Benchmark theory (BT), introduced by Ralph Wedgwood, departs from decision theories of pure expectation maximization like evidential decision theory (EDT) and causal decision theory (CDT) and instead ranks actions according to the desirability of an outcome they produce in some state of affairs compared to a standard—a benchmark—for that state of affairs. Wedgwood motivates BT through what he terms Gandalf’s principle, that the merits of an action in a given state should be evaluated relative only to the performances of other (...) actions in that state, and not to their performances in other states. Although BT succeeds in selecting intuitively rational actions in a number of cases—including some in which EDT or CDT seem to go wrong—it places constraints on rational decision-making that either lack motivation or are untenable. Specifically, I argue that as it stands BT is committed both to endorsing and rejecting the independence of irrelevant alternatives. Furthermore its requirement that weakly dominated actions be excluded from consideration of rational action lacks motivation and threatens to collide with traditional game theory. In the final section of the paper, I construct a counterexample to BT. (shrink)

Evaluating large language models (LLMs) for tasks like fact extraction in support of knowledge graph construction frequently involves computing accuracy metrics using a ground truth benchmark based on a knowledge graph (KG). These evaluations assume that errors represent factual disagreements. However, human discourse frequently features metalinguistic disagreement, where agents differ not on facts but on the meaning of the language used to express them. Given the complexity of natural language processing and generation using LLMs, we ask: do metalinguistic disagreements occur (...) between LLMs and KGs? Based on an investigation using the T-REx knowledge alignment dataset, we hypothesize that metalinguistic disagreement does in fact occur between LLMs and KGs, with potential relevance for the practice of knowledge graph engineering. We propose a benchmark for evaluating the detection of factual and metalinguistic disagreements between LLMs and KGs. An initial proof of concept of such a benchmark is available on Github. (shrink)

El tema de este trabajo es el benchmarking en el sector público. Esta investigación, parte del interés por analizar la importancia que ha cobrado el benchmarking en el sector como herramienta de mejora e innovación de la gestión pública donde los Estados comprometen esfuerzos para conseguir calidad, eficiencia y eficacia en los servicios que presta. En esta lógica se inscribe el principal objetivo, que consiste en realizar aportes y propuestas, para la implementación de herramientas de benchmarking en (...) las dimensiones transversales y regionales del Estado de la Provincia de Buenos Aires. El estudio es exploratorio y descriptivo, emplea una metodología cualitativa que combina un análisis bibliográfico para la elaboración del marco teórico y la definición de los tipos y dimensiones del benchmarking, con la identificación y descripción de experiencias a partir de la evidencia empírica relevada. El punto de partida teórico, se estructura en base a los modelos y enfoques desarrollados por Robert Camp, Michael Spendolini, Rolf Pfeiffer y Fernando Marchitto. Este marco conceptual, permite examinar distintas prácticas institucionales de los niveles subnacional, nacional e internacional. (shrink)

The theme of this book is benchmarking in the public sector and part of the interest to analyze the importance that benchmarking has gained in the sector -as a tool for improvement and innovation of public management- where States commit efforts to achieve quality, efficiency and effectiveness in the services it provides. The study is exploratory and descriptive, employing a qualitative methodology that combines a bibliographic analysis for the elaboration of the theoretical framework and the definition of the (...) types and dimensions of benchmarking, with the identification and description of experiences from the empirical evidence surveyed. In a special chapter, the importance, scope and dimensions of benchmarking of product design (comparative evaluation of product design or industrial design) is discussed for the state assessment in design and development of new products for micro, small and medium producers. Our approach includes the different policies and actions to support Micro, Small and Medium Industries (MiPyMIs), which are undertaken from subnational states. RESUMEN. El tema de este libro es el benchmarking en el sector público y parte del interés por analizar la importancia que ha cobrado el benchmarking en el sector –como una herramienta de mejora e innovación de la gestión pública– donde los Estados comprometen esfuerzos para conseguir calidad, eficiencia y eficacia en los servicios que presta. El estudio es exploratorio y descriptivo, emplea una metodología cualitativa que combina un análisis bibliográfico para la elaboración del marco teórico y la definición de los tipos y dimensiones del benchmarking, con la identificación y descripción de experiencias a partir de la evidencia empírica relevada. En un capítulo especial se trata la importancia, alcances y dimensiones del benchmarking of product design (evaluación comparada de diseño de producto o diseño industrial) para el asesoramiento estatal en diseño y desarrollo de nuevos productos a micro, pequeños y medianos productores. Nuestro enfoque comprende a las distintas políticas y acciones de apoyo a las Micro, Pequeñas y Medianas Industrias (MiPyMIs), que se emprenden desde los Estados subnacionales. (shrink)

