In this paper, I argue that various disputes in ontology have important ramifications and so are worth taking seriously. I employ a criterion according to which whether a dispute matters depends on how integrated it is with the rest of our theoretical projects. Disputes that arise from previous tensions in our theorizing and have additional implications for other issues matter, while insular di...

Is there a distinction between questions of fact and questions of language? Many philosophers have said no. But a version of the distinction is ubiquitous, in philosophy and elsewhere, in the notion of a verbal dispute. Intuitively, a dispute between two parties is verbal when the two parties agree on the relevant facts about a domain of concern, and just disagree about the language used to des...

While much attention has been given to reputation mechanisms to deter fraudulent behavior in online auctions, we know little about the nature of disputes or the types of problems that users face. This is an exploratory analysis of 129 disputes for six different types of products that were sold on eBay. In the descriptive and multinomial analysis, we find eight different types of disputes includ...

Networked systems often consist of inter-dependent subsystems that are governed by locally determined heterogeneous preferences or policies. Examples include interdomain routing, peer-to-peer storage, and decentralised security systems. This dissertation introduces a notion called dispute — a cyclic structure that underlies the dependence and preferences of subsystems. Disputes may cause advers...

This paper investigates the effects of the formation of free trade agreements (FTAs) on trade disputes. We construct a unique and comprehensive dataset on inter-country trade disputes from 1995 to 2007. The dataset covers 110 countries and 1130 trade disputes. We find that the incidences of trade disputes between two countries are positively associated with economic size, economic growth, and t...

Contentious issues have frequently been overlooked in the study of international relations and interstate conflict. This chapter explores the influence of territory and territorial issues on processes of interstate conflict. I begin by reviewing existing approaches to the study of territory, and existing theoretical efforts to understand the role of territory. I then offer an empirical investig...

In recent years China has witnessed a surge in medical disputes, including many widely reported violent riots, attacks, and protests in hospitals. This is the result of a confluence of inappropriate incentives in the health system, the consequent distorted behaviors of physicians, mounting social distrust of the medical profession, and institutional failures of the legal framework. The detrimen...

Disputes over territory are a major contributing factor to the disruption of international relations. We believe that a cumulative, integrated, and continuously updated resource providing information about such disputes in an easily accessible form would be of benefit to intelligence analysts, military strategists, political scientists, and also to historians and others concerned with internati...

Internet peering disputes have had an impact on the Internet AS-graph. As a result, the customers of the ASes often suffer because they cannot reach to the all of the Internet. There is a lack of study of the disputes that have taken place so far, even though each dispute is individually well understood. In this paper, we collect data on 26 disputes from from various resources, categorize them ...