An Introduction to Bootstrap Methods with Applications to R

by Michael R. Chernick, Robert A. LaBudde

2014 · John Wiley & Sons

A comprehensive introduction to bootstrap methods in the R programming environment Bootstrap methods provide a powerful approach to statistical data analysis, as they have more general applications than standard parametric methods. An Introduction to Bootstrap Methods with Applications to R explores the practicality of this approach and successfully utilizes R to illustrate applications for the bootstrap and other resampling methods. This book provides a modern introduction to bootstrap methods for readers who do not have an extensive background in advanced mathematics. Emphasis throughout is on the use of bootstrap methods as an exploratory tool, including its value in variable selection and other modeling environments. The authors begin with a description of bootstrap methods and its relationship to other resampling methods, along with an overview of the wide variety of applications of the approach. Subsequent chapters offer coverage of improved confidence set estimation, estimation of error rates in discriminant analysis, and applications to a wide variety of hypothesis testing and estimation problems, including pharmaceutical, genomics, and economics. To inform readers on the limitations of the method, the book also exhibits counterexamples to the consistency of bootstrap methods. An introduction to R programming provides the needed preparation to work with the numerous exercises and applications presented throughout the book. A related website houses the book's R subroutines, and an extensive listing of references provides resources for further study. Discussing the topic at a remarkably practical and accessible level, An Introduction to Bootstrap Methods with Applications to R is an excellent book for introductory courses on bootstrap and resampling methods at the upper-undergraduate and graduate levels. It also serves as an insightful reference for practitioners working with data in engineering, medicine, and the social sciences who would like to acquire a basic understanding of bootstrap methods.

Heroes, Saints, and Ordinary Morality

by Andrew Michael Flescher

2003 · Georgetown University Press

Most of us are content to see ourselves as ordinary people—unique in ways, talented in others, but still among the ranks of ordinary mortals. Andrew Flescher probes our contented state by asking important questions: How should "ordinary" people respond when others need our help, whether the situation is a crisis, or something less? Do we have a responsibility, an obligation, to go that extra mile, to act above and beyond the call of duty? Or should we leave the braver responses to those who are somehow different than we are: better somehow, "heroes," or "saints?" Traditional approaches to ethics have suggested there is a sharp distinction between ordinary people and those called heroes and saints; between duties and acts of supererogation (going beyond the expected). Flescher seeks to undo these standard dichotomies by looking at the lives and actions of certain historical figures—Holocaust rescuers, Martin Luther King, Jr., Dorothy Day, among others—who appear to be extraordinary but were, in fact, ordinary people. Heroes, Saints, and Ordinary Morality shifts the way we regard ourselves in relationship to those we admire from afar—it asks us not only to admire, but to emulate as well—further, it challenges us to actively seek the acquisition of virtue as seen in the lives of heroes and saints, to learn from them, a dynamic aspect of ethical behavior that goes beyond the mere avoidance of wrongdoing. Andrew Flescher sets a stage where we need to think and act, calling us to lead lives of self-examination—even if that should sometimes provoke discomfort. He asks that we strive to emulate those we admire and therefore allow ourselves to grow morally, and spiritually. It is then that the individual develops a deeper altruistic sense of self—a state that allows us to respond as the heroes of our own lives, and therefore in the lives of others, when times and circumstance demand that of us.

Contesting Rurality

by Michael Woods

2017 · Routledge

Rural issues have gained national prominence in Britain in recent years. The future of hunting, the Foot and Mouth outbreak, farm income and agricultural reform and housing development have all claimed political and media attention, promoted by a vocal rural lobby and headline-grabbing protests and demonstrations. Combining detailed empirical research and case studies with theoretically informed critical analysis, this book provides an overview of the contemporary politics of the British countryside. It explores how and why rural issues have suddenly achieved such political prominence, by examining the changing politics and governance of rural Britain from the local to the national scale over the past century. It investigates the social, economic and institutional restructuring of rural communities and argues that we are witnessing not so much a rural politics, but a 'politics of the rural' in which the definition and representation of rurality itself has become the key focus of conflict.