The field of scientific image integrity presents a challenging research bottleneck given the lack of available datasets to design and evaluate forensic techniques. The sensitivity of data also creates a legal hurdle that restricts the use of real-world cases to build any accessible forensic benchmark. In light of this, there is no comprehensive understanding on the limitations and capabilities of automatic image analysis tools for scientific images, which might create a false sense of data integrity. To mitigate this issue, we (...) present an extendable open-source algorithm library that reproduces the most common image forgery operations reported by the research integrity community: duplication, retouching, and cleaning. We create a large scientific forgery image benchmark with enriched ground truth using this library and realistic scientific images. All figures within the benchmark are synthetically doctored using images collected from creative commons sources. While collecting the source images, we ensured that the they did not present any suspicious integrity problems. Because of the high number of retracted papers due to image duplication, this work evaluates the state-of-the-art copy-move detection methods in the proposed dataset, using a new metric that asserts consistent match detection between the source and the copied region. All evaluated methods had a low performance in this dataset, indicating that scientific images might need a specialized copy-move detector. The dataset and source code are available at https://github.com/phillipecardenuto/rsiil. (shrink)

Tools are needed to benchmark carbon emissions and pledges against criteria of equity and fairness. However, standard economic approaches, which use a transparent optimization framework, ignore equity. Models that do include equity benchmarks exist, but often use opaque methodologies. Here we propose a utilitarian benchmark computed in a transparent optimization framework, which could usefully inform the equity benchmark debate. Implementing the utilitarian benchmark, which we see as ethically minimal and conceptually parsimonious, in two leading climate–economy models allows for calculation of (...) the optimal allocation of future emissions. We compare this optimum with historical emissions and initial nationally determined contributions. Compared with cost minimization, utilitarian optimization features better outcomes for human development, equity and the climate. Peak temperature is lower under utilitarianism because it reduces the human development cost of global mitigation. Utilitarianism therefore is a promising inclusion to a set of benchmarks for future explorations of climate equity. (shrink)

This paper investigates the possibilities and problems of benchmarking Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). After a methodological analysis of the advantages and problems of benchmarking, we develop a benchmark method that includes economic, social and environmental aspects as well as national and international aspects of CSR. The overall benchmark is based on a weighted average of these aspects. The weights are based on the opinions of companies and NGO's. Using different methods of weighting, we find that the outcome of (...) the benchmark is rather robust for a sample of more than 50 large Dutch companies. (shrink)

With over 2 billion people lacking medicines for treatable diseases and 14 million people dying annually from infectious disease, there is undeniable need for increased access to medicines. There has been an increasing trend to benchmark the pharmaceutical industry on their corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance in access to medicines. Benchmarking creates a competitive inter-business environment and acts as incentive for improving CSR. This article investigates the corporate feedback discourses pharmaceutical companies make in response to criticisms from benchmarking (...) reports. It determines whether these responses are part of a healthy process in increasing access to medicines or a barrier to improvement. A qualitative analysis on the feedback the industry provided was performed, and the responses seen in these statements were grouped by analysing the language used, the ideas portrayed and attitudes of the companies. Increasing transparency through benchmarking is a powerful tool which reveals the industry's shortfalls to the public, affects the decisions of socially responsible investors, and is a risk to their financial bottom line. This article demonstrates the importance of benchmarking and transparency in creating inter-business competition and the translation of these responses to actual access to medicine practices. (shrink)

