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Archive 1

Path independence in Social Choice and Individual Values

The last page (120) of Arrow's book (available online thru the "Table of Contents" External link) gives an argument for path independence, which transitivity as to the social ordering ensures. Calvin B. Hoover called path dependence the coral-reef effect. But of course foresight, discussion, argument, persuasion, and social (r)evolution remove any historical necessity (as distinct from possible tendency) of path dependence. Thomasmeeks 02:14, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

A link seemed not to go to a forum thread that exists anymore. So I removed this from the external links section:

Debate
  • Forum Debate a lively and informative ongoing debate over open vs. closed systems, standards, formats, vendor lock-in, and path dependence as a deliberate strategy by some businesses

—Isaac Dupree(talk) 18:44, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Discussion of the urn models and extensions?

I would like to add a tidbit about the mathematics of Polya's urn models and Arthur's extensions thereof. I think it would be nice to stress the non-ergodic nature of even simple urn draws, and its real-life examples from biology (e.g., Cohen's paper "Irreproducible Results and the Breeding of Pigs (Or Nondegenerate Limit Random Variables in Biology)," BioScience, Vol. 26, No. 6 (Jun., 1976), pp. 391-394).

Any suggestions on where to put this would be appreciated! Aldebrn (talk) 14:22, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

I think perhaps at the beginning of the third paragraph as this would clearly demonstrate and expand on the point. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.135.45.77 (talk) 18:42, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Merge with Historicism

What is the difference between this and Historicism, anyway? Either the articles should be merged or else each should mention the difference between it and the other. Vectro (talk) 04:05, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Tricky--it might be that the ideas developed in different fields, and so are somewhat different. I'm not familiar with historicism, so I'm not prepared to say what the differences/similarities are. After a brief skim of that article, I don't think they should be merged because it does seem like discussion of the two ideas is separate, even if the two ideas are very similar. CRETOG8(t/c) 16:04, 5 November 2008 (UTC)
Definitely not; these are two entirely different topics. Path dependence is an empirical hypothesis, rather than a philosophical school. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.105.139.59 (talk) 21:52, 9 November 2008 (UTC)
If they are different, then each article should link to the other and explain the difference. Can you take care of this? Vectro (talk) 23:07, 3 December 2008 (UTC)
In fact path-dependency is the very opposite of historicism. it implies the presence of evolution, a tendency of a "random walk process" to occationally stick to one direction or path. Historicism implies determinism, the complete absence of evolution as replaced by fate, or meaning as creationists would have it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.250.202.119 (talk • contribs) 11:50, 12 November 2008 (UTC)
The article on Historicism seems to say the opposite. Perhaps you can correct it with the addition of reliable citations? Vectro (talk) 23:07, 3 December 2008 (UTC)
In The Open Society and Its Enemies, Karl Popper has criticized historicism determinism and declared it is an enemy of open society. When Karl Popper attacks historicism, he introduced it as:

It is widely believed that a truly scientific or philosophical attitude towards politics, and a deeper understanding of social life in general, must be based upon a contemplation and interpretation of human history. ... This is a brief description of an attitude which I call historicism.

--Kittyhawk2 (talk) 14:05, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
I agree that these are separate topics and need separate articles! ch (talk) 16:48, 11 May 2009 (UTC)
Removing the merge tags. Nothing happening and it's silly from the jump. A wide range of topics have seriality (e.g. the Markov Property) as their core concept, that doesn't make their articles automatically candidates for merge. Lycurgus (talk) 19:19, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Liebowitz and Margolis as critics of path dependence

I'm surprised at the amount of space devoted to economists Liebowitz and Margolis, who are highly ideological critics of path dependence (Liebowitz is "associated" with the Cato Institute), compared to the amount of attention devoted to the people who have actually developed the economic theory of path dependence, namely "Paul A. David" and W. Brian Arthur. I made a slight edit to the mention of L&M's article "Fable of the Keys" to identify the critique as a defense of neoclassical economics and also to provide a reference to a response by Paul David. However, the paragraph about L&M's ideas needs to be clarified as a critique of path dependence, and for balance it should also discuss Paul David's sophisticated reply, available "here". One of David or Arthur's students would be ideal for the edit; I'm pretty familiar with the theory, but not entirely comfortable with summarizing it in detail.Histotech (talk) 18:56, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Punctuation example

This Quotation_mark#Punctuation is cited as an example (in Path_dependence#Other_examples) where there was once a purpose for doing it a certain way, but I see no reasons at all. Am I missing it? Perhaps someone could add some hint as to what the vestigial origin was. dvdrtrgn (talk) 18:03, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

The claim under punctuation is actually a bit of nonsense. All metal type sorts are the same height and the width of the period is roughly the same as the quotation mark.

