer stresses the importance of understanding traditional ceremonies so that elements of a rich repertoire of techniques developed over long periods can be planned into new rituals for contemporary application, despite the dissipation of shared, coherent belief systems in a highly secularised culture. This impels consideration of questions of cultural sensitivity, raises the need for close community involvement in design, and requires exploration of managing the challenges of multiple signification. Contemporary cultural contexts for ritual and celebratory events are marked by plurality, multi-vocalism and multicultural experience. Designers thus need to achieve, out of difference, an event that produces coherence, deep effects for each participant and a sense of shared experience. The thesis demonstrates means to this end through informed praxis, that is, by practitioners ensuring that theory and practice are working together in these complex contexts that involve the well being of individuals and communities. The categories have been identified through investigations into the literature of myth, ritual and celebration, helpful frameworks developed in cognitive science, and extensive research provided by thirty years of practice in the field. As a designer and director of rituals and celebrations, the writer seeks both to confirm the importance of the artist within the process and to demonstrate a new, practical, ethically located and effective approach for the education of intending practitioners. No claim is made that the four categories are definitive or mutually exclusive of one another. It is accepted that in many situations the categories might coalesce, be added to and/or fragment. However, the categorisation provides a fresh vantage point from which to view the potentially powerful effects of ritual experience, an effective tool of construction for the use of artists and cultural activists working in this field, and an informed basis for praxis. In developing this new categorisation the writer argues an ongoing need for rituals and celebrations to clarify and enrich the lives of individuals and the community while stressing the importance of careful and appropriate design of such events.

Increasingly, cultural workers and artists from many disciplines are finding themselves involved in the creation of public and private rituals, ceremonies and celebrations. Focusing on ritual and celebration in Australian contexts, this thesis posits a new categorisation of the types of event that might be encountered, grouping and examining them according to their action upon participants with the aim of enabling a more practical methodology of design in contemporary societal conditions. Existing categories, which have defined these age-old activities in terms of anthropological observation or social intention, must now be regarded as obsolete because they take no account of rapid and widespread changes in degrees of adherence to traditional belief systems, in social orientation and in Western cultural practices. There is a need to reappraise why individuals and communities might continue to hold rituals and celebrations, and how these can be designed, managed and operated most effectively. The thesis identifies four major categories of ritual: Transformation, Reinforcement, Transcendence and Catharsis. It argues that, by recognising the differences between how each category operates for participants and also certain commonalities across categories, effectiveness of design is facilitated. In developing parameters for each category and giving examples of contemporary praxis, the writer stresses the importance of understanding traditional ceremonies so that elements of a rich repertoire of techniques developed over long periods can be planned into new rituals for contemporary application, despite the dissipation of shared, coherent belief systems in a highly secularised culture. This impels consideration of questions of cultural sensitivity, raises the need for close community involvement in design, and requires exploration of managing the challenges of multiple signification. Contemporary cultural contexts for ritual and celebratory events are marked by plurality, multi-vocalism and multicultural experience. Designers thus need to achieve, out of difference, an event that produces coherence, deep effects for each participant and a sense of shared experience. The thesis demonstrates means to this end through informed praxis, that is, by practitioners ensuring that theory and practice are working together in these complex contexts that involve the well being of individuals and communities. The categories have been identified through investigations into the literature of myth, ritual and celebration, helpful frameworks developed in cognitive science, and extensive research provided by thirty years of practice in the field. As a designer and director of rituals and celebrations, the writer seeks both to confirm the importance of the artist within the process and to demonstrate a new, practical, ethically located and effective approach for the education of intending practitioners. No claim is made that the four categories are definitive or mutually exclusive of one another. It is accepted that in many situations the categories might coalesce, be added to and/or fragment. However, the categorisation provides a fresh vantage point from which to view the potentially powerful effects of ritual experience, an effective tool of construction for the use of artists and cultural activists working in this field, and an informed basis for praxis. In developing this new categorisation the writer argues an ongoing need for rituals and celebrations to clarify and enrich the lives of individuals and the community while stressing the importance of careful and appropriate design of such events.
Thesis (Masters)
Master of Philosophy (MPhil)
School of Arts
Full Text

Upper-echelons theory has been an extremely active stream of research for over two-decades and, as a counterbalance to the population ecology perspective, has provided evidence to support the position that managers influence firm outcomes. Upper-echelons theory posits that, as managers are boundedly rational and selectively perceptive, a behavioural component derived from their idiosyncratic characteristics should be evident in organisation outcomes. While extensive research has found support for these posited relationships, the operationalisation process subsumes the presumed micro psychological processes into a black-box. Adopting a realist perspective, this thesis goes beyond accepting that organisational outcomes are shaped by managers characteristics and explores the underlying generative mechanisms at work. While upper-echelons theory presumes that a process of selective perception explains the black-box processes, in the two-decades since its publication it has received little empirical attention. In this light, the selective perception literature is extensively reviewed, ultimately rejected, and an alternative model developed. Over time, both strategic choice and population ecology theorists have moved from their extreme positions of opposition and a theory of managerial discretion has been proposed to bridge the divide. This thesis builds and extends the concept of managerial discretion as an alternative framework to explain the black-box processes of upper-echelons theory. The theoretical model developed, proposes how, through the process of perceived, enacted, and actual discretion, managers characteristics shape outcomes. The model provides an extensive base for future research and this thesis tests the initial stage, exploring the relationship between managerial characteristics and perceived discretion.

