Does autonomous moral reasoning favor consequentialism?

This paper addresses an important issue that has been commonly debated in moral psychology, namely the normative and metaethical implications of our differing intuitive responses to morally indistinguishable dilemmas. The prominent example of the asymmetry in our responses is that people often intuitively accept pulling a switch and deny pushing as a morally permissible way of sacrificing an innocent person to save more innocent people. Joshua Greene traces our negative responses to actions involving “up close and personal” harm back to our evolutionary past and argues that this undermines the normative power of deontological judgments. I reject Greene’s argument by arguing that our theoretical moral intuitions, as opposed to concrete and mid-level ones, are independent of direct evolutionary influence because they are the product of autonomous (gene-independent) moral reasoning. I then explain how both consequentialist and deontological theoretical intuitions, which enable us to make important moral distinctions and grasp objective moral facts, are produced by the exercise of autonomous moral reasoning and the process of cultural evolution. My conclusion will be that Greene is not justified in his claim that deontology is normatively inferior to consequentialism.

Explaining Valence Asymmetries in Value Learning: A Reinforcement Learning Account

To understand how acquired value impacts how we perceive and process stimuli, psychologists have developed the Value Learning Task (VLT; e.g., Raymond & O’Brien, 2009). The task consists of a series of trials in which participants attempt to maximize accumulated winnings as they make choices from a pair of presented images associated with probabilistic win, loss, or no-change outcomes. Despite the task having a symmetric outcome structure for win and loss pairs, people learn win associations better than loss associations (Lin, Cabrera-Haro, & Reuter-Lorenz, 2020). This asymmetry could lead to differences when the stimuli are probed in subsequent tasks, compromising inferences about how acquired value affects downstream processing. We investigate the nature of the asymmetry using a standard error-driven reinforcement learning model with a softmax choice rule. Despite having no special role for valence, the model yields the asymmetry observed in human behavior, whether the model parameters are set to maximize empirical fit, or task payoff. The asymmetry arises from an interaction between a neutral initial value estimate and a choice policy that exploits while exploring, leading to more poorly discriminated value estimates for loss stimuli. We also show how differences in estimated individual learning rates help to explain individual differences in the observed win-loss asymmetries, and how the final value estimates produced by the model provide a simple account of a post-learning explicit value categorization task.

Worst-Case Higher Moment Coherent Risk Based on Optimal Transport with Application to Distributionally Robust Portfolio Optimization

The tail risk management is of great significance in the investment process. As an extension of the asymmetric tail risk measure—Conditional Value at Risk (CVaR), higher moment coherent risk (HMCR) is compatible with the higher moment information (skewness and kurtosis) of probability distribution of the asset returns as well as capturing distributional asymmetry. In order to overcome the difficulties arising from the asymmetry and ambiguity of the underlying distribution, we propose the Wasserstein distributionally robust mean-HMCR portfolio optimization model based on the kernel smoothing method and optimal transport, where the ambiguity set is defined as a Wasserstein “ball” around the empirical distribution in the weighted kernel density estimation (KDE) distribution function family. Leveraging Fenchel’s duality theory, we obtain the computationally tractable DCP (difference-of-convex programming) reformulations and show that the ambiguity version preserves the asymmetry of the HMCR measure. Primary empirical test results for portfolio selection demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed model.

Maternal transmission as a symbiont sieve, and the absence of lactation in male mammals

Gut microbiomes of humans carry a complex symbiotic assemblage of microorganisms. As in all mammals, the special mode of feeding newborn infants through milk from the mammary gland enhances the opportunity for vertical transmission of elements of this microbiome. This has potential benefits, but it also brings with it some hazards for the host. We point out here that vertical transmission from both parents would allow host populations to be invaded by elements that are deleterious. In contrast, vertical transmission, when restricted to one parent, acts as a sieve preventing the spread of such elements. Because some transmission from mother to infant is unavoidable in placental mammals, uniparental transmission of symbionts, if it were to be selected, would require some separation of the father from the newborn infant. This paper therefore puts forward the hypothesis that the asymmetry in roles of mother and father, together with the hazards that come with biparental transmission, generate a selection pressure against male lactation in humans, and in mammals in general.