With over 2 billion people lacking medicines for treatable diseases and 14 million people dying annually from infectious disease, there is undeniable need for increased access to medicines. There has been an increasing trend to benchmark the pharmaceutical industry on their corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance in access to medicines. Benchmarking creates a competitive inter-business environment and acts as incentive for improving CSR. This article investigates the corporate feedback discourses pharmaceutical companies make in response to criticisms from benchmarking (...) reports. It determines whether these responses are part of a healthy process in increasing access to medicines or a barrier to improvement. A qualitative analysis on the feedback the industry provided was performed, and the responses seen in these statements were grouped by analysing the language used, the ideas portrayed and atti- tudes of the companies. Increasing transparency through benchmarking is a powerful tool which reveals the industry’s shortfalls to the public, affects the decisions of socially responsible investors, and is a risk to their financial bottom line. This article demonstrates the importance of benchmarking and transparency in creating inter-business competition and the translation of these responses to actual access to medicine practices. (shrink)

Large language model evaluation has become dominated by single-number leaderboards that rank models using aggregate scores across diverse tasks. While these leaderboards provide useful high-level comparisons, they obscure critical details about model behavior, capabilities, and limitations that matter for responsible deployment. This paper critiques current LLM benchmarking practices and proposes a framework for comparative analysis built on three principles: parity of information (standardized evaluation conditions), uncertainty and risk reporting (confidence intervals and safety metrics), and benchmark cards (comprehensive metadata about (...) datasets, tasks, and protocols). Through case studies in multidomain evaluation, I demonstrate how transparent, multidimensional comparisons can support responsible model development and deployment while enabling fairer assessment of competing approaches. The framework provides both theoretical foundations and practical tools for moving beyond reductive metrics toward evaluation practices that capture the dimensions of model performance most relevant for beneficial real-world deployment. (shrink)

Scientific understanding is a fundamental goal of science. However, there is currently no good way to measure the scientific understanding of agents, whether these be humans or Artificial Intelligence systems. Without a clear benchmark, it is challenging to evaluate and compare different levels of scientific understanding. In this paper, we propose a framework to create a benchmark for scientific understanding, utilizing tools from philosophy of science. We adopt a behavioral conception of understanding, according to which genuine understanding should be recognized (...) as an ability to perform certain tasks. We extend this notion of scientific understanding by considering a set of questions that gauge different levels of scientific understanding, covering information retrieval, the capability to arrange information to produce an explanation, and the ability to infer how things would be different under different circumstances. We suggest building a Scientific Understanding Benchmark (SUB), formed by a set of these tests, allowing for the evaluation and comparison of scientific understanding. Benchmarking plays a crucial role in establishing trust, ensuring quality control, and providing a basis for performance evaluation. By aligning machine and human scientific understanding we can improve their utility, ultimately advancing scientific understanding and helping to discover new insights within machines. (shrink)

We applaud many aspects of Elqayam & Evans' (E&E's) call for a descriptivist research programme in studying reasoning. Nevertheless, we contend that normative benchmarks are vital for understanding individual differences in performance. We argue that the presence of normative responses to particular problems by certain individuals should inspire researchers to look for converging evidence for analytic processing that may have a normative basis.

Socially assistive robotics is a growing area of research. Evaluating SAR systems presents novel challenges. Using a robot for a socially assistive task can have various benefits and ethical implications. Many questions are important to understanding whether a robot is effective for a given application domain. This paper describes several benchmarks for evaluating SAR systems. There exist numerous methods for evaluating the many factors involved in a robot’s design. Benchmarks from psychology, anthropology, medicine, and human–robot interaction are proposed as measures (...) of success in evaluating a given SAR system and its impact on the user and broader population. (shrink)

In a discussion session; I provided the following overview describing the Beard Center for Leadership in Ethics' “Benchmarking Study" began in 1996 and completed in 1998.