Forgiveness is the act of moving beyond shame, guilt, anger, or blame, and it has been linked to psychological well-being, prosocial behavior, and religion/spirituality (R/S). However, the research on why and how people forgive is inconsistent, as the concepts involved are complex and difficult to define and operationalize. The purpose of this interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) was to provide a better understanding of why and how people are cognitively and emotionally able to forgive and the role of R/S in that process. Goal orientation and cognitive restructuring theories were used as frameworks for understanding the forgiveness experience. First-person, semistructured interviews were conducted with 12 persons from 10 different sacred belief systems who had experienced forgiveness of a major transgression. Data were analyzed using the IPA process, and five themes emerged: what is forgiveness?; why forgive?; how to forgive; the relationship between self-forgiveness and forgiveness of others; and developing a forgiveness disposition. All participants described forgiveness as an effortful, transformative process. Their motivation to forgive was based on a learning goal orientation and benefits to personal well-being and relationships. Participants forgave through making supportive R/S and/or social connections, finding the courage to confront transgressions, and resolving issues with compassion and creativity. A model of forgiveness was proposed that researchers can apply to future research efforts, and that mental health providers, clergy, and other helping professionals can use with clients in therapeutic applications of healing from major transgressions.

This work examines the belief system underlying computer-based systems development, by reference to an analogy with a model of scientific research due to Kuhn. Kuhn's model describes 'scientific communities', each united by an underlying many-faceted belief system, the 'disciplinary matrix', which forms a constellation of commitments shared by the members of these communities. A scientific community is compared here with the community of computer-based systems developers and its sub-groups. The division of the developers of computer-based systems development methods and tools into schools based on paradigmatic differences is paralleled with Kuhn's view of a scientific discipline at the early, pre-science, stage. The use of a computer-based systems development method in practice, and informal computer-based systems development activities, are paralleled with Kuhnian normal science, working within the paradigm of the discipline and of the techniques employed. This parallel provides a framework for structuring the explicit and implicit assumptions and models which form the craft knowledge underlying computer-based systems development theory and practice. Following a search for elements of the disciplinary matrix in the theory of computer-based systems development, as described in textbooks, and in its practice through interviews with developers, the results of action research and reports of systems development failures, it is concluded that the analogy with Kuhn's view of scientific activity is justifiable, and that articulation and examination of the implications of the analogy can reveal useful information to assist in describing and improving computer-based systems development. The results of this search are presented in terms of the specific beliefs and models identified. It is suggested that, as future research, the Kuhn-based model of computer-based systems development should be extended into a detailed investigation into the effects of individual elements of the disciplinary matrix, either individually or in combination, on the mind set of the computer-based systems developer.

This qualitative research seeks to identify and understand the beliefs of 10 high school geometry teachers that help resolve apparent inconsistencies between their espoused and enacted beliefs. Data was collected using an initial interview, classroom observations, and a follow-up interview to gather evidence of teacher beliefs based on what they say, do, and intend respectively. Open coding, analytical coding, cluster identification, coding memos, and analytical memos were used to analyze the data and write summaries of the teachers' explanatory beliefs with beliefs as the unit of analysis. It was identified that teachers consistently and inconsistently enact their espoused beliefs, but there are also instances when teachers both consistently and inconsistently enact particular espoused beliefs. This endeavor necessitates a shared understanding of terms, and it was found what it means to "understand" needs to be clarified with a definition and examples from teachers. When teachers appear to not enact their espoused beliefs, explanatory beliefs were pinpointed that resolve the conflict and found the explanatory beliefs exist in at least seven macro clusters. These explanatory beliefs interact with espoused beliefs by overriding, limiting, or preventing the espoused beliefs to resolve the apparent inconsistency in teachers espoused and enacted beliefs. The explanatory beliefs with limiting and overriding interactions were found to coexist for some teachers around a teaching practice as overriding interactions are connected to constraints on the classroom whereas limiting interactions are not. It was also found that belief clusters are nested within clusters of beliefs, and these clusters allow for beliefs to cluster in isolation in different ways. This work also shows empirically that some geometry teacher beliefs are socially constructed due to the presence of common cultural artifacts and influence from mathematics teacher educators. This work has implications and future research directions in the areas of using beliefs as the unit of analysis, mapping teacher's belief systems, considering the social construction of beliefs and role of community, connecting beliefs to specific teaching practices, and educating teachers.
Doctor of Philosophy
This research seeks to understand and interpret the beliefs of 10 high school geometry teachers that resolve apparent inconsistencies between what teachers say they believe and what they do in the classroom. Data was collected using an initial interview, classroom observations, and a follow-up interview to gather evidence of teacher beliefs based on what they say, do, and intend respectively. It was identified that teachers consistently and inconsistently enact their stated beliefs, but there are also instances when teachers both consistently and inconsistently enact their stated beliefs. When teachers appear to inconsistently enact their stated beliefs, it was found that teachers have logical reasons why they do so, and these reasons relate to specific teaching practices. It was also found that teacher beliefs interact with each other in different ways. Teachers' beliefs can limit or prevent the enaction of their other beliefs. In addition, school level constraints can override the enaction of some teacher beliefs. This research shows that some beliefs are held by different teachers from vastly different schools which suggests that some geometry teacher beliefs are held socially. The findings from this research have implications for teacher education

