Submodular set functionIn mathematics, a submodular set function (also known as a submodular function) is a set function whose value, informally, has the property that the difference in the incremental value of the function that a single element makes when added to an input set decreases as the size of the input set increases. Submodular functions have a natural diminishing returns property which makes them suitable for many applications, including approximation algorithms, game theory (as functions modeling user preferences) and electrical networks.
Greedy algorithmA greedy algorithm is any algorithm that follows the problem-solving heuristic of making the locally optimal choice at each stage. In many problems, a greedy strategy does not produce an optimal solution, but a greedy heuristic can yield locally optimal solutions that approximate a globally optimal solution in a reasonable amount of time. For example, a greedy strategy for the travelling salesman problem (which is of high computational complexity) is the following heuristic: "At each step of the journey, visit the nearest unvisited city.
Utility functions on indivisible goodsSome branches of economics and game theory deal with indivisible goods, discrete items that can be traded only as a whole. For example, in combinatorial auctions there is a finite set of items, and every agent can buy a subset of the items, but an item cannot be divided among two or more agents. It is usually assumed that every agent assigns subjective utility to every subset of the items. This can be represented in one of two ways: An ordinal utility preference relation, usually marked by .
Approximation algorithmIn computer science and operations research, approximation algorithms are efficient algorithms that find approximate solutions to optimization problems (in particular NP-hard problems) with provable guarantees on the distance of the returned solution to the optimal one. Approximation algorithms naturally arise in the field of theoretical computer science as a consequence of the widely believed P ≠ NP conjecture. Under this conjecture, a wide class of optimization problems cannot be solved exactly in polynomial time.
Diophantine approximationIn number theory, the study of Diophantine approximation deals with the approximation of real numbers by rational numbers. It is named after Diophantus of Alexandria. The first problem was to know how well a real number can be approximated by rational numbers. For this problem, a rational number a/b is a "good" approximation of a real number α if the absolute value of the difference between a/b and α may not decrease if a/b is replaced by another rational number with a smaller denominator.
Kruskal's algorithmKruskal's algorithm (also known as Kruskal's method) finds a minimum spanning forest of an undirected edge-weighted graph. If the graph is connected, it finds a minimum spanning tree. (A minimum spanning tree of a connected graph is a subset of the edges that forms a tree that includes every vertex, where the sum of the weights of all the edges in the tree is minimized. For a disconnected graph, a minimum spanning forest is composed of a minimum spanning tree for each connected component.
SinIn a religious context, 'sin' is a transgression against divine law or a law of God. Each culture has its own interpretation of what it means to commit a sin. While sins are generally considered actions, any thought, word, or act considered immoral, selfish, shameful, harmful, or alienating might be termed "sinful".
Mortal sinA mortal sin (peccatum mortale), in Catholic theology, is a gravely sinful act which can lead to damnation if a person does not repent of the sin before death. It is alternatively called deadly, grave, and serious. A sin is considered to be "mortal" when its quality is such that it leads to a separation of that person from God's saving grace. Three conditions must together be met for a sin to be mortal: "Mortal sin is sin whose object is grave matter and which is also committed with full knowledge and deliberate consent.
Christian views on sinIn Christianity, 'sin' is an immoral act considered to be a transgression of divine law. The doctrine of sin is central to the Christian faith, since its basic message is about redemption in Christ. Hamartiology, a branch of Christian theology which is the study of sin, describes sin as an act of offence against God by despising his persons and Christian biblical law, and by injuring others. Christian hamartiology is closely related to concepts of natural law, moral theology and Christian ethics.
Original sin'Original sin' is the Christian doctrine that holds that humans, through the fact of birth, inherit a tainted nature with a proclivity to sinful conduct in need of regeneration. The biblical basis for the belief is generally found in Genesis 3 (the story of the expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden), in a line in Psalm 51:5 ("I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me"), and in Paul's Epistle to the Romans, 5:12-21 ("Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned").