Drawing on the critical discourse analysis of journals and working papers from 2011-2020 referring to the at-risk of poverty or social exclusion composite indicator (AROPE), we shed light on how benchmarks technicize academic discourse, particularly in its part contributed by economists. First developed to measure progress towards the poverty target set in the EU's Europe 2020 strategy, AROPE has easily permeated academic debate. Its anchoring in statistical procedures and expertise has allowed it to function in this debate as a neutral (...) and purely technical measurement tool, obscuring the interests and normative choices underlying its design and implementation. As a result, the discursive practices associated with the benchmark have led to the reproduction and legitimization of the anti-poverty policy objectives of the Europe 2020 strategy. Simultaneously, AROPE has provided a 'cognitive infrastructure' that enabled an economic view of the world geared towards raising competitiveness. It has made it possible to assess which Member State is doing well and which is doing poorly, and making recommendations on how the laggards should improve. Our analysis shows that benchmarks such as AROPE support the process of shaping Europe as a supranational entity, creating a picture of common European problems with uniform definitions, on the basis of which it is possible to divide Member States into better and worse performers and even promote common solutions through good practices. We conclude by highlighting that the academic discourse around AROPE, generated mainly by economists, reflects the growing interdependence of the academic and political spheres and the pressure for research to have social and political impact. (shrink)

This article explores the ethical and cultural complexities of AI chatbot development through an autoethnographic lens grounded in Actor–Network Theory (ANT) and Practice Theory. By benchmarking my experiences as a chatbot trainer against the Fairwork principles, a set of guidelines developed to ensure fair working conditions, I uncover the intricate interplay between freelance trainers, algorithms, and the broader AI industry. The study addresses two primary research questions: How do the lived experiences of chatbot trainers align with the Fairwork principles? (...) What systemic challenges and ethical dilemmas arise in the context of AI training work? Key findings highlight significant challenges, such as inconsistent pay, overwork, and biased management practices, all exacerbated by systemic pressures prioritizing rapid development and profit over ethical considerations. ANT is utilized to analyze network dynamics among trainers, platforms, and employers, revealing how these interactions lead to ethical drift and the normalization of unfair labor practices. Practice Theory provides insights into the daily practices and pressures shaping the trainers’ work environment, contributing to stress and burnout. In addition, I apply the concept of “enshittification” to describe how profit-driven motives lead to the deterioration of working conditions and the quality of chatbot training, reflecting broader trends in digital labor platforms. Furthermore, I propose concrete recommendations for refining the Fairwork principles to better address the unique vulnerabilities faced by AI trainers. (shrink)

In the area of machine learning, different techniques are used to train machines and perform different tasks like computer vision, data analysis, natural language processing, and speech recognition. Computer vision is one of the main branches where machine learning and deep learning techniques are being applied. Optical character recognition is the ability of a machine to recognize the character of a language. Pashto is one of the most ancient and historical languages of the world, spoken in Afghanistan and Pakistan. OCR (...) application has been developed for various cursive languages like Urdu, Chinese, and Japanese, but very little work is done for the recognition of the Pashto language. When it comes to handwritten character recognition, it becomes more difficult for OCR to recognize the characters as every handwritten character’s shape is influenced by the writer’s hand motion dynamics. The reason for the lack of research in Pashto handwritten character data as compared to other languages is because there is no benchmark dataset available for experimental purposes. This study focuses on the creation of such a dataset, and then for the evaluation purpose, a machine is trained to correctly recognize unseen Pashto handwritten characters. To achieve this objective, a dataset of 43000 images was created. Three Feed Forward Neural Network models with backpropagation algorithm using different Rectified Linear Unit layer configurations were trained and tested with this dataset. The simulation shows that Model 1 achieved accuracy up to 87.6% on unseen data while Model 2 achieved an accuracy of 81.60% and 3% accuracy, respectively. Similarly, loss was the lowest for Model 1 with 0.15 and 3.17 for training and testing, followed by Model 2 with 0.7 and 4.2 for training and testing, while Model 3 was the last with loss values of 6.4 and 3.69. The precision, recall, and f-measure values of Model 1 were better than those of both Model 2 and Model 3. Based on results, Model 1 is found to be the most efficient as compared to the other two models in terms of accuracy to recognize Pashto handwritten characters. (shrink)