Il existe différentes façons de classifier l’incertitude ou ses sources. La distinction la plus courante est de diviser l’incertitude en deux types : Incertitude aléatoire et incertitude épistémique. Le premier type est irréductible et dû à la variabilité naturelle des phénomènes aléatoires. Le deuxième est réductible et dû à un manque de connaissances qui peut être réduit en faisant d’avantage d’efforts (recueil de plus de données, consultation d’experts, essais accélérés. . . ). Récemment, plusieurs auteurs ont commencé à contester l’usage de probabilités classiques pour traiter ces deux types d’incertitudes. Des nouvelles théories qui traitent les différents types d’incertitudes sont apparues. Ces théories sont capables de représenter et propager, à la fois, l’incertitude aléatoire et épistémique. Parmi ces théories, la théorie des fonctions de croyance est exploitée dans ce manuscrit pour gérer les incertitudes dans les études de fiabilité des systèmes. Les différentes questions relatives aux études de fiabilité en présence d’incertitudes épistémiques, ainsi que les raisons pour lesquelles la théorie des probabilités ne doit pas être utilisée dans ce cas, sont traitées. Le manuscrit introduit des méthodes pour représenter les données de fiabilité et combiner les avis d’experts. Puis, il présente plusieurs méthodes pour propager l’incertitude concernant la fiabilité des composants à l’échelle du système. Un résultat important de ces méthodes est que la borne inférieure (supérieure) de fiabilité du système ne dépend que des bornes inférieures (supérieures) de fiabilité des composants, et que les fonctions de croyance et de plausibilité sont additives pour la collection des chemins minimaux et coupes minimales
There are different ways to classify uncertainty or its sources. The most common distinction is to divide them into two types : aleatory uncertainty and epistemic uncertainty. The first is consider as non reducible due to the natural variability of a random phenomena. The second is caused by a lack of knowledge which can be reduced by acquiring more information. Several authors have questioned the use of classical probabilities to treat both types of uncertainties. As a consequence, new theories that tackle this issue have appeared. These theories are able to represent and propagate both epistemic and aleatory uncertainty. Among these theories, the theory of belief functions is used in this manuscript to represent and propagate both types of uncertainty in reliability analysis of systems. The manuscript presents: A discussion about the different issues that arise in reliability studies under epistemic uncertainties, as well as the reasons why probability theory should not be used in this case; How to represent reliability data and how to combine experts opinions; Finally, several methods to propagate uncertainty about the components reliability to a system level. An important conclusion of these methods is that the lower (upper) bound of reliability of the system depends only on the lower (upper) bounds of reliability of components; and that belief and plausibility functions are additive for the collection of minimal path-sets and cut-sets

African American Studies
M.L.A.
The significance of the removal of the “White Mask” in Ayitian Vodou is to provide an Afrocentric analysis regarding the detriment of Catholicism/Protestantism has inflicted on African agency in Ayiti. The Practice of Ayitian Vodou derives from a variety of West African Spiritual Belief Systems like the Yoruba, Kongo, and Dahomean. During the imperialist era in Ayiti, Ayitians utilized biblical figures to hide their African gods in order to partake in Ayitian Vodou overtly. Due to classism, colorism, racism, and white domination, the camouflage aspect of Ayitian Vodou became a permanent component within Ayitian Vodou. This study proposes that scholars should rely on the method of Masking rather than the popular notion of Double Consciousness in examining African phenomena. W.E.B. Dubois coined Double Consciousness, which does not accurately explain or articulate how African people endured the institution of mental and physical enslavement. Double Consciousness derives from a Eurocentric ideology that operates from depriving African people of their history, culture, perspective, and personal development.
Temple University--Theses

yes
A new legal framework has been developed in Great Britain over the last ten years which protects individuals against unfair treatment on the grounds of their religion or belief. This framework regards all the major faith groups, secular belief systems (such as Humanism or Atheism), and non-belief on formally equal terms. There has also been a rapid growth of research interest in religion/belief in contemporary scholarship on equalities. This report provides a critical overview of this extensive research base relating mainly to England, Scotland and Wales up until 2008.

