Problem Of Indeterminacy Research Articles

Culling profiles: the indeterminacy of archaeozoological data to survivorship curve modelling of sheep and goat herd maintenance strategies

The comparison of survivorship curves derived from seven different models aiming to reconstruct ancient sheep and goat herd maintenance strategies (e.g. optimization of wool, meat, and milk production) shows that many of these models cannot be distinguished statistically. This observation renders the current theoretical framework for reconstructing ancient herd maintenance strategies problematic, due to the possible indeterminacy of model data analysis. In order to assign empirically observed age-at-death data to a model of herd maintenance strategy, it is suggested that a direct fit of observed data to survivorship curves be forgone in favor of a binning procedure highlighting the differences between fewer and more distinguishable models. The incorporation of high-resolution sexing and taxonomic determination to coarse-grained age-at-death models may go a long way towards solving the current problem of indeterminacy.

A Cognitive Approach to Moral Responsibility: The Case of a Failed Attempt to Kill

AbstractMany theoretical claims about the folk concept of moral responsibility coming from the current literature are indeterminate because researchers do not clearly specify the folk concept of moral responsibility in question. The article pursues a cognitive approach to folk concepts that pays special attention to this indeterminacy problem. After addressing the problem, the article provides evidence on folk attributions of moral responsibility in the case a failed attempt to kill that goes against a specific claim coming from the current literature – that the dimension of causation is part of the structure of the folk concept of moral responsibility.

Determinacy, Stock Market Dynamics and Monetary Policy Inertia

This note deals with the stability properties of an economy where the central bank is concerned with stock market developments. We introduce a Taylor rule reacting to stock price growth rates along with inflation and output gap in a New-Keynesian setup. We explore the performance of this rule from the vantage of equilibrium uniqueness. We show that this reaction function is isomorphic to a rule with an interest rate smoothing term, whose magnitude increases in the degree of aggressiveness towards asset prices growth. As shown by Bullard and Mitra (2007, Determinacy, learnability, and monetary policy inertia, Journal of Money, Credit and Banking 39, 1177-1212) this feature of monetary policy inertia can help at alleviating problems of indeterminacy.

Solo instrumental music analysis using the source-filter model as a sound production model considering temporal dynamics

A source-filter model, originally devised to represent a sound production process, has been widely used to estimate both of the source signal which includes pitch information and the synthesis filter which includes vowel information, as from sounds of a speech signal. We use this model to identify instruments by their instrumental sound signal. However, this model suffers from an indeterminacy problem. To resolve it, we employ three elements of the sound: loudness, pitch and timbre. Our assumption is that the source signal is represented by time-varying pitch and amplitude, and the synthesis filter by time-invariant line spectral frequency parameters. We construct a probabilistic model that represents our assumption with an extension of the source-filter model. For learning of model parameters, we employed an EM-like minimization algorithm of a cost function called the free energy. Reconstruction of the spectrum with the estimated source signal and synthesis filter, and instrument identification by using the model parameters of the estimated synthesis filter are performed to evaluate our approach, showing that this learning scheme could achieve simultaneous estimation of the source signal and the synthesis filter.

Whole body inverse dynamics over a complete gait cycle based only on measured kinematics

This paper presents a three-dimensional (3D) whole body multi-segment model for inverse dynamics analysis over a complete gait cycle, based only on measured kinematic data. The sequence of inverse dynamics calculations differs significantly from the conventional application of inverse dynamics using force plate data. A new validated “Smooth Transition Assumption” was used to solve the indeterminacy problem in the double support phase. Kinematic data is required for all major body segments and, hence, a whole body gait measurement protocol is presented. Finally, sensitivity analyses were conducted to evaluate the effects of digital filtering and body segment parameters on the accuracy of the prediction results. The model gave reasonably good estimates of sagittal plane ground forces and moment; however, the estimates in the other planes were less good, which we believe is largely due to their small magnitudes in comparison to the sagittal forces and moment. The errors observed are most likely caused by errors in the kinematic data resulting from skin movement artefact and by errors in the estimated body segment parameters. A digital filtering cut-off frequency of 4.5 Hz was found to produce the best results. It was also shown that errors in the mass properties of body segments can play a crucial role, with changes in properties sometimes having a disproportionate effect on the calculated ground reactions. The implication of these results is that, even when force plate data is available, the estimated joint forces are likely to suffer from similar errors.