Split the article?

This should be made a disambig. Path-dependence in economics has precious little to do with path-dependence in physics. --Smack (talk) 22:52, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

I would like to revive the idea of splitting this article. While I have no formal training in economics or the social sciences, I do understand the use of the phrase path dependence in physics (particularly in thermodynamics), and I completely agree with Smack's assertion that the two concepts have little, if any, overlap.
In physics, path dependence is defined in the context of the possible states of a system. Having chosen a beginning state and an ending state, one can then say that a specific aspect of a process may rely on the path taken between those same two states. That is, the process can have different characteristics even when all the available paths begin at the same state and end at the same state. For example, the work, or energy input/output, required to compress or expand some quantity of gas from one combination of pressure and volume to a different pressure and volume depends on whether you (1) change the pressure first and then the volume, (2) change the volume first and then the pressure, or (3) change both the pressure and the volume together gradually.
On the other hand, all examples of "path dependence" given in this article describe systems with paths that end at different states. For example, the introduction mentions the competition between VHS and Betamax: due to the bandwagon effect and vendor lock-in, one path ends with VHS dominating and the other ends with Betamax dominating. Furthermore, the economics section explicitly states that the systems under discussion have multiple possible outcomes and that the actual ending state depends sensitively on events at the beginning of the path.
All of the article's examples, including the brief mention of symmetry breaking in the article's physics section, are simply examples of chaotic systems with multiple attractors. While this concept may go by many names in different fields, it is not related to the idea of path dependence as defined in physics. (At least one of the references[1] makes the comparison to chaos theory. However, it incorrectly mentions physics and also misinterprets chaotic systems as always lacking stable states.) This justifies the use of a disambiguation page with two articles: Path dependence (physics) and Path dependence (economics). JCarlos 17:42, 2 June 2007 (UTC)
It seems a good idea to split the article, although putting path dependence in the economics section really bothers me. The concept is widely usen in political science (Pierson 2002, North 1990, Kay 2005 and many more!) So basically I suggest to split the article to Path dependence (physics or math like JCarlos suggests) and Path dependence (politics) This comment was added by User:74.56.85.87 in between JCarlos' comments above. I have moved it here. Classical geographer 13:54, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
I would also be in favour of this, though perhaps would prefer Path dependence (math) to (physics), since that is more general. Inexact differentials are not used only in thermo. A similar concept occurs when analyzing control (and other) system with hysteresis; roughly, there's two kinds of memory, dynamics (time-dependent, analogy with C1-continuity for a curve), and hysteresis (path-dependent, analogy with G1-continuity for a curve). I would try to fill this in, but with the article's present condition, there doesn't seem to be much point. 219.127.154.18 12:43, 22 September 2007 (UTC)
The linked article (hysteresis) describes what is essentially a non-Markov process. It is more closely related to "path dependence" as described in most of this article — i.e. chaotic systems with multiple attractors — than to the concept of path dependence in thermodynamics. Unfortunately, both of these concepts can be described mathematically, so a "(math)" title would probably not suffice for either page after the split. On the topic of titles, however, my original suggestion for an "(economics)" title is probably not general enough for that page. Perhaps it could be titled "Path dependence (chaotic systems)".
JCarlos 05:23, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
The splitting is a good idea. But the point about "economics" being narrow might be good too. Maybe a solution would be "social science". Although "economics" might be fine since political science borrowed from there. In any case, "systems" is extremely misleading as a way to refer to, say, Qwerty-nomics etc. Typewritten 16:06, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
Path dependence (math) could equally be claimed by Path dependence (physics) and Path dependence (economics). Subjects like this benefit from articles named very specifically, so Path dependence (economics) is preferable to Path dependence (social science). Also Path dependence (history) and Path dependence (politics) cover much younger fields (I believe) so articles on them are likely to be less stable than those on economics/physics. Another usage: "Path Dependence" is used differently in finance than in economics; "Path Dependendent Options" (especially without state changes, like asian options) are just non-Markovian in the physicist's sense, but might be included within Path dependence (economics) because economics & finance both deal with money. Let's split the article immediately into economics & physics children, with further children as necessary, and let's clearly give the two separate implications (nicely explained above): In economics & history, saying that something is "path dependent" essentially means that its inexplicable by general causes & macro analysis, whereas in physics & finance it means non-markovian. --Wragge 12:36, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Yep, I agree on "(physics)" vs "(economics)" as the most reasonable broad distinction. -- Typewritten (talk) 18:13, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
Me too. Apart from the problem of Finance, which can be explained within the (economics) page. It seems lots of people are in favour of splitting, so I guess whoever wants to take it up could start doing so. Classical geographer (talk) 09:15, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Don't think we should split the page. Someone can create a path dependence (economics) or (physics) and then link to it under their sections. Don't split until someone has shown the willingness to actually do this. II | (t - c) 03:21, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

