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The Lottery Colonel Blotto Game with Draws
No full textThis study presents a novel exploration of the lottery Colonel Blotto game. This adaptation introduces the possibility of draws or ties, moving beyond the traditional winner-take-all framework. The inclusion of the possibility of a draw allows for a more realistic depiction of contests where players may arbitrarily split the value of a battlefield in the absence of a decisive victory. Our model is characterized by the number of battlefields, battlefield values that may vary across battlefields, but are symmetric across players, the distinct player shares of each battlefield value captured in the event of a draw, the potentially asymmetric budgets of the players and a parameter influencing the (endogenously determined) likelihood of a draw. Within this modified game structure, we derive the range of the underlying parameters for which there exists an interior solution and provide an analytic characterization of that solution. Additionally, we expand our analysis across the entire parameter space to determine the optimal resource allocation strategies when solutions are not interior (either some player’s complete budget is allocated to a battlefield, or a nonempty set of battlefields receives a zero allocation). Special cases corresponding to prominent models in the contest literature are examined and extensions explored
We’re Israelis Who Study Fascism. This Week, Our Country Took a Terrifying Step Toward the Abyss
No full textWith even the proposal of this law — which reportedly enjoys the support of a Knesset majority — Israel is hurtling toward fascism at breakneck speed. We should know; we are historians of authoritarian regimes, specializing, respectively, in Mussolini’s Italy and Iran after 1979. Explaining state repression is our bread and butter.
And we are Israeli. We both grew up there, attended Israeli universities, and talk daily to our families who are still living there. When we warn that Israel is on a slippery slope to authoritarianism, we are not self-hating Jews calling for the destruction of the only Jewish state, as is often claimed by right-wing pundits. We speak out because we see Israel marching toward an abyss, and we care
Increases in Regional Brain Volume Across Two Native South American Male Populations
Get PDFIndustrialized environments, despite benefits such as higher levels of formal education and lower rates of infections, can also have pernicious impacts upon brain atrophy. Partly for this reason, comparing age-related brain volume trajectories between industrialized and non-industrialized populations can help to suggest lifestyle correlates of brain health. The Tsimane, indigenous to the Bolivian Amazon, derive their subsistence from foraging and horticulture and are physically active. The Moseten, a mixed-ethnicity farming population, are physically active but less than the Tsimane. Within both populations (N = 1024; age range = 46–83), we calculated regional brain volumes from computed tomography and compared their cross-sectional trends with age to those of UK Biobank (UKBB) participants (N = 19,973; same age range). Surprisingly among Tsimane and Moseten (T/M) males, some parietal and occipital structures mediating visuospatial abilities exhibit small but significant increases in regional volume with age. UKBB males exhibit a steeper negative trend of regional volume with age in frontal and temporal structures compared to T/M males. However, T/M females exhibit significantly steeper rates of brain volume decrease with age compared to UKBB females, particularly for some cerebro-cortical structures (e.g., left subparietal cortex). Across the three populations, observed trends exhibit no interhemispheric asymmetry. In conclusion, the age-related rate of regional brain volume change may differ by lifestyle and sex. The lack of brain volume reduction with age is not known to exist in other human population, highlighting the putative role of lifestyle in constraining regional brain atrophy and promoting elements of non-industrialized lifestyle like higher physical activity
Individual Longitudinal Changes in DNA-methylome Identify Signatures of Early-life Adversity and Correlate with Later Outcome
Get PDFAdverse early-life experiences (ELA) affect a majority of the world\u27s children. Whereas the enduring impact of ELA on cognitive and emotional health is established, there are no tools to predict vulnerability to ELA consequences in an individual child. Epigenetic markers including peripheral-cell DNA-methylation profiles may encode ELA and provide predictive outcome markers, yet the interindividual variance of the human genome and rapid changes in DNA methylation in childhood pose significant challenges. Hoping to mitigate these challenges we examined the relation of several ELA dimensions to DNA methylation changes and outcome using a within-subject longitudinal design and a high methylation-change threshold. DNA methylation was analyzed in buccal swab/saliva samples collected twice (neonatally and at 12 months) in 110 infants. We identified CpGs differentially methylated across time for each child and determined whether they associated with ELA indicators and executive function at age 5. We assessed sex differences and derived a sex-dependent ‘impact score’ based on sites that most contributed to methylation changes. Changes in methylation between two samples of an individual child reflected age-related trends and correlated with executive function years later. Among tested ELA dimensions and life factors including income to needs ratios, maternal sensitivity, body mass index and infant sex, unpredictability of parental and household signals was the strongest predictor of executive function. In girls, high early-life unpredictability interacted with methylation changes to presage executive function. Thus, longitudinal, within-subject changes in methylation profiles may provide a signature of ELA and a potential predictive marker of individual outcome