Determinacy and Learnability of Monetary Policy Rules in Small Open Economies

This paper evaluates under which conditions different Taylor‐type rules lead to determinacy and expectational stability (E‐stability) of rational expectations equilibrium in a simple “New Keynesian” small open economy model, developed by Gali and Monacelli (2005). In particular, we extend Bullard and Mitra (2002) results of determinacy and E‐stability in a closed economy to this small open economy framework. Our results highlight an important link between the Taylor principle and both determinacy and learnability of equilibrium in small open economies. More importantly, the degree of openness coupled with the nature of the policy rule adopted by the monetary authorities might change this link in important ways. A key finding is that, contrary to Bullard and Mitra, expectations‐based rules that involve the consumer price inflation and/or the nominal exchange rate limit the region of E‐stability and the Taylor Principle does not guarantee E‐stability. We also show that some forms of managed exchange rate rules can help to alleviate problems of both indeterminacy and expectational instability, yet these rules might not be desirable since they can promote greater volatility in the economy.

On the Indeterminacy of Resemblance Measures for Binary (Presence/Absence) Data

Many similarity coefficients for binary data are defined as fractions. For certain resemblance measures the denominator may become zero. If the denominator is zero the value of the coefficient is indeterminate. It is shown that the seriousness of the indeterminacy problem differs with the resemblance measures. Following Batagelj and Bren (1995) we remove the indeterminacies by defining appropriate values in critical cases.

Torture and Systems Theory

Abstract Niklas Luhmann’s attack on the rhetoric of the ›indispensable values‹ brigade is important and timely. Self-evidently good norms have political usefulness but no philosophical value. However replacing values with rights and entrusting decisions to lawyers displaces rather than solves the problems of indeterminacy and conflict of law and rights. The (falsely) ascetic commitment to description coupled with the acceptance of the social order makes systems theory useless as a tool for improving society. Philosophy tends the distance between the naturally and socially given and the eternal aspiration to resist and transcend it, by exploring both the justice internal to law and the justice which holds the whole of law to account.

Bounded rational expectations and the stability of interest rate policy

The New Keynesian model has recently been subject to two serious criticisms: the model cannot produce plausible inflation and output dynamics following a monetary shock, and the stability of its dynamics suffers from indeterminacy. The procedures that have been proposed to eliminate these two shortcomings fall into two categories: the introduction of some sort of backward price indexation into the standard model and/or other forms of stickiness (like sticky information); and the adoption of some form of policy rule that completely offsets the effects of forward looking dynamics in the optimization process. In this paper we do not eradicate forward looking behavior from the dynamics of the New Keynesian model, neither do we impose some form of backward price indexation. We assume that private economic agents have forward looking behavior and that they do try to optimize with all available information; the only novelty is that they are allowed to make small mistakes near the rational expectations equilibrium, in a fully deterministic setup. These “near rational” or “bounded rational” expectations show that the dynamics of the model with active interest rate rules is much richer than the simple problem of local indeterminacy as is usually found in the literature.

Biaxial extension of a plane single crystal

This paper concerns the rigid-plastic modelisation of a f.c.c. single crystal, deforming by crystallographic slip, under large strain. Adopting the plane single crystal model, which corresponds to a true two-dimensional evolution of a real three-dimensional crystal, the activity of slip systems and the plastic indetermination, due to multiplicity of solutions, are studied according to the rate-independent Schmid law or the rate-dependent Bingham law. To promote a more general situation of potential multiple slip and therefore of potential indeterminacy, the biaxial loading is investigated. Based on this model and the Bingham slip law, the indeterminacy problem is surmounted, by adopting the geometrical analysis in the strain rate space and it is proved that the linear viscoplastic analysis is a new way of solving the indeterminacy problem.