They probably ought to be split, I think, because the mathematical treatment of what physicists call path dependence makes it different from the vague verbal sparring used by social scientists and economics to define concepts, In physics, path dependence only arises from certain beginning states but in economics, "that looks like path dependence" is an ad hoc judgment. Certainly, this is something that should wait for an expert. However, there might also be some mention of, or a link to, the judicial concept of stare decisis as a particularly rigid, manmade form of path dependence. 72.177.123.145 (talk) 13:15, 20 July 2013 (UTC) Eric

Technology

"It is not clear, however, that there is any inefficiency involved in the costs of remaining compatible with past decisions." I think that paragraf should be removed. It's pure speculation and really doesn't bring anything new to the subject at hand. It is at best simply wrong. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.225.194.192 (talk • contribs) 15:15, 31 October 2006


Eh. It's just a statement that the author isn't aware of any clear research that shows backwards compatibility leads to net inefficiency. This may reverse the burden of proof, but I don't think that makes it untrue. If it IS true, or at least it is true that we have yet to suggest net inefficiency, then it is notable and worthwhile.

However, I could be pressed to believe that some study private or public exists on social costs of compatibility with older standards. 24.160.241.34 (talk) 02:07, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

With all the talk recently round the 'net resulting from the term "skeumorph" coming into more popular usage (discussions, news articles, presentations surrounding the upcoming release of a new version of Apple's iOS has brought 'Skeumorphism' into a sort of weird, derogatory limelight in that a whole world of people knew that many of the interfaces that were popular features of many mobile applications were popular because they were cute digital representations of the real-world equivalent of that same thing (a guitar amp app on a mobile device might "look like" a guitar amp, has knobs, mic inputs, etc.) , it would be interesting to build more into this article (or a new article split from a disambig of this article, should the earlier discussions of a split be fruitful) with regards to the ways in which Path Dependence shows up in User Interface Designs.

It seems logical to me that Path Dependence *would* show up, but I don't know if "since we've got knobs, this one can't possibly go to eleven." technically meets the requirements. ;-) [[[User:RedRobinRed|IHaveNoIdeaWhatsGoingOn]] (talk) 21:30, 20 July 2013 (UTC)]

Reflist

Does any contributor to this article object making the reference list better to read on large screens by using flexible columns as implemented here? --bender235 (talk) 12:48, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

I don't think it is a substantial reason to change from one optional style to another, particularly when not all browsers even support it (e.g. Chrome does not). Take this discussion to the MOS page - if the change is really an objective improvement, they will make is part of the MOS. Until then, it is just your personal preference, which is hardly an argument for changing the article. — Carl (CBM · talk) 12:59, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
I use Chrome, and it works perfectly in it. But regardless: in all older browsers in which columns do not work, nothing "bad" happens. It just displays the same content like it is now, only w/out columns. So where is the downside of adding this feature? --bender235 (talk) 13:32, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
The MOS talk page, which is the venue where you should raise this and other style discussions, is that-a-way. Peace out, — Carl (CBM · talk) 14:15, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
The problem is that you are confusing citation style with page layout. --bender235 (talk) 06:43, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

Why not a slightly more modern example? :P

Seriously, VHC vs Betamax? I wonder how many readers even know what Betamax was... How about Blu-ray vs HDDVD? Was this article written in 70's? 71.65.237.218 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 00:14, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

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