Thesis (PhD)--University of Stellenbosch, 2003.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The introduction of Outcomes Based Education in the South African school system brought about a new approach to education. The existing system of a multitude of subjects was replaced by a curriculum with eight learning areas. In this curriculum the focus is on attitudes, skills and values which replaced a content based approach with a process-based approach. Educators thereby became facilitators in the educational process. With the barriers of segregation removed in the South African society the diversity of the population created multi-cultural classrooms. Schools became the meeting place of many cultures and belief systems. Educators who facilitated learning in schools were not always prepared for the task of managing a multi-cultural and multi-religious school environment. This change within the school system required that educators make a paradigm shift regarding their role as educators. The introduction of Curriculum 2005 (1997); The Revised National Curriculum (2001) and the National Curriculum Statement (2002) was not without problems in South Africa. Many educators resisted change and had negative perceptions about the implementation of Outcomes Based Education in schools. These perceptions stemmed from inadequate training of educators for the implementation phase of the curriculum. The lack of skills to facilitate the content of the curriculum was also visible in the educators' inability to identify values in the curriculum. The multi-cultural and multi-religious classroom confronted educators with values from the different value and belief systems of learners. It is, therefore, important that educators should be able to identify values in order to attain the outcomes of the curriculum. Previous research indicated that educators did not play an active role in the teaching of values in schools. Neither were the educators participating in this research able to either identify or promote the values identified in the curriculum. The aim of this research was to develop an instrument to assist educators in identifying values from different belief systems in C2005 (1997); The Revised National Curriculum (2001) and the National Curriculum Statement (2002). Guidelines were developed for the facilitation of the identified values within the OBE curriculum. An empirical research was undertaken regarding the management of values in schools in the Western Cape during June 1999. Possible methods and approaches to values in education in general were identified and the suggested instrument and guidelines to assist educators with the identification of values was developed. The relevance of this study is to assist in-service and pre-service educators In identifying and facilitating different belief and value systems in an OBE education system.
AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Die implementering van Uitkomsgebaseerde Onderwys (UGO) in die Suid-Afrikaanse skoolstelsel het 'n nuwe benadering tot onderwys gebring. Die veelvoudige vakkeuses van die vorige kurrikulum is vervang deur een met agt leerareas. 'n Nuwe kurrikulum wat gefokus is op gesindhede, vaardighede en waardes het op sy beurt die inhoudgebaseerde kurrikulum met 'n prosesbenadering vervang. Opvoeders het nou fasiliteerders van die leerproses geword. Die verwydering van skeidslyne in die Suid Afrikaanse samelewing het tot gevolg gehad dat die diversiteit van die S.A. bevolking tot multikulturele klaskamers gelei het. Skole het die ontmoetingsplek van vele kulture en waardestelsels geword. Die opvoeders wat die leerproses in skole moet fasiliteer, is nie altyd voorbereid op die multikulturele en multireligieuse skoolomgewing nie. Die verandering in die skoolwese vereis dat opvoeders 'n paradigmaskuif betreffende hulle rol as opvoeders moet maak. Die implementering van Kurrikulum 2005(Curriculum 2005,1997; Hersiene Nasionale Kurrikulum (Revised National Curriculum, 2001); Nasionale Kurrikulum Stelling (National Curriculum Statement, 2002) was geensins sonder probleme nie. Heelwat opvoeders het weerstand gebied en baie negatiewe persepsies is behou in verband met die implementering van Uitkomsgebaseerde Onderwys in skole. Die persepsies van opvoeders ten opsigte van die implementeringsfase van die kurrikulum word gemotiveer as gevolg van die onvoldoende opleiding in die voorbereidingsproses .. Die gebrek aan vaardighede om die inhoud van die kurrikulum te fasiliteer, is sigbaar in die opvoeders se onvermoë om waardes in die kurrikulum te identifiseer. Die multikulturele en multireligieuse klaskamer het opvoeders konfronteer met die leerders se waardes vanuit hul verskillende waarde- en oriënteringsomgewings. (belief systems). Dit word belangrik geag dat opvoeders hierdie waardes kan identifiseer sodat die uitkomste van die kurrikulum behaal kan word. Vorige navorsing het aangedui dat opvoeders nie 'n aktiewe rol in die fasilitering van waardes in die skool speel nie. Die opvoeders wat deel was van hierdie navorsing, kon ook nie waardes in die kurrikulum identifiseer of bevorder nie. Die doel van hierdie navorsing was om 'n instrument te ontwerp om opvoeders te help met die identifisering van waardes van die verskillende oriënteringsomgewings (belief systems) in C200S (1997); RNC (2001); NCS(2002) Riglyne is ontwerp vir fasilitering van die geïdentifiseerde waardes in die UGO kurrikulum. Empiriese ondersoek is onderneem met die doelom die hantering van waardes in Wes-Kaapse skole na te vors. Moontlike metodes en benaderings tot waardes in onderwys in die algemeen is geïdentifiseer en 'n instrument om opvoeders te help met die identifisering van waardes, is ontwikkel. Riglyne word voorgestelom opvoeders te help in hulle benadering tot waardes in die kurrikulum. Die waarde van die studie lê daarin om sowel voor- as indiensopvoeders te help met die identifisering en fasilitering van waardes vanuit die verskillende waarde en oriënteringsomgewings in 'n Uitkomsgebaseerde Onderwysstelsel.