Large language models have demonstrated notable performance across various logical reasoning benchmarks. However, it remains unclear which core logical skills they truly master. To address this, we introduce LogicSkills, a unified benchmark designed to isolate three fundamental skills in formal reasoning: (i) formal symbolization—translating premises into first-order logic; (ii) countermodel construction—formulating a finite structure in which all premises are true while the conclusion is false; and (iii) validity assessment—deciding whether a conclusion follows from a given set of premises. Items are (...) drawn from the two-variable fragment of first-order logic (without identity) and are presented in both natural English and a Carroll-style language with nonce words. All examples are verified for correctness and non-triviality using the SMT solver Z3. Across leading models, performance is high on validity but substantially lower on symbolization and countermodel construction, suggesting reliance on surface-level patterns rather than genuine symbolic or rule-based reasoning. (shrink)

The existing literature on savings, insurance, and portfolio choices under risk has revealed that quite often comparative statics results depend, among other things, upon the values of the coefficients of relative risk aversion and relative prudence. More specifically the benchmark values for these coefficients are, respectively, one and two. Recently, several papers investigated constraints on the higher degree extensions of the coefficients of relative risk aversion and of relative prudence. The present work provides a unified approach to this question based (...) on the concept of elementary correlation increasing transformations, allowing for a better understanding of changes in risk in the multiplicative case. (shrink)

Predatory pricing is one of the forms of the abuse of a dominant position. Judicial institutions of the European Union and Commission during analysis of predatory pricing devote main attention to the relationship between costs and prices of the dominant undertaking. Moreover, attention is paid also to various cost benchmarks: average variable costs, average avoidable costs, average total costs and long run average incremental costs. European judicial institutions should pay less attention to the costs of a dominant undertaking than to (...) evaluation of the effect of the actions of a dominant undertaking to consumers and competition in the market. Moreover, proposition of the Commission to use average avoidable costs in predation cases does not correspond to the practice of the Court of Justice and the General Court. The Commission should stipulate more clearly how average avoidable costs and long-run average incremental costs should be calculated in order to increase legal certainty of the undertakings. Establishment of prices higher than average total costs by the dominant undertaking should not be recognized as predatory pricing. (shrink)

Default reasoning occurs when the available information does not deductively guarantee the truth of the conclusion; and the conclusion is nonetheless correctly arrived at. The formalisms that have been developed in Artificial Intelligence to capture this mode of reasoning have suffered from a lack of agreement as to which non-monotonic inferences should be considered correct; and so Lifschitz 1989 produced a set of “Nonmonotonic Benchmark Problems” which all future formalisms are supposed to honor. The present work investigates the extent to (...) which humans follow the prescriptions set out in these Benchmark Problems. (shrink)

While it is often said that robotics should aspire to reproducible and measurable results that allow benchmarking, I argue that a focus on benchmarking can be a hindrance for progress in robotics. The reason is what I call the ‘measure-target confusion’, the confusion between a measure of progress and the target of progress. Progress on a benchmark (the measure) is not identical to scientific or technological progress (the target). In the past, several academic disciplines have been led into (...) pursuing only reproducible and measurable ‘scientific’ results – robotics should be careful to follow that line because results that can be benchmarked must be specific and context-dependent, but robotics targets whole complex systems for a broad variety of contexts. While it is extremely valuable to improve benchmarks to reduce the distance be- tween measure and target, the general problem to measure progress towards more intelligent machines (the target) will not be solved by benchmarks alone; we need a balanced approach with sophisticated benchmarks, plus real-life testing, plus qualitative judgment. (shrink)

Initiatives relying on artificial intelligence (AI) to deliver socially beneficial outcomes—AI for social good (AI4SG)—are on the rise. However, existing attempts to understand and foster AI4SG initiatives have so far been limited by the lack of normative analyses and a shortage of empirical evidence. In this Perspective, we address these limitations by providing a definition of AI4SG and by advocating the use of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as a benchmark for tracing the scope and spread of AI4SG. (...) We introduce a database of AI4SG projects gathered using this benchmark, and discuss several key insights, including the extent to which different SDGs are being addressed. This analysis makes possible the identification of pressing problems that, if left unaddressed, risk hampering the effectiveness of AI4SG initiatives. (shrink)

