This book provides an excellent illustration of the interrelationship between progress in scientific methodology and conceptual advances, and its publica- tion should contribute to further advances. It is well known that major advances in understanding often follow the development of new methods. The development of the acetylene reduction assay for nitrogenase activity provides a good example of this interrelationship between theory and methods. Theoretical knowledge led to a search for substrates for nitro- genase that could be assayed for more easily than ammonium, the normal product of the...

Credibility assessment refers to any attempt to ascertain truthfulness. Other terms which have been used to refer to the assessment of credibility include the detection of deception and lie detection. The term lie detection has become virtually synonymous with the use of the polygraph and can no longer be used to refer to the range of procedures currently employed to assess credibility. Also, both lie detection and the detection of deception have a negative cast which does not fully capture the orientation of current approaches to credibility. Consequently, the term credibility assessment has...

A wide range of books on urban systems models are available today for the student of urban planning, geography, and economics. There are few, if any, books, however, that deal with integrated urban systems modeling from the operational viewpoint. The term "integrated" is used here in the same sense as the "general equilibrium," in contrast to such approaches as "sequential" or "partial equilibrium." In fact, the main thesis of this book is that the characteristics of ur ban activity that best distinguish it from rural activity are (1) the intensive use of urban land and (2) urban congestion....

The principal differences between the contemporary philosophic traditions which have come to be known loosely as analytic philosophy and phenomenology are all related to the central issue of the interplay between predication and perception. Frege's critique of psychologism has led to the conviction within the analytic tradition that philosophy may best defend rationality from relativism by detaching logic and semantics from all dependence on subjective intuitions. On this interpretation, logical analysis must account for the relationship of sense to reference without having recourse to a...

This book contains the key-note lectures and a selection of papers that were presented at the 15th Conference of the European Association for Research in Industrial Econo mics (EARlE) held under the auspices of GRASP at Erasmus University Rotterdam in 1988, plus an introductory chapter by the Editors. Upon suggestions by the Editors, all papers have been revised for this book, some more extensively than others. Robin Marris has added to his lecture a synopsis of the contributions to the Round Table on the Micro-Macro Interface which he chaired during the Conference. The papers cover issues...

Impact analysis of economic policy is a subject which is gaining in- creasing interest in both theoretical and applied economic research. Two main reasons for the growing interest can be distinguished. First, the situation of the government's finances is making it more than ever necessary to assess critically the effects of the instruments used to pursue public policy goals. Secondly, because of the economic stagnation government will be increasingly appealed to for support. Impact analysis, however, is hampered by three major problems: methodological deficiencies, lack of econometric...

Giovanni Castellani Rector of the University of Venice This book contains the Proceedings of the Conference on "Economic Policy and Control Theory" which was held at the University of Venice (Italy) on 27 January-l February 1985. The goal of the Conference was to survey the main developments of control theory in economics, by emphasizing particularly new achievements in the analysis of dynamic economic models by con- trol methods. The development of control theory is strictly related to the development of science and technology in the last forty years. Control theory was indeed applied mainly...

This NATO-ASI on BIOPOLYMERS STRUCTURE AND DYNAMICS held between 22nd June 4th July 1986 at Erice (Italy) has brought together scientists from a broad variety of biophysical disciplines - polymer physics, biophysics and physical chemistry, structure and dynamics of polynucleotides, proteins, and polysaccharides - to present the current state of knowledge in their fields, both experimental and theoretical. This Advanced Study Institute was indeed a successfull attempt to enhance the possibility of intersection of a number of research lines that currently are progressing well but are still...

Spatial econometrics deals with spatial dependence and spatial heterogeneity, critical aspects of the data used by regional scientists. These characteristics may cause standard econometric techniques to become inappropriate. In this book, I combine several recent research results to construct a comprehensive approach to the incorporation of spatial effects in econometrics. My primary focus is to demonstrate how these spatial effects can be considered as special cases of general frameworks in standard econometrics, and to outline how they necessitate a separate set of methods and techniques,...