Why a Simple Second-Price Auction Induces Efficient Endogenous Entry

This article further studies ex ante efficient auctions in the setting of Stegeman (1996 Participation costs and efficient auctions, Journal of Economic Theory 71, 228–259.), where there exist entry costs for bidders who know their valuations. An alternative method is established to address efficient auctions. This method illustrates the intuition why the ex ante efficient allocation is Bayesian implementable through the Stegeman (1996) auction (a second-price auction with a reserve price equal to seller’s valuation and no entry fee). More importantly, our method leads to an alternative ex ante efficient auction that implements uniquely the efficient entry. Thus, this alternative auction solves the entry indeterminacy problem of the Stegeman (1996) auction, which generally induces inefficient entry equilibria besides the efficient ones.

Equilibrium selection through incomplete information in coordination games: an experimental study

We perform an experiment on a pure coordination game with uncertainty about the payoffs. Our game is closely related to models that have been used in many macroeconomic and financial applications to solve problems of equilibrium indeterminacy. In our experiment, each subject receives a noisy signal about the true payoffs. This game (inspired by the “global” games of Carlsson and van Damme, Econometrica, 61, 989–1018, 1993) has a unique strategy profile that survives the iterative deletion of strictly dominated strategies (thus a unique Nash equilibrium). The equilibrium outcome coincides, on average, with the risk-dominant equilibrium outcome of the underlying coordination game. In the baseline game, the behavior of the subjects converges to the theoretical prediction after enough experience has been gained. The data (and the comments) suggest that this behavior can be explained by learning. To test this hypothesis, we use a different game with incomplete information, related to a complete information game where learning and prior experiments suggest a different behavior. Indeed, in the second treatment, the behavior did not converge to equilibrium within 50 periods in some of the sessions. We also run both games under complete information. The results are sufficiently similar between complete and incomplete information to suggest that risk-dominance is also an important part of the explanation.

Equilibrium Selection through Incomplete Information in Coordination Games: An Experimental Study

We perform an experiment on pure coordination game with uncertainty about the payoffs. Our game is closely related to models that have been used in many macroeconomic and financial applications to solve problems of equilibrium indeterminacy. In our experiment each subject receives noisy signal about the true payoffs. This game has unique strategy profile that survives the iterative deletion of strictly dominated strategies (thus unique Nash equilibrium). The equilibrium outcome coincides, on average, with the risk-dominant equilibrium outcome of the underlying coordination game. The behavior of the subjects converges to the theoretical prediction after enough experience has been gained. The data (and the comments) suggest that subjects do not apply through a priori reasoning the iterated deletion of dominated strategies. Instead, they adapt to the responses of other players. Thus, the length of the learning phase clearly varies for the different signals. We also test behavior in game without uncertainty as benchmark case. The game with uncertainty is inspired by the global games of Carlsson and Van Damme (1993).

UNIQUENESS AND INDETERMINACY OF THE EQUILIBRIUM GROWTH PATH IN THE UZAWA-LUCAS MODEL WITH SECTOR SPECIFIC EXTERNALITIES

We introduce sector specific external effects of human capital on production in an otherwise Uzawa-Lucas model of endogenous growth; and show that the problem of indeterminacy of the competitive equilibrium growth path does not exist even if the production function satisfies the increasing returns to scale at the social level.

Determinacy, Learnability, and Monetary Policy Inertia

We show how monetary policy inertia can help alleviate problems of indeterminacy and non‐existence of stationary equilibrium observed for some commonly studied monetary policy rules. We also find that inertia promotes learnability of equilibrium. The context is a simple, forward‐looking model of the macroeconomy widely used in the rapidly expanding literature in this area. We conclude that this might be an important reason why central banks in the industrialized economies display considerable inertia when adjusting monetary policy in response to changing economic conditions.