This work describes a framework for simultaneous estimation and modeling (SEAM) of dynamic systems using non-Gaussian belief fusion by first presenting the relevant fundamental formulations, then building upon these formulations incrementally towards a more general and ubiquitous framework. Multi-Gaussian belief fusion (MBF) is introduced as a natural and effective method of fusing non-Gaussian probability distribution functions (PDFs) in arbitrary dimensions efficiently and with no loss of accuracy. Construction of some multi-Gaussian structures for potential use in MBF is addressed. Furthermore, recursive Bayesian estimation (RBE) is developed for linearized systems with uncertainty in model parameters, and a rudimentary motion model correction stage is introduced. A subsequent improvement to motion model correction for arbitrarily non-Gaussian belief is developed, followed by application to observation models. Finally, SEAM is generalized to fully nonlinear and non-Gaussian systems. Several parametric studies were performed on simulated experiments in order to assess the various dependencies of the SEAM framework and validate its effectiveness in both estimation and modeling. The results of these studies show that SEAM is capable of improving estimation when uncertainty is present in motion and observation models as compared to existing methods. Furthermore, uncertainty in model parameters is consistently reduced as these parameters are updated throughout the estimation process. SEAM and its constituents have potential uses in robotics, target tracking and localization, state estimation, and more.
Doctor of Philosophy
The simultaneous estimation and modeling (SEAM) framework and its constituents described in this dissertation aim to improve estimation of signals where significant uncertainty would normally introduce error. Such signals could be electrical (e.g. voltages, currents, etc.), mechanical (e.g. accelerations, forces, etc.), or the like. Estimation is accomplished by addressing the problem probabilistically through information fusion. The proposed techniques not only improve state estimation, but also effectively "learn" about the system of interest in order to further refine estimation. Potential uses of such methods could be found in search-and-rescue robotics, robust control algorithms, and the like. The proposed framework is well-suited for any context where traditional estimation methods have difficulty handling heightened uncertainty.

Dans cette thèse, nous proposons des modèles logiques pour la représentation des croyances et leur changement dans un cadre multi-agent, en insistant sur l'importance de se fixer un point de vue particulier pour la modélisation. A cet égard, nous distinguons deux approches différentes: l'approche externe, où le modélisateur est quelqu'un d'externe à la situation; l'approche interne, où le modélisateur est l'un des agents. Nous proposons une version interne de la logique épistémique dynamique (avec des modèles d'événements), ce qui nous permet de généraliser facilement la théorie de la révision des croyances d'AGM au cas multi-agent. Ensuite, nous mod´elisons les dynamismes logiques complexes qui soustendent notre interprétation des événements en introduisant des probabilités et des infinitésimaux. Finalement, nous proposons un formalisme alternatif qui n'utilise pas de modèle d'événement mais qui introduit à la place un opérateur d'événement inverse.

During the recent exponential rise in the use of alternative medicines (AM) in the West and increasing integration into the health service, little research has been done on AM in the context in which it is practised, or over time to look at changing belief systems. This thesis provides an anthropologically informed analysis of one alternative therapy in depth - homeopathy- explored from the multiple perspectives of biomedical and lay homeopaths, users and students of homeopathy. The ethnography comprised 18 months participant observation in 4 settings in south London: the surgery of a homeopathic GP; a homeopathy adult education class; a vaccination support group; and a low cost homeopathy clinic for victims of crime. The fieldwork is contextualised by a critique of the existing research on users of AM; a review of the history and politics of integration of AM and a review of anthropological conceptions of the body and health. Analysis of the empirical data reveals different groups of users of homeopathy with differing beliefs around health, healing and the body. 'Pragmatic users' had a normative biomedical view of health. 'Committed users' moved away from the normative biomedical position and were enculturated into a different view of health and the body through interaction with lay homeopaths. Inherent in these practitioners' and users' beliefs and practices were a number of oppositions to science-based medicine. Prolonged fieldwork enabled the changing views of users to be charted as they moved from biomedical to alternative views. The medical homeopath stayed allied to many biomedical beliefs about the body and health, partly as a result of general practice constraints of time, colleagues and training. Tensions between his biomedical and homeopathic practice lead to paradoxical behaviours that confused his patients. These findings problematise the notion of integration, of trying to incorporate two opposing ideologies into one system. Implications for alternative medicine more widely are discussed.

