In the 1920s, Alfred Lotka suggested that evolution results both in an increasing total energy flow through the biosphere and in increasing energy efficiency of biological processes. Later authors attempted to generalize Lotka’s conjectures and to transform them into general evolutionary laws. These laws are derived from the laws of thermodynamics, and it is frequently argued that they also app...

II. REVERSE ENGINEERING IN TRADITIONAL MANUFACTURING INDUSTRIES.....................................................................................1582 A. A Legal Perspective on Reverse Engineering ..........................1582 B. An Economic Perspective on Reverse Engineering .................1585 C. Anti-Plug-Mold Laws: An Exception to Reverse Engineering Rules?................................

Modernization theory predicts that rising education should increase assortative mating by education and decrease sorting by race. Recent research suggests that effects of educational expansion depend on contextual factors, such as economic development. Using log-linear and log-multiplicative models of male household heads ages 36 to 75 in the 1940 U.S. census data--the first U.S. census with ed...

The costs of credit and accountability are good incentives for the Central Bank to increase independence. Independence of power and attention to economic policymaking in monetary decision-making can have a positive effect on the level of economic organization independence. The independent organization of the Central Bank has provided a plan for controlling inflation due to the importance of ind...

Although controversial, local and state governments draw on broad interpretations of the Fifth Amendment takings clause to justify using eminent domain for economic development. Previous studies examine such uses from the perspective of property rights and the scope and size of government. This paper addresses the fundamental question: Do states that grant local governments liberal eminent doma...

N INCREASiNGLY contentious issue in international trade pertains to so-called “traderemedy laws.” These laws are intended to remedy hardships for U.S. firms resulting from the actions and policies of foreign firms and governments. Allegedly, these laws produce a “fair” and “free” trading environment. The possibility exists, however, that the concept of fair trade is simply a pretext used by int...

Most industrialized countries have increased access to abortion over the past 30 years. Economic theory predicts that abortion laws affect sexual behavior since they change the marginal cost of having risky sex. We use gonorrhea incidence as a metric of risky sexual behavior. Using a panel of 41 North American, European and Central Asian countries over the period 1980-2000, we estimate the impa...

Laws of nature take center stage in philosophy of science. Laws are usually believed to stand in a tight conceptual relation to many important key concepts such as causation, explanation, confirmation, determinism, counterfactuals etc. Traditionally, philosophers of science have focused on physical laws, which were taken to be at least true, universal statements that support counterfactual clai...

business of goods is one of the necessities of social life. man has produced the money to facilitate the business, which simultaneously with the development of social and economic life has taken different forms. intrinsic value of some money and relative value of the other and the role of the inflation in decrease in value of money cause the different religious commandments. that is why, for co...