My sincere gratitude is long overdue to those who have provided me with empathy and help, and I cannot thank them enough for their contributions to the results of my work.
I would first like to acknowledge the teachers and especially the excellent professors Chirvonen, Yanko-Trinicki and Akodis, who were able to instil a deep admiration for the creators of mechanics, the theory of electromagnetism and high-voltage processes in the students of the Ural Polytechnic Institute (Technical University) in Ekaterinburg (formerly Swerdlowsk), Russia.
A special debt is owed to Albert Perez, one of the top specialists in information theory. His information concept was general enough to enable the inclusion of (non-statistical) information of an individual data item derived in gnostic theory. Moreover, his extensive knowledge of mathematical physics enabled him to accept and welcome the innovation. It would not be possible to continue in the development of the gnostic project at the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences without his constant support.
The following colleagues of the Institute of Information Theory and Automation of the Czech Academy of Sciences made significant contributions to my work and warrant my appreciation: Antonín Tuzar, Jana Novovičová, Jan Ježek, Jiří Jarůšek, Jan Šindelář and Peter Volf. Other colleagues also provided their earnest critique that was very useful for improving the theory.
Many important applications were made possible by Ronald A. Barack, who created a user-friendly version of the gnostic analyzer (1995) by translating my Basic version into C+. The selfless support of Martin Michajlov is also deeply appreciated. My thanks are expressed also to Ivana Hexnerová (publishing house POLYGON, Prague), who was repeatedly publishing our books on applications to the accountancy and financial statement analysis.
The moral and pragmatic support that Marcel B. Humber has given me since the early nineties has been of invaluable help. Thanks to his deep knowledge of science and technology and his conviction of both the theoretical and practical importance of the new approach, his cooperation has been an invaluable asset especially in economic applications of gnostic methodology. This resulted in his co-authorship of the book Economics of Information. The book was essentially finished in 2003 when several attempts to find a publisher failed because of the entire novelty of the paradigm. Thanks are owed to the Humber family, who have been supporting the gnostic project all along. Thanks are also due to Karel Kupka (Trilobyte Ltd.) for enabling me the use of S-technology to further develop the gnostic software and for his participation in systematic dissemination of basic ideas of the new approach in our country.
A significant support of Zdenek Wagner (The Institute of Chemical Process Fundamentals of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague) is cordially appreciated: he not only read and checked our book, but independently worked out his versions of gnostic algorithms with worthful applications.
Significant applications were enabled to problems of several fields due to understanding and cooperation of specialists like I. Žofková (medicine), I. Sabo (measuring technology), J. Závorka (gas distribution systems), J. Böhm (adaptive control systems), O. Tománek (chemical industry), V. Pinta (numismatics) and members of the testing and research laboratory of the TATRA truck factory.
Started in 2000, the main efforts in applications of mathematical gnostics have come to focus on problems of Health Risk Analysis and of monitoring pollutants in the environment thanks to Tomáš Ocelka, who recognized the value of this approach as the right tool to satisfy the difficult and weighty requirements of the field. He managed to push through this methodology into large European research projects. His deep knowledge in chemistry of pollutants helped him to cooperate in gnostic analyses of difficult environmental data. The burden of developing the Graphical User Interface for the R-environment was borne by Lubomír Pavliska. I owe a debt to both of these men – not only for their help and understanding, but also for their friendship. Thanks are also due to Z. Kovanicová, O. Tomoszková, M. Klimasová, K. Kavoňová and K. Strakoš for their contributions to these pages and to our activities.
Finally I would like to express thanks to Mr. Petr Hapala, director of IPH, for his kindly support to novelties of IPH among which mathematical gnostic belonged.
And last but not least special thanks are owed to my dear wife Dana, without whose empathy and self-sacrificing care my scientific activity would have come to an end already decades ago.
Pavel Kovanic