We present a detailed study on application of factorgraphs and the belief propagation (BP) algorithm to thepower system state estimation (SE) problem. We startfrom the BP solution for the linear DC model, for whichwe provide a detailed convergence analysis. Using BPbasedDC model we propose a fast real-time stateestimator for the power system SE. The proposedestimator is easy to distribute and parallelize, thusalleviating computational limitations and allowing forprocessing measurements in real time. The presentedalgorithm may run as a continuous process, with eachnew measurement being seamlessly processed by thedistributed state estimator. In contrast to the matrixbasedSE methods, the BP approach is robust to illconditionedscenarios caused by significant differencesbetween measurement variances, thus resulting in asolution that eliminates observability analysis. Using theDC model, we numerically demonstrate the performanceof the state estimator in a realistic real-time systemmodel with asynchronous measurements. We note thatthe extension to the non-linear SE is possible within thesame framework.Using insights from the DC model, we use two differentapproaches to derive the BP algorithm for the non-linearmodel. The first method directly applies BP methodology,however, providing only approximate BP solution for thenon-linear model. In the second approach, we make a keyfurther step by providing the solution in which the BP isapplied sequentially over the non-linear model, akin towhat is done by the Gauss-Newton method. The resultingiterative Gauss-Newton belief propagation (GN-BP)algorithm can be interpreted as a distributed Gauss-Newton method with the same accuracy as thecentralized SE, however, introducing a number ofadvantages of the BP framework. The thesis providesextensive numerical study of the GN-BP algorithm,provides details on its convergence behavior, and gives anumber of useful insights for its implementation.Finally, we define the bad data test based on the BPalgorithm for the non-linear model. The presented modelestablishes local criteria to detect and identify bad datameasurements. We numerically demonstrate that theBP-based bad data test significantly improves the baddata detection over the largest normalized residual test.
Glavni rezultati ove teze su dizajn i analiza novihalgoritama za rešavanje problema estimacije stanjabaziranih na faktor grafovima i „Belief Propagation“ (BP)algoritmu koji se mogu primeniti kao centralizovani ilidistribuirani estimatori stanja u elektroenergetskimsistemima. Na samom početku, definisan je postupak zarešavanje linearnog (DC) problema korišćenjem BPalgoritma. Pored samog algoritma data je analizakonvergencije i predloženo je rešenje za unapređenjekonvergencije. Algoritam se može jednostavnodistribuirati i paralelizovati, te je pogodan za estimacijustanja u realnom vremenu, pri čemu se informacije moguprikupljati na asinhroni način, zaobilazeći neke odpostojećih rutina, kao npr. provera observabilnostisistema. Proširenje algoritma za nelinearnu estimacijustanja je moguće unutar datog modela.Dalje se predlaže algoritam baziran na probabilističkimgrafičkim modelima koji je direktno primenjen nanelinearni problem estimacije stanja, što predstavljalogičan korak u tranziciji od linearnog ka nelinearnommodelu. Zbog nelinearnosti funkcija, izrazi za određenuklasu poruka ne mogu se dobiti u zatvorenoj formi, zbogčega rezultujući algoritam predstavlja aproksimativnorešenje. Nakon toga se predlaže distribuirani Gaus-Njutnov metod baziran na probabilističkim grafičkimmodelima i BP algoritmu koji postiže istu tačnost kao icentralizovana verzija Gaus-Njutnovog metoda zaestimaciju stanja, te je dat i novi algoritam za otkrivanjenepouzdanih merenja (outliers) prilikom merenjaelektričnih veličina. Predstavljeni algoritam uspostavljalokalni kriterijum za otkrivanje i identifikacijunepouzdanih merenja, a numerički je pokazano daalgoritam značajno poboljšava detekciju u odnosu nastandardne metode.

Change management is a highly researched topic. With industry changing at record speed, it is inevitable that corporations will engage in a change management endeavor. As humans innately resist change at first exposure, corporations strive to acquire knowledge in adoption. It may not be enough to understand status quo proponents, but rather their underlying long-standing belief systems which may be affecting how they view change. What makes an employee resist corporate change? Most studies conclude that humans will resist innately. This research dives into the unique environment of the equine industry to uncover how long-standing belief systems contribute to adoption or resistance.

The motivation for this research began with a fascination with long-standing belief systems within the equine industry. The unique environment of the equine industry is steeped in centuries of tradition, and while housing long-standing belief systems that are time-tested and passed down from generation to generation, in most cases, without awareness. The industry is currently experiencing a phenomenon that has never taken place: a change is occurring that is positioning two equine factions, natural and traditional, against each other in opposing viewpoints. Some view this change as the start of a paradigm shift; others view it as a fad. The nature of natural horsemanship is now up for debate.

The study was conducted by using qualitative data collection in a semi-structured format. Forty-one (41) equine leaders in natural and traditional hoof care and horsemanship were recorded in over 30 hours of data. The interview model included not only the industry leaders proposing or resisting change but also the professionals in the industry working in the field, experiencing the conflict first hand.

The research presented revealed an interesting finding. Although 61 codes were identified, a specific area within the study revealed a “hybrid” group of codes amongst the traditional horsemen in hoof care and horsemanship. Leaders who are advocating for the status quo showed levels of natural adoption that was unexpected. The research pivoted to the areas of traditional resistors and traditional adopters.

