The Nesterov-Todd Direction and its Relation to Weighted Analytic Centers

The subject of this report concerns differential-geometric properties of the Nesterov-Todd search direction for linear optimization over symmetric cones. In particular, we investigate the rescaled asymptotics of the associated flow near the central path. Our results imply that the Nesterov-Todd direction arises as the solution of a Newton system defined in terms of a certain transformation of the primal-dual feasible domain. This transformation has especially appealing properties which generalize the notion of weighted analytic centers for linear programming

Sharing is caring vs. stealing is wrong: a moral argument for limiting copyright protection

Copyright is at the centre of both popular and academic debate. That emotions are running high is hardly surprising – copyright influences who contributes what to culture, how culture is used, and even the kind of persons we are and come to be. Consequentialist, Lockean, and personality interest accounts are generally advanced in the literature to morally justify copyright law. I argue that these approaches fail to ground extensive authorial rights in intellectual creations and that only a small subset of the rights accorded by copyright law is justified. The pared-down version of copyright that I defend consists of the right to attribution, the right to have one’s non-endorsement of modifications or uses of one’s work explicitly noted, and the right to a share of the profit resulting from the commercial uses of one’s work. I also cursorily explore whether contribution to another person’s work gives rise to moral interests

Avoiding initiation of repair in L2 conversations-for-learning

Using audio-recorded data from second language (L2) English conversations-for-learning between an L2 user of English and a first language (L1) user of English (the researcher), this study analyzes cases in which the L1 user avoids initiation of repair. In each case, the L2 user appears to have misunderstood something said by the L1 user. Instead of initiating repair in next turn on the L2 user’s talk, or in third position on his own talk, the L1 user goes along, at least briefly, with the direction set by the L2 user. Often, the L1 user, sooner or later, returns to the misunderstood talk. Avoidance of repair initiation is one way in which the L1 user contributes to the construction of the L2 user as interactionally competent to participate in conversations-for-learning

Private Speech as Social Action

An important theoretical construct within the Vygotskian sociocultural approach to second language learning is private speech. Within a conversation-analytic framework, an agnostic stance is taken in this paper toward the possible intrapsychological function(s) of private speech in order to (1) illustrate how private speech can be identified within the details of talk-in-interaction and (2) how private speech can be understood as social action. It is argued that attention to the details of how private speech is produced is important in order to show how private speech has been identified as such; that viewing private speech as social action allows for a more emic perspective; and that, at least within interaction, private speech is social not just in origin, but each time that it is produced

Problems of the German Contribution to EU-SILC: A Research Perspective, Comparing EU-SILC, Microcensus and SOEP

EU-SILC will become one of the most important statistical data sources for the Federal Government's future Poverty and Wealth Reports, for comparing Germany's position with those of the other EU member states in the "open method of coordination", and for the international scientific community and international organisations. Hence this sample needs intensive quality control to ensure data quality. Ex ante quality control must take the form of selecting suitable survey methods, internal control of consistency of the data collected from each household, transparent data editing, reliable imputation methods and compensation for drop-outs by reweighting. Ex post consistency checks are needed in the form of comparison with other similar household samples, with administrative statistics and with macro-economic aggregates of the national accounts. In this paper the need for intensive ex post quality control is met with consistency checks in the form of a comparison between the results of EU-SILC and the microcensus and SOEP, which reveals significant deviations in the coverage of poorly integrated foreigners, small children and the level of education, as well as the ratio of house/apartment owners and the employment ratio. This causes serious distortions to the Laeken indicators calculated.Intergenerational Mobility, Germany