In this paper, we provide an overview of the benchmarks that have been recently employed in Abstract Argumentation. We first describe the benchmark suite from previous editions of the International Competition of Computational Models of Argumentation (ICCMA), and then briefly describe the benchmarks for non-Dung frameworks. This article is a contribution to the new Argument & Computation Community Resources (ACCR) corner.

The proliferation of legal documents in various formats and their dispersion across multiple courts present a significant challenge for users seeking precise matches to their information requirements. Despite notable advancements in legal information retrieval systems, research into legal recommender systems remains limited. A plausible factor contributing to this scarcity could be the absence of extensive publicly accessible datasets or benchmarks. While a few studies have emerged in this field, a comprehensive analysis of the distinct attributes of legal data that influence (...) the design of effective legal recommenders is notably absent in the current literature. This paper addresses this gap by initially amassing a comprehensive session-based dataset from Jusbrasil, one of Brazil’s largest online legal platforms. Subsequently, we scrutinize and discourse key facets of legal session-based recommendation data, including session duration, types of recommendable legal artifacts, coverage, and popularity. Furthermore, we introduce the first session-based recommendation benchmark tailored to the legal domain, shedding light on the performance and constraints of several renowned session-based recommendation approaches. These evaluations are based on real-world data sourced from Jusbrasil. (shrink)

The subject of this book is benchmarking in the public sector and part of the interest is to analyze the importance that benchmarking has acquired in this sector - as a tool for improving and innovating public administration - when states strive for quality, efficiency and effectiveness of the services offered. The study is exploratory and descriptive and uses a qualitative methodology that combines a bibliographic analysis to develop the theoretical framework and the definition of the types and (...) dimensions of benchmarking with the identification and description of the experiences from the empirical data studied. A special chapter discusses the importance, scope and dimensions of product design benchmarking (comparative assessment of product design or industrial design) for government assessment of design and development of new products for micro, small and medium-sized manufacturers. Our approach covers the various policies and measures to support Micro, Small and Medium Industries (MiPyMIs) implemented by sub-national states. (shrink)

When the U.S. conducts warfare, elements of a force are drawn from different services and work together as a single team to accomplish an assigned mission. To achieve such unified action, it is necessary that the doctrines governing the actions of members of specific services be both consistent with and subservient to joint Doctrine. Because warfighting today increasingly involves not only live forces but also automated systems, unified action requires that information technology that is used in joint warfare must be (...) aligned with joint doctrine. It requires also that the separate information systems used by the different elements of a joint force must be interoperable, in the sense that data and information that is generated by each element must be usable (understandable, processable) by all the other elements that need them. Currently, such interoperability is impeded by multiple inconsistencies among the different data and software standards used by warfighters. We describe here the on-going project of creating a Joint Doctrine Ontology (JDO), which uses joint doctrine to provide shared computer-accessible content valid for any field of military endeavor, organization, and information system. JDO addresses the two previously mentioned requirements of unified action by providing a widely applicable benchmark for use by developers of information systems that will both guarantee alignment with joint doctrine and support interoperability. (shrink)

Causal maps are specialized ontologies in which concept nodes are connected through typed, directed edges that encode positive or negative causality. These maps can be used to elicit the mental models of participants, thus supporting tasks such as the identification of meaningful groups or the synthesis of comprehensive models of a domain. Although producing causal maps involves a transparent process, the large maps produced by groups are notoriously difficult to interpret. In addition, creating maps is a time-consuming process that requires (...) trained facilitators. These limitations have fueled the interest in automatically explaining maps by transforming them into accessible narratives (i.e., map-to-text) or in creating maps using authoritative reports (i.e., text-to-map). In this brief ontology report, we provide a set of open resources on standard formats to support both tasks. Specifically, we provide five datasets that can support map-to-text or text-to-map tasks at different levels (e.g., sentence- or paragraph-level generation), across application domains (e.g., ecological management and public health), and with a variety of writing styles (novice, advanced, and experts). We detail assessment procedures for these tasks, covering both existing metrics and emerging approaches. Finally, we provide five notebooks to support users in performing these tasks and assessments through our open datasets. (shrink)

