Includes bibliographical references and index.

Ch. 1. Decision Making: Drawbacks of the Classical Statistics Approach / C. A. Clarotti -- Ch. 2. The Likelihood Principle in Reliability Analysis / L. Piccinato -- Ch. 3. Dutch Books, the Jeffreys-Savage Theory of Hypothesis Testing and Bayesian Reliability / B. M. Hill -- Ch. 4. Influence Diagrams and Decision Modelling / R. E. Barlow and C. Pereira -- Ch. 5. Concepts of Optimality in Stochastic Control / W. J. Runggaldier -- Ch. 6. Information and Reliability: A Bayesian Perspective / E. Arjas -- Ch. 7. Multivariate Conditional Hazard Rate and Mean Residual Life Functions and Their Applications / M. Shaked and J. G. Shanthikumar -- Ch. 8. Point Processes and Some Application in Reliability Theory / A. Gerardi and G. Koch -- Ch. 9. A Unifying Model for the Optimal Design of Life-testing and Burn-in / F. Spizzichino -- Ch. 10. On Stochastic Control Concepts for Sequential Burn-in Procedures / W. J. Runggaldier.

Ch. 11. Similarity as a Probabilistic Characteristic of Aging / R. E. Barlow and M. B. Mendel -- Ch. 12. Shannon Information, Bayesian Design for Prediction in Accelerated Life-testing / I. Verdinelli, N. Polson and N. D. Singpurwalla -- Ch. 13. The Bayesian Approach to Quality / R. E. Barlow and T. Z. Irony -- Ch. 14. Design by Decision Theory: A Unifying Perspective on Taguchi's Approach to Quality Engineering / N. D. Singpurwalla -- Ch. 15. Some Aspects of Change-Point Problems / P. Muliere and M. Scarsini -- Ch. 16. Modelling Dependence in Coherent Systems / P. J. Boland -- Ch. 17. Conservative Bayesian Interval Estimation of System Reliability / I. Gertsbakh and Kh. B. Kordonsky -- Ch. 18. The Interpretation of Probability, De Finetti's Representation Theorem, and their Implications to the Use of Expert Opinions in Safety Assessment / G. E. Apostolakis and J. S. Wu -- Ch. 19. Making Decision via PRA: The Frequentist vs the Bayesian Approach / C. A. Clarotti.

Ch. 20. Using Expert Opinions in Bayesian Estimation of System Reliability / B. Natvig.