The contribution of resident physicians to hospital productivity

Resident physicians play a double role in hospital activity. They participate in medical practices and thus, on the one hand, they should be considered as an input. Also, they are medical staff in training and, on the other hand, must be considered as an output. The net effect on hospital activities should therefore be empirically determined. Additionally, when considering their role as active physicians, a natural hypothesis is that resident physicians are not more productive than senior ones. This is a property that standard logarithmic production functions (including Cobb–Douglas and Translog functional forms) cannot verify for the whole technology set. Our main contribution is the development of a Translog modification, which implies the definition of the input “doctors” as a weighted sum of senior and resident physicians, where the weights are estimated from the empirical application. This modification of the standard Translog is able, under suitable parameter restrictions, to verify our main hypothesis across the whole technology set while determining if the net effect of resident physicians in hospitals’ production should be associated to an output or to an input. We estimate the resulting output distance function frontier with a sample of Spanish hospitals. Our findings show that the overall contribution of resident physicians to hospitals’ production allows considering them as an input in most cases. In particular, their average productivity is around 37% of that corresponding to senior physicians.

What Is Consciousness? -Artificial Intelligence, Real Intelligence, Quantum Mind, and Qualia

We approach the question, "What is Consciousness?'' in a new way, not as Descartes' "systematic doubt'', but as how organisms find their way in their world. Finding one's way involves finding possible uses of features of the world that might be beneficial or avoiding those that might be harmful. "Possible uses of X to accomplish Y'' are "Affordances''. The number of uses of X is indefinite, the different uses are unordered and are not deducible from one another. All biological adaptations are either affordances seized by heritable variation and selection or, far faster, by the organism acting in its world finding uses of X to accomplish Y. Based on this, we reach rather astonishing conclusions: 1) Strong AI is not possible. Universal Turing Machines cannot "find'' novel affordances. 2) Brain-mind is not purely classical physics for no classical physics system can be an analogue computer whose dynamical behavior can be isomorphic to "possible uses''. 3) Brain mind must be partly quantum - supported by increasing evidence at 6.0 sigma to 7.3 Sigma. 4) Based on Heisenberg's interpretation of the quantum state as "Potentia'' converted to "Actuals'' by Measurement, a natural hypothesis is that mind actualizes Potentia. This is supported at 5.2 Sigma. Then Mind's actualization of entangled brain-mind-world states are experienced as qualia and allow "seeing'' or "perceiving'' of uses of X to accomplish Y. We can and do jury-rig. Computers cannot. 5) Beyond familiar quantum computers, we consider Trans-Turing-Systems.

Backwards or forwards? Direction of working and success in problem solving

We pose ourselves the question: What can one infer from the direction of working when solvers work on the same task for a second time? This is discussed on the basis of 44 problem solving processes of the TIMSS task K10. A natural hypothesis is that working forwards can be taken as evidence that the task is recognized and a solution path is recalled. This can be confirmed by our analysis. A surprising observation is that when working backwards, pivotal for success is (in case of K10) to change to working forwards soon after reaching the barrier.

Rigidity for partially hyperbolic diffeomorphisms

In this work we completely classify $C^{\infty }$ conjugacy for smooth conservative (pointwise) partially hyperbolic diffeomorphisms homotopic to a linear Anosov automorphism on the 3-torus by its center foliation behavior. We prove that the uniform version of absolute continuity for the center foliation is the natural hypothesis to obtain $C^{\infty }$ conjugacy to its linear Anosov automorphism. Avila, Viana and Wilkinson [Absolute continuity, Lyapunov exponents and rigidity I: Geodesic flows. J. Eur. Math. Soc. (JEMS)17(6) (2015), 1435–1462] proved that for a perturbation in the volume preserving case of the time-one map of an Anosov flow absolute continuity of the center foliation implies smooth rigidity. The absolute version of absolute continuity is the appropriate scenario for our context since it is not possible to obtain a result analogous to that of Avila, Viana and Wilkinson for our class of maps, for absolute continuity alone fails miserably to imply smooth rigidity for our class of maps. Our theorem is a global rigidity result as we do not assume the diffeomorphism to be at some distance from the linear Anosov automorphism. We also do not assume ergodicity. In particular, a metric condition on the center foliation implies ergodicity and $C^{\infty }$ center foliation.

The centric p-radical complex and a related p-local geometry

We shall introduce a p-local geometry Δp(G) for the pair (G, p) of a finite group G and a prime divisor p of the order of G, which is constructed by ‘maximal parabolic like’ subgroups of G. Under the natural hypothesis, Δp(G) behaves very much like the building associated with a group of Lie type in characteristic p. We shall also show that, under some hypothesis, Δp(G) is homotopy equivalent to the subgroup complex [Bscr ]cenp(G) which is a more essential part of the p-radical complex [Bscr ]p(G). Some of the p-local sporadic geometries can be understood well in our system.

On the rate of maximum activation by collision for complex molecules with applications to velocities of gas reactions

The difficulties of the theory of homogeneous unimolecular gas reactions are well known. The well known natural hypothesis on which to account for a unimolecular reaction such as the decomposition of N 2 O 5 is to assume that there exist in equilibrium in the gas N 2 O 5 molecules of two classes, active and inert, and that the active molecules are all those which contain internal energy greater than ϵ 0 . This idea of active and inactive molecules, due to Arrhenius, is demanded in order to account for the observed temperature coefficient of the reaction velocity. The equilibrium conditions must be maintained by some mechanism which allows inactive molecules to be activated and the reverse process to occur, the rates of change a t the equilibrium point of the reaction (N 2 O 5 ) active ⇄(N 2 O 5 ) inactive being, of course, equal. In order to account for the decomposition, as of N 2 O 5 , at a rate strictly proportional to the concentration of N 2 O 5 , a t least over a very wide range of concentrations, we have now merely to assume that the active N 2 O 5 -molecules have a certain chance of spontaneous decomposition, so that if at any time there are x such molecules present, Bxdt will decompose in the following interval dt . It is not necessary to look farther into the mechanism of this decomposition. We may recognise it as of a type made familiar to us by the phenomenon of the spontaneous emission of light by excited molecules. The coefficient B may, or may not, be an absolute molecular constant; it is only essential here that it should be independent of any concentration. These spontaneous decompositions will then proceed at a rate proportional to the concentration of active molecules and therefore at a rate proportional to the total concentration of N 2 O 5 , provided that the equilibrium ratio (active/total) is unaltered by the spontaneous decomposition. This will be true so long as the natural rate of activation and deactivation is large compared with the rate of decomposition.

4. Note on the Preceding Paper

If we assume the lowering of the temperature of maximum density to be proportional to the pressure, which is the simplest and most natural hypothesis, we may writewhere p is in tons-weight per square inch.Now Thomson's thermodynamic result is of the formThis becomes, with our assumption,As the left-hand member is always very small, no sensible error will result from integrating on the assumption that t is constant on the right (except when the quantity in brackets is very small, and then the error is of no consequence).