Managers in Peru, South Africa, and the United States were classified into four groups along Singhapakdi et al. (J Bus Ethics 15:1131–1140, 1996) Perceived Role of Ethics and Social Responsibility (PRESOR) scale. In Peru and the United States, individuals in the ethics and social responsibility first category reported greater satisfaction with organizational performance than did those in the profits first category. Moral capitalists—individuals who report high emphases on both social responsibility and profits—reported the highest satisfaction with performance in the United (...) States. Managers in the United States are more likely than their counterparts in Peru and South Africa to reject the mutual exclusivity of prioritizing social responsibility and profits simultaneously. Directions for future research are outlined. (shrink)

Working on the assumption that ideas are embedded in socio-technical arrangements which actualize them, this essay sheds light on the way the Open Method of Co-ordination (OMC) achieves the Lisbon strategic goal: to become the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world. Rather than framing the issue in utilitarian terms, it focuses attention on quantified indicators, comparable statistics and common targets resulting from the increasing practice of intergovernmental benchmarking, in order to tackle the following questions: how does (...) the OMC go about co-ordinating Member States through the benchmarking of national policies? And to what extent does this managerial device impact the path of European construction? Beyond the ideological and discursive construction of the competitive imperative, this technology of government transforms it into an indefinite discipline (Foucault) which constantly urges decision-makers to hit the top of the charts. This contribution thus argues that the practice of intergovernmental benchmarking is far from being neutral in purpose and effect. On the contrary, it lays the foundation for building a competitive Europe which unites Member States through competition. (shrink)

There is not a single country in the world that does not advocate or promote patriotism. Nonetheless, it may be said that there is perhaps no other country that exalts patriotism as the highest standard of moral virtue the way modern China does. In particular, for Chinese intellectuals, "the great cause of the nation" (minzu dayi) has been held up as the supreme value above all other standards.

This paper develops and benchmarks the Relational Zero State (RZS) framework as an action-free, graph-dynamical model for pre-geometric cosmology. The starting point is not a spacetime Lagrangian, but a weighted relational network (graph) and node fields updated by explicit rules constrained by a stability principle (“Romero Law”). A reproducible workflow (“Universe Factory”) is provided to generate synthetic universes on a laptop and to track phase-transition diagnostics such as component unification (percolation), global communication onset (spectral connectivity growth), and saturation (stability plateaus). (...) -/- A core requirement is low-redshift validation. Mechanisms intended to amplify early rare events must remain compatible with the established low- and intermediate-redshift large-scale-structure (LSS) phenomenology. To isolate the specific RZS statistical effect—symmetric heavy-tail amplification of rare peaks with minimal impact on the two-point sector—controlled surrogate tests are performed using BOSS DR12 LOWZ and CMASS power-spectrum targets (NGC/SGC) and multiple k-windows. Iterative amplitude-adjusted Fourier transform (IAAFT) surrogates hold the target two-point spectrum fixed by construction while varying only the one-point distribution. Across catalogs and parameter sweeps, the heavy-tail prescription keeps skewness consistent with zero, increases excess kurtosis, and boosts tail exceedance in the high-sigma regime, consistent with an even-order (trispectrum-like) signature rather than a two-point modification. -/- All scripts, figures, and summary tables are included for reproducibility and direct scrutiny. -/- . (shrink)

In this paper, we utilized triangular conorms. The essence of using S-norm is that the similarity order does not change using different norms. In fact, we are investigating for a new conception for calculating the similarity of two Fermatean fuzzy sets. For this purpose, utilizing an S-norm, we first present a formula for calculating the similarity of two Fermatean fuzzy values, so that they are truthful in similarity properties. Following that, we generalize a formula for calculating the similarity of the (...) two Fermatean fuzzy sets which prove truthful in similarity conditions. Finally, various numerical examples have been presented to elaborate this method. (shrink)