Dirichlet's approximation theoremIn number theory, Dirichlet's theorem on Diophantine approximation, also called Dirichlet's approximation theorem, states that for any real numbers and , with , there exist integers and such that and Here represents the integer part of . This is a fundamental result in Diophantine approximation, showing that any real number has a sequence of good rational approximations: in fact an immediate consequence is that for a given irrational α, the inequality is satisfied by infinitely many integers p and q.
Best-first searchBest-first search is a class of search algorithms, which explores a graph by expanding the most promising node chosen according to a specified rule. Judea Pearl described the best-first search as estimating the promise of node n by a "heuristic evaluation function which, in general, may depend on the description of n, the description of the goal, the information gathered by the search up to that point, and most importantly, on any extra knowledge about the problem domain.
Marginal costIn economics, the marginal cost is the change in the total cost that arises when the quantity produced is incremented, the cost of producing additional quantity. In some contexts, it refers to an increment of one unit of output, and in others it refers to the rate of change of total cost as output is increased by an infinitesimal amount. As Figure 1 shows, the marginal cost is measured in dollars per unit, whereas total cost is in dollars, and the marginal cost is the slope of the total cost, the rate at which it increases with output.
CostIn production, research, retail, and accounting, a cost is the value of money that has been used up to produce something or deliver a service, and hence is not available for use anymore. In business, the cost may be one of acquisition, in which case the amount of money expended to acquire it is counted as cost. In this case, money is the input that is gone in order to acquire the thing. This acquisition cost may be the sum of the cost of production as incurred by the original producer, and further costs of transaction as incurred by the acquirer over and above the price paid to the producer.
Electromagnetic inductionElectromagnetic or magnetic induction is the production of an electromotive force (emf) across an electrical conductor in a changing magnetic field. Michael Faraday is generally credited with the discovery of induction in 1831, and James Clerk Maxwell mathematically described it as Faraday's law of induction. Lenz's law describes the direction of the induced field. Faraday's law was later generalized to become the Maxwell–Faraday equation, one of the four Maxwell equations in his theory of electromagnetism.
Induction heatingInduction heating is the process of heating electrically conductive materials, namely metals or semi-conductors, by electromagnetic induction, through heat transfer passing through an inductor that creates an electromagnetic field within the coil to heat up and possibly melt steel, copper, brass, graphite, gold, silver, aluminum, or carbide. An important feature of the induction heating process is that the heat is generated inside the object itself, instead of by an external heat source via heat conduction.
Cost curveIn economics, a cost curve is a graph of the costs of production as a function of total quantity produced. In a free market economy, productively efficient firms optimize their production process by minimizing cost consistent with each possible level of production, and the result is a cost curve. Profit-maximizing firms use cost curves to decide output quantities. There are various types of cost curves, all related to each other, including total and average cost curves; marginal ("for each additional unit") cost curves, which are equal to the differential of the total cost curves; and variable cost curves.
GoalA goal or objective is an idea of the future or desired result that a person or a group of people envision, plan and commit to achieve. People endeavour to reach goals within a finite time by setting deadlines. A goal is roughly similar to a purpose or aim, the anticipated result which guides reaction, or an end, which is an object, either a physical object or an abstract object, that has intrinsic value. Goal setting Goal-setting theory was formulated based on empirical research and has been called one of the most important theories in organizational psychology.
Opportunity costIn microeconomic theory, the opportunity cost of a choice is the value of the best alternative forgone where, given limited resources, a choice needs to be made between several mutually exclusive alternatives. Assuming the best choice is made, it is the "cost" incurred by not enjoying the benefit that would have been had by taking the second best available choice. The New Oxford American Dictionary defines it as "the loss of potential gain from other alternatives when one alternative is chosen.
Fuzzy setIn mathematics, fuzzy sets (a.k.a. uncertain sets) are sets whose elements have degrees of membership. Fuzzy sets were introduced independently by Lotfi A. Zadeh in 1965 as an extension of the classical notion of set. At the same time, defined a more general kind of structure called an L-relation, which he studied in an abstract algebraic context. Fuzzy relations, which are now used throughout fuzzy mathematics and have applications in areas such as linguistics , decision-making , and clustering , are special cases of L-relations when L is the unit interval [0, 1].
