The Force of Assumptions and Self-Attributions

This essay provides a general, abstract characterization of the content-force connection: the force of an utterance applies the content to the actual index of evaluation, for instance the actual world. It then considers two possible counterexamples to this general connection: Sextus Empiricus’ claim that talk about appearances is not assertoric, despite being concerned with the actual world, and that assumptions made in arguments concern the actual world, despite lacking assertoric force. The chapter notes that by modern standards, talk about appearance is assertoric. It also argues that, contrary to appearance, assumptions do not concern the actual world. The possible counterexamples are therefore not real.

THE EXPERIMENTAL EVALUATION OF THE CHANGE OF THE DYNAMIC PROPERTIES OF THE CAR VAZ-2110 IN THE EXPLOITATION WHEN USING PETROL AND GAS FUELS

The experimental method is proposed for determination of own actual index of dynamics of the car using a measuring system on the basis of linear accelerometers. A comparison of the dynamic properties of the car VAZ-2110 when using petrol and gas fuels

Research on Evaluation Method for Construction Bidding Projects

There are great subjectivity and tendentiousness during bid evaluation of engineering construction projects, which may cause deviation to bid evaluation results of bidding work. BP neural network model for bid evaluation of construction projects is built in the thesis, and the model can solve non-linear issues in the bid evaluation construction engineering projects well. And at the same time, evaluation results of the model are verified with the use of actual index data of sample enterprises, which can confirm effectiveness of such model.

Downscaling Extremes—An Intercomparison of Multiple Statistical Methods for Present Climate

Five statistical downscaling methods [automated regression-based statistical downscaling (ASD), bias correction spatial disaggregation (BCSD), quantile regression neural networks (QRNN), TreeGen (TG), and expanded downscaling (XDS)] are compared with respect to representing climatic extremes. The tests are conducted at six stations from the coastal, mountainous, and taiga region of British Columbia, Canada, whose climatic extremes are measured using the 27 Climate Indices of Extremes (ClimDEX; http://www.climdex.org/climdex/index.action) indices. All methods are calibrated from data prior to 1991, and tested against the two decades from 1991 to 2010. A three-step testing procedure is used to establish a given method as reliable for any given index. The first step analyzes the sensitivity of a method to actual index anomalies by correlating observed and NCEP-downscaled annual index values; then, whether the distribution of an index corresponds to observations is tested. Finally, this latter test is applied to a downscaled climate simulation. This gives a total of 486 single and 162 combined tests. The temperature-related indices pass about twice as many tests as the precipitation indices, and temporally more complex indices that involve consecutive days pass none of the combined tests. With respect to regions, there is some tendency of better performance at the coastal and mountaintop stations. With respect to methods, XDS performed best, on average, with 19% (48%) of passed combined (single) tests, followed by BCSD and QRNN with 10% (45%) and 10% (31%), respectively, ASD with 6% (23%), and TG with 4% (21%) of passed tests. Limitations of the testing approach and possible consequences for the downscaling of extremes in these regions are discussed.