Biotechnology companies have been forced to take account of the social and ethical pressures which increasingly surround their activities. A research project was undertaken with the aims of identifying the practices and procedures which companies put in place as a response to these pressures, and of advising the European Commission on ways by which interaction between these companies and their stakeholders might be improved. Two questionnaires were administered, and although the response rate was not high a reasonably balanced sample was (...) achieved. The results indicated that although there was a high degree of ethical awareness and a willingness to pursue an ‘integrity approach’ to decision‐making as opposed to a ‘compliance approach’, companies on the whole lacked the institutional tools which would enable them to operationalise an integrity approach to corporate decision‐making. (shrink)

This paper investigates the state of the art with respect to sustainability reporting, its linkages with the corporations, internal measurement and monitoring systems and their combined impact on the quality of contemporary sustainability benchmarks, developed by SRI analysts and so-called rating and screening agencies. This research originated from the EU-funded research initiative to create a new generation management framework for corporate sustainability and responsibility (CS-R). The aim of it is to develop a coherent set of assessment -, measurement - and (...) monitoring tools. The sustainability benchmark tool should align the interests of corporations implementing CS-R and various organizations supporting SRI, such as fund managers, analysts and screening agencies. This paper show the essentials features of an actual sustainability benchmark which is currently under construction. This approach will have significance impact on the further development of SRI and CS-R practices, as well as support the development of sustainability reporting standards. (shrink)

Recently, there has been growing interest in the use of ontology as a fundamental tool for representing domain-specific conceptual models to improve the semantics, accuracy, and relevance of domain users’ query results. Although the amount of data has grown steadily over the past decade, much data shares similar characteristics that can be captured by a foundational ontology. In this paper, we show how queries based on a foundational ontology can be evaluated and their performance measured. We also present a Foundational (...) Patterns benchmark to help select the most efficient triple memory and its layout. We evaluate the foundational benchmark with both generated and real datasets for state-of-the-art triple stores. (shrink)

The importance of education in boosting the manpower of an economy cannot be overemphasized. This critical sector has been bastardized, relegated and put in a dust bin position through paltry figures usually allocated to it by the Federal Government of Nigeria. This paper presents a holistic trend of budgetary activities in Nigeria with a particular focus on the allocation to the Education sector using times series approach from 2009-2018. Two research questions were answered using secondary data gathered from the Central (...) Bank of Nigeria's Statistical Bulletin, 2018. Collected data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, while the results of the analysis showed that, the total allocation to the education sector from 2009 – 2018 is N4,038,115,000,000. The results further revealed a difference of N 10,311,805,000,000 between UNESCO benchmark of 26% and the actual allocation to the education sector for the same time period. It was concluded that the total allocation made to the education sector within the time period of 2009-2018 is generally low, and below the UNESCO benchmark. Based on the findings, it was recommended amongst others that the Federal Government of Nigeria should adequately fund the educational sector by allocating at least 26% of her budget to the education sector as prescribed by UNESCO. (shrink)

In choosing Hans-Georg Gadamer’s Truth and Method (1985 [1960]) as a comprehensive benchmark against which we can assess a broad swath of writings on modern, secular hermeneutics, this introductory chapter addresses the main achievements of Gadamer’s magnum opus, such as his critique of Romantic hermeneutics, his objections to Dilthey, Gadamer’s conception of language and hermeneutic circularity, as well as the notions of “fusion of horizons”, understanding, hermeneutics of facticity, Wirkungsgeschichte, prejudice, and tradition. The chapter concludes with two major criticisms, Gadamer’s (...) failure to distinguish between Kant’s species subject and Romantic subjectivity and his neglect of Kant’s final critical concept of reflective-teleological judgment. In the remainder of the book, the latter is argued to be a major root of modern hermeneutics from Ast and Schleiermacher to their poststructuralist and postmodern successors. (shrink)