The main objective is to decipher why some members of the industry are adopting while others are resisting. As adoption is the main objective for change management, uncovering the reasons for resisting seemed to dictate the data more prevalently. From this research, it can be deduced that there is significant evidence to support the findings that people who resist change may have these characteristics or traits in their belief system: Strong traditional beliefs such as culture and history, honor-driven, strong religious ties, defensive by nature, communicate well, believe safe, minimal adaptation (innovation), and consider themselves to be trustworthy and responsible, are people-oriented and outgoing. According to this research, people with those traits and characteristics are more apt to resist change and may be a potential problem when instituting change in an organization. This research points towards the significant evidence to support the findings that people who resist change may have these characteristics or traits in their belief system: Frustration in industry or a sense of apathy, open-mindedness or flexibility, vulnerability, communicate well, family ties, controlling and shows hero tendencies.

Not many other industries can report that it has remained unchanged over time, even in the face of industrial revolution, war, and domestication. However, in the past 20 years, the equine industry has been divided through a new belief system that is challenging these time-tested traditions and beliefs regarding hoof care and horsemanship. The natural horse viewpoint has created an opposing faction to the traditional belief system that governed horse care and welfare since the dawn of time. The qualitative data that was gathered for this research allows for the synthesis of the proposed paradigm shift and opposing force analysis. Although not a true paradigm shift to date, these two factions, natural and traditional, are dividing the industry in two. Not a more perfect scenario could be present to study long-standing belief systems in relation to adoption and resistance to change. The Hybrid Adaptation Model was formed from the qualitative data provided by 41 industry experts through the grounded theory method. This model can be used to navigate through the change management process. This research revealed a theory that adaptation must occur prior to adoption and partial adoption may cause a “hybrid” sector.

Change management is a highly researched topic. With industry changing at record speed, it is inevitable that corporations will engage in a change management endeavor. As humans innately resist change at first exposure, corporations strive to acquire knowledge in adoption. It may not be enough to understand status quo proponents, but rather their underlying long-standing belief systems which may be affecting how they view change. What makes an employee resist corporate change? Most studies conclude that humans will resist innately. This research dives into the unique environment of the equine industry to uncover how long-standing belief systems contribute to adoption or resistance. The motivation for this research began with a fascination with long-standing belief systems within the equine industry. The unique environment of the equine industry is steeped in centuries of tradition, and while housing long-standing belief systems that are time-tested and passed down from generation to generation, in most cases, without awareness. The industry is currently experiencing a phenomenon that has never taken place: a change is occurring that is positioning two equine factions, natural and traditional, against each other in opposing viewpoints. Some view this change as the start of a paradigm shift; others view it as a fad. The nature of natural horsemanship is now up for debate. The study was conducted by using qualitative data collection in a semi-structured format. Forty-one (41) equine leaders in natural and traditional hoof care and horsemanship were recorded in over 30 hours of data. The interview model included not only the industry leaders proposing or resisting change but also the professionals in the industry working in the field, experiencing the conflict first hand. The research presented revealed an interesting finding. Although 61 codes were identified, a specific area within the study revealed a “hybrid” group of codes amongst the traditional horsemen in hoof care and horsemanship. Leaders who are advocating for the status quo showed levels of natural adoption that was unexpected. The research pivoted to the areas of traditional resistors and traditional adopters. The main objective is to decipher why some members of the industry are adopting while others are resisting. As adoption is the main objective for change management, uncovering the reasons for resisting seemed to dictate the data more prevalently. From this research, it can be deduced that there is significant evidence to support the findings that people who resist change may have these characteristics or traits in their belief system: Strong traditional beliefs such as culture and history, honor-driven, strong religious ties, defensive by nature, communicate well, believe safe, minimal adaptation (innovation), and consider themselves to be trustworthy and responsible, are people-oriented and outgoing. According to this research, people with those traits and characteristics are more apt to resist change and may be a potential problem when instituting change in an organization. This research points towards the significant evidence to support the findings that people who resist change may have these characteristics or traits in their belief system: Frustration in industry or a sense of apathy, open-mindedness or flexibility, vulnerability, communicate well, family ties, controlling and shows hero tendencies. Not many other industries can report that it has remained unchanged over time, even in the face of industrial revolution, war, and domestication. However, in the past 20 years, the equine industry has been divided through a new belief system that is challenging these time-tested traditions and beliefs regarding hoof care and horsemanship. The natural horse viewpoint has created an opposing faction to the traditional belief system that governed horse care and welfare since the dawn of time. The qualitative data that was gathered for this research allows for the synthesis of the proposed paradigm shift and opposing force analysis. Although not a true paradigm shift to date, these two factions, natural and traditional, are dividing the industry in two. Not a more perfect scenario could be present to study long-standing belief systems in relation to adoption and resistance to change. The Hybrid Adaptation Model was formed from the qualitative data provided by 41 industry experts through the grounded theory method. This model can be used to navigate through the change management process. This research revealed a theory that adaptation must occur prior to adoption and partial adoption may cause a “hybrid” sector.

