Acknowledgments
All praise is due to Allah. May blessings and peace be upon the Messenger of Allah. Behind the scene of this thesis, there are hope, helps, supports, prayers, and trust, from many great people. In this part of this thesis, I shall take this opportunity to express my gratitude to them.
Tom Heskes and Perry Groot. I recalled when the three of us met for the first time via a Skype meeting, discussing a possibility of my PhD plan. It was 2012. In about one year later, I arrived at Nijmegen, starting the plan we discussed; that was August 2013, the beginning of my PhD. From then on, we had pretty consistent weekly meetings; from discussions about research (of course), to family-related news exchanges. I am, in particular, grateful of those times, and would like to say to you both: thank you.
Tom, thank you for opening the door and letting me in; going through this amazing and unforgettable PhD journey. You have been very receptive to any new ideas, and at the same time, flagging constructive criticisms and clever suggestions when necessary. Thank you for being supportive to all of my PhD plans, cordial in all discussions and conversations, as well as very patient. Perry, thank you for your kindness and patience, helping me to go through every single details of my works. And I truly appreciate it as you have been there, whenever I had questions and something to discuss. Once again, I thank you both most warmly; two best supervisors in the world!
I would like to thank all of my colleagues at the Radboud University Nijmegen, Elena Sokolova, Elena Marchiori, Nicole Messink, Wout Megchelenbrink, Robbert Krebbers, Jonce Dimov, Henning Basold, Simone Lederer, Feri Wijayanto, Jesse Krijthe, Twan van Laarhoven, Tom Claassen, Tjeerd Dijkstra, Theo van der Weide,
Daniel K¨uhlwein, Jacopo Acquarelli, Gabriel Bucur, Ruifei Cui, Gido Schoen-
macker, Fabian Gieseke, Christiaan de Leeuw, Maryam Kamis, Martha Larson, Her- man Geuvers, Arjen de Vries, Max Hinne, Marieke de Vries, Suzan Verberne, Saskia Koldijk, Maya Sappelli, Mohsen Ghafoorian, Luc Evers, Nastaran Mohammadian Rad, Errol Zalmijn, Konrad Philipp Mielke, Marvin Oeben, Zaheer Babar, Zhengyu Zhao, Kai Chen, Didi Rustam, Johannes Textor, David van Leeuwen, Maaike de Boer, Saiden Abbas, Tameem Adel, Kasper Brink, and Simone Meeuwsen. I appre- ciate all the good times we shared together and thank you for making our workplace a fun place to be.
I would like to thank my colleagues in the OPTIMISTIC project who brought me to another world of research. Thanks to Baziel van Engelen, Hans Knoop, Kees Okkersen, Jeffrey Glennon, Linda Heskamp, Cecilia Jimenez-Moreno, Shaun Treweek, Libby Wood, Benedikt Schoser, Juliane Dittrich, Darren Monckton, and all of the team, I did enjoy the times working with you.
I also would like to thank my colleagues from the Radboud University Medical Center, Marianne Heins, Jan van den Brand, Marieke van Rijn, Anthonie Janse, Jan-Federich Wiborg, Sofiati Dian, Arjan van Laarhoven, and Reinout van Crevel. Thank you for the excellent discussions and the works we have been conducting together.
I want to extend my thanks to my colleagues at the Carnegie Mellon Uni- versity, and Pittsburgh University, Richard Scheines, Peter Spirtes, Joseph Ram- sey, Kun Zhang, Clark Glymour, Gregory Cooper, Connor Robinson-Arnull, Masayuki Tashiro, Ruben Sanchez-Romero, Daniel Malinsky, Colin Zwanziger, Alex Markham, Jacqueline deFazio, Mary Grace Joseph, and Biwei Huang. Thank you for making my visiting research wonderful and memorable.
Many sincere thanks to Indonesian colleagues and their families in the Nether- lands, especially to Tosri family and Ardiansyah family, to the PPIN and the Ke- muni, to those in Pittsburgh, to my brothers at the Islamic Center of Pittsburgh, to my colleagues in the Department of Informatics, Universitas Islam Indonesia, and to my colleagues in the Budi Mulia Dua foundation. I am deeply indebted to you for all of your helps and supports.
I am eternally grateful to my family, of their endless supports, of their prayers. My sincerest thanks to my late father Nazaruddin and my mother Rosladiah, the teachers of all my first times; to my parents-in-law, Mohammad Amien Rais and Kusnasriyati Sri Rahayu, for those countless encouragements through thick and thin; to my brothers and sisters, Abdi Satriawan, Rizki Fitriasari and Darwin Umar, Ahmad Hanafi Rais and Astriani Karnaningrum, Hanum Rais and Rangga Almahendra, Ahmad Mumtaz Rais and Futri Zulya, and Ahmad Baihaqy Rais and Selmadena Aquilla, who have always been my supporters.
Finally, to my wife Tasniem, my daughters Sofie and Sasha, I hardly find a sentence or two to express my feelings, after all of the times we have been together. Sofie, you were not even a 1-year-old little girl when first arrived at Linz, Austria, in the middle of winter, coming to give me support in finishing my master. Sasha, the little new member born in Nijmegen, becoming another driving force. And Tasniem, the person who has been there for me, rain or shine; you complete me. My heartfelt thanks to you all. I dedicate this thesis to you.