An Asymmetric Grating Refractive Index Sensor Generating Quasi-Bound States in the Continuum with High Figure of Merit and Temperature Self-Compensation

A subwavelength asymmetric grating refractive index (RI) sensor based on quasi-bound states in the continuum (q-BIC) with temperature self-compensation was proposed. The sensor structure consisted of a Prism / Asymmetric grating / Analytes, where the grating layers were periodically arranged asymmetric silicon (Si) and polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS). The asymmetry of the structure led to the fact that the tangential field component and the radiative field component in the grating layer were no longer in a fully decoupled state at the resonance position, creating two extremely narrow q-BIC resonance peaks, which gave the sensor a high Figure of Merit (FOM) and a low detection limit (DL). In addition, the thermo-optical coefficient of the materials made one of the resonance peaks more sensitive to temperature changes, realizing the temperature self-compensation of RI detection and thus improving the detection accuracy. From the results, reducing the asymmetry of the structure by modifying the parameters could theoretically make FOM > 5.1*106 RIU-1 and DL < 9.8*10-9 RIU. For the RI sensor with temperature self-compensation, FOM = 3057.85 RIU-1 and DL = 1.64*10-5 RIU for the RI, FOM = 0.88 °C-1 and DL = 0.057 °C for the temperature. These findings could effectively improve the temperature interference resistance of the sensor and thus the accuracy of trace substance detection.

Correlations and Critical Behavior in Lattice Gluodynamics

In the Landau-gauge lattice gluodynamics we find that, both in the SU(2) and SU(3) theory, a correlation of the Polyakov loop with the asymmetry of the A2 gluon condensate as well as with the longitudinal propagator makes it possible to determine the critical behavior of these quantities. We discuss finitevolume corrections and reveal that they can be reduced by the use of regression analysis. We also analyze the temperature dependence of low-momenta propagators in different Polyakov-loop sectors.

Single-spin asymmetry ATsin(2ϕ−ϕS) in π−p Drell-Yan process within TMD factorization

We study the single-spin asymmetry ATsin(2ϕ−ϕS) in the pion-induced Drell-Yan process within the transverse momentum dependent factorization (TMD factorization). The asymmetry can be expressed as the convolution of the Boer-Mulders function and the transversity function. We numerically estimate the asymmetry ATsin(2ϕ−ϕS) at the COMPASS kinematics with the model results for the pion meson distributions from the light-cone wave function approach and the available parametrization for the proton distributions. We also include the TMD evolution formalism both proton and pion parton distribution functions by using two different parametrizations on nonperturbative Sudakov form factor. We find that the asymmetry ATsin(2ϕ−ϕS) as functions of xp, xπ, xF and q⊥ is qualitatively consistent with the recent COMPASS measurement.

The Asymmetric Impact of Economic Growth, Energy Consumption, Population, and R&D on Carbon Emission in Turkey

The presented study analyzes the asymmetry effect of research and development (R&D) expenditures, population growth, energy consumption, and economic growth on carbon emissions in the sample of Turkey for the period 1990-2020. Nonlinear ARDL is used to control the asymmetry of the variables. Linear ARDL is used to control the long-term and short-term relationships between the variables. The findings show that there is a symmetrical or linear relationship between the variables of R&D expenditures, population growth, energy consumption, economic growth, and carbon emissions. The findings display that economic growth and R&D are effective in reducing carbon emissions, while energy consumption seems to increase carbon emissions. Interestingly, the population was found to be effective in reducing carbon emissions in the study. In order for Turkey to reach its 2050 target, it is necessary to give priority to environmental regulations and policies.

Prognostication of the asymmetry of population incomes in Ukrainian regions

The article presents the results of the medium-term forecast of income asymmetry of the population of Ukraine. Of the set of special research methods, statistical analysis was used. The initial information for the forecast was the official statistical data, namely: the income of the population of Ukraine in the dynamics by the type of economic activity and in the regional section over the past ten years. Construction of the forecast of the income and the definition of asymmetry was carried out based on the generalization of homogeneous phenomenons (million UAH and ten years). The average values were used to compare the obtained results, summarizing the characteristics of mass, qualitatively homogeneous socio-economic phenomenons, which scientifically predicted the main prospects. The results show a steady trend in the asymmetry of income asymmetry in Ukraine (both by type of economic activity and region), which will remain until 2024. In addition, it is found that Luhansk and Donetsk regions and the indicator (property income received) require additional research by surveying to establish the key risk factors.