Among the various natural calamities, flood is considered one of the most catastrophic natural hazards, which has a significant impact on the socio-economic lifeline of a country. The Assessment of flood risks facilitates taking appropriate measures to reduce the consequences of flooding. The flood risk assessment requires Big data which are coming from different sources, such as sensors, social media, and organizations. However, these data sources contain various types of uncertainties because of the presence of incomplete and inaccurate information. This paper presents a Belief rule-based expert system (BRBES) which is developed in Big data platform to assess flood risk in real time. The system processes extremely large dataset by integrating BRBES with Apache Spark while a web-based interface has developed allowing the visualization of flood risk in real time. Since the integrated BRBES employs knowledge driven learning mechanism, it has been compared with other data-driven learning mechanisms to determine the reliability in assessing flood risk. Integrated BRBES produces reliable results comparing from the other data-driven approaches. Data for the expert system has been collected targeting different case study areas from Bangladesh to validate the integrated system.

This thesis proposes a hypothesis that a conventional, and essentially manual, HAZOP process can be improved with information obtained with model-based dynamic simulation, using a Monte Carlo approach, to update a Bayesian Belief model representing the expected relations between cause and effects - and thereby produce an enhanced HAZOP. The work considers how the expertise of a hazard and operability study team might be augmented with access to behavioural models, simulations and belief inference models. This incorporates models of dynamically complex system behaviour, considering where these might contribute to the expertise of a hazard and operability study team, and how these might bolster trust in the portrayal of system behaviour. With a questionnaire containing behavioural outputs from a representative systems model, responses were collected from a group with relevant domain expertise. From this it is argued that the quality of analysis is dependent upon the experience and expertise of the participants but this might be artificially augmented using probabilistic data derived from a system dynamics model. Consequently, Monte Carlo simulations of an improved exemplar system dynamics model are used to condition a behavioural inference model and also to generate measures of emergence associated with the deviation parameter used in the study. A Bayesian approach towards probability is adopted where particular events and combinations of circumstances are effectively unique or hypothetical, and perhaps irreproducible in practice. Therefore, it is shown that a Bayesian model, representing beliefs expressed in a hazard and operability study, conditioned by the likely occurrence of flaw events causing specific deviant behaviour from evidence observed in the system dynamical behaviour, may combine intuitive estimates based upon experience and expertise, with quantitative statistical information representing plausible evidence of safety constraint violation. A further behavioural measure identifies potential emergent behaviour by way of a Lyapunov Exponent. Together these improvements enhance the awareness of potential hazard cases.

Richard Holton has criticized the common idea that self-deception is deception by the self, and suggested it is rather deception about the self; self-deception must include necessarily erroneous beliefs about the self. In this article I claim that this condition is not necessary, based on two central traits of self-deception: its temporal character  and  its  bound  to  multiplication.  In  addition,  I  suggest  an  alternative condition in relation to the beliefs system implied in self-deception.
Richard  Holton  ha  cuestionado  la  idea  usual  de  que  el  autoengaño consiste en un engaño por el sí mismo, y ha propuesto en su lugar que la caracterización de este fenómeno debe incluir, como condición necesaria, la tesis de que  el  autoengaño  es  un  engaño acerca del  sí  mismo.  Se  defiende  aquí  la  afirmación de que tal requisito no es necesario, sobre la base de dos características centrales del autoengaño: su carácter temporal y su tendencia a la multiplicación. Asimismo, se esboza una condición alternativa respecto del conjunto de creencias involucrado en el autoengaño.

Flood is one of the most devastating natural disasters. It is estimated that flooding from sea level rise will cause one trillion USD to major coastal cities of the world by the year 2050. Flood not only destroys the economy, but it also creates physical and psychological sufferings for the human and destroys infrastructures. Disseminating flood warnings and evacuating people from the flood-affected areas help to save human life. Therefore, predicting flood will help government authorities to take necessary actions to evacuate humans and arrange relief for the people. This licentiate thesis focuses on four different aspects of flood prediction using wireless sensor networks (WSNs). Firstly, different WSNs, protocols related to WSN, and backhaul connectivity in the context of predicting flood were investigated. A heterogeneous WSN network for flood prediction was proposed. Secondly, data coming from sensors contain anomaly due to different types of uncertainty, which hampers the accuracy of flood prediction. Therefore, anomalous data needs to be filtered out. A novel algorithm based on belief rule base for detecting the anomaly from sensor data has been proposed in this thesis. Thirdly, predicting flood is a challenging task as it involves multi-level factors, which cannot be measured with 100% certainty. Belief rule based expert systems (BRBESs) can be considered to handle the complex problem of this nature as they address different types of uncertainty. A web based BRBES was developed for predicting flood. This system provides better usability, more computational power to handle larger numbers of rule bases and scalability by porting it into a web-based solution. To improve the accuracy of flood prediction, a learning mechanism for multi-level BRBES was proposed. Furthermore, a comparison between the proposed multi-level belief rule based learning algorithm and other machine learning techniques including Artificial Neural Networks (ANN), Support Vector Machine (SVM) based regression, and Linear Regression has been performed. In the light of the research findings of this thesis, it can be argued that flood prediction can be accomplished more accurately by integrating WSN and BRBES.