Have you ever wondered where the safety factors come from? Why is it
that deterministic analysis has reached a very sophisticated level, but
in the end empirical factors are still needed? Is there a way to select
them, rather than assigning them arbitrarily as is often done?
This book clearly shows that safety factors are closely related with the
reliability of structures, giving yet another demonstration of Albert
Einstein's maxim that "It is incomprehensible that Nature is
comprehensible". The book shows that the safety factors are much more
comprehensible if they are seen in a probabilistic context. Several
definitions of the safety factors are given, analytical results on
insightful numbers are presented, nonprobabilistic safety factors are
shown, as well as their estimates derived by the inequalities of
Bienayme, Markov, Chebushev and Camp-Meidell. A special chapter is
devoted to important contributions by Japanese experts.
This volume will help to critically re-think the issue of safety
factors, which can create a false feeling of security. The deterministic
paradigm can be enhanced by incorporating probabilistic concepts wisely
where they are needed without treating all variables as probabilistic
ones. The book shows that there is a need of their integration rather
than separation.
This book is intended for engineers, graduate students, lecturers and
researchers.