Investment, interest rate policy, and equilibrium stability

Carlstrom and Fuerst [2005. Investment and interest rate policy: a discrete time analysis. Journal of Economic Theory 123, 4–20.] show that in the presence of investment activity and price stickiness, indeterminacy of equilibrium is induced by forward-looking monetary policy that sets the interest rate in response only to future inflation. In a stochastic version of their model, we find that this indeterminacy problem is due to a cost channel of monetary policy, whereby inflation expectations become self-fulfilling, and the problem can be overcome once the forward-looking policy responds also to current output or contains sufficiently strong interest rate smoothing, since this prevents the self-fulfilling expectations. We also show that when E-stability is adopted as the selection criterion from multiple equilibria, even the forward-looking policy generates a locally unique non-explosive E-stable fundamental rational expectations equilibrium as long as the policy response to expected future inflation is sufficiently strong.

Sequential Estimation of Dynamic Discrete Games

This paper studies the estimation of dynamic discrete games of incomplete information. Two main econometric issues appear in the estimation of these models: the indeterminacy problem associated with the existence of multiple equilibria and the computational burden in the solution of the game. We propose a class of pseudo maximum likelihood (PML) estimators that deals with these problems, and we study the asymptotic and finite sample properties of several estimators in this class. We first focus on two-step PML estimators, which, although they are attractive for their computational simplicity, have some important limitations: they are seriously biased in small samples; they require consistent nonparametric estimators of players' choice probabilities in the first step, which are not always available; and they are asymptotically inefficient. Second, we show that a recursive extension of the two-step PML, which we call nested pseudo likelihood (NPL), addresses those drawbacks at a relatively small additional computational cost. The NPL estimator is particularly useful in applications where consistent nonparametric estimates of choice probabilities either are not available or are very imprecise, e.g., models with permanent unobserved heterogeneity. Finally, we illustrate these methods in Monte Carlo experiments and in an empirical application to a model of firm entry and exit in oligopoly markets using Chilean data from several retail industries.

Price-level Determinancy, Lower Bounds on the Nominal Interest Rate, and Liquidity Traps

We study standard monetary-policy rules with inflation-rate targets and either interest-rate or money-supply instruments using a flexible-price, perfect-foresight model. We focus mainly on interest-rate rules, but the results for money-supply rules are analogous. A locally-unique target equilibrium always exists. There are also below-target equilibria (BTE) with inflation below target and constant or asymptotically approaching or eventually reaching a below-target value. Liquidity traps are neither necessary nor sufficient for BTE. Such equilibria can also arise if monetary policy keeps the interest rate above a lower bound. We construct monetary-policy rules that preclude BTE. All are non-monotonic and discontinuous in current inflation. Each implies a difference equation in inflation. Some of these difference equations are continuous, but others are not. They are all non-monotonic and non-differentiable at a point. We argue that Japan's difficulties in the 1990s were probably the result of a stabilization problem rather than an indeterminacy problem.

Robust inflation-forecast-based rules to shield against indeterminacy

This paper provides a first attempt to quantify and at the same time utilize estimated measures of uncertainty for the design of robust interest rate rules. We estimate several variants of a linearized form of a New Keynesian model using quarterly US data. Both our theoretical and numerical results indicate that inflation-forecast-based (IFB) rules are increasingly prone to the problem of indeterminacy as the forward horizon increases. As a consequence the stabilization performance of optimized rules of this type worsens too. Robust IFB rules can be designed to avoid indeterminacy in an uncertain environment, but at an increasing utility loss as rules become more forward-looking.

Explaining cosmetic compliance with international regulatory regimes: The implementation of the Basle Accord in Japan, 1998–2003

A central theme of much recent international political economy (IPE) scholarship has been the question of what determines compliance with international regulatory regimes.1 The contemporary debate ...