To the French critics who originally labelled certain films noir it seemed that a class of Hollywood products had gone darker during the war years – as though a dark filter had been placed over the lens. Films were not designed or marketed as noir, and retrospectively noir's status as a genre is still unsettled. Yet there is widespread interest today in experiencing diverse films as noir, and even in using a Noir Filter in Instagram and video games. Pursuing the (...) filter clue, the noir experience can be thought of as subjection to a dark filtering of narrative. Image filtering styles can help to resolve not only the puzzle of noir's quasi-genre status but also an issue of general interest in aesthetic experience. The use of image filters makes a distinctively powerful contribution to the experience of a work or genre, or to the cultural dominance of an aesthetic regime, due to the unobtrusive formative role it plays in the economy of experience. (shrink)

A general class of labeled sequent calculi is investigated, and necessary and sufficient conditions are given for when such a calculus is sound and complete for a finite -valued logic if the labels are interpreted as sets of truth values. Furthermore, it is shown that any finite -valued logic can be given an axiomatization by such a labeled calculus using arbitrary "systems of signs," i.e., of sets of truth values, as labels. The number of labels needed is logarithmic in the (...) number of truth values, and it is shown that this bound is tight. (shrink)

We propose to represent the syntax and semantics of natural languages with labelled proof nets in the implicative fragment of intuitionistic linear logic. Resource-sensitivity of linear logic is used to express all dependencies between the syntactic constituents of a sentence in the form of a proof net. Phonological and semantic labelling of the proof net from its inputs to the unique output are used to produce the well-formed phonological form and the semantic representation of a sentence from entries of a (...) lexicon. In this way we obtain a linguistic model of great flexibility because labelling is not completely determined logically: it is used to introduce linguistic constraints which go beyond the underlying logic. (shrink)

Biotechnology is one of the fastest-growing areas of scientific, technical and industrial innovation and one of the most controversial. As developments have occurred such as genetic test therapies and the breeding of genetically modified food crops, so the public debates have become more heated and grave concerns have been expressed about access to genetic information, labelling of genetically modified foods and human and animal cloning. Across Europe, public opinion has become a crucial factor in the ability of governments and biotech (...) industries to exploit the new technology. This 2002 book presents the results of a unique cross-national and cross-disciplinary study of the relationship between the development of new biotechnology and public perception, media coverage and policy formulation. It outlines a conceptual framework for understanding these issues and contains a number of empirical studies including studies of the international controversies surrounding the cloning of Dolly the sheep and GM Soya. (shrink)

In German criminal law, intention is the label used not only for cases of knowledge and desire; it also includes cases of what the common law would call recklessness. German criminal law calls its approximation of recklessness dolus eventualis. It is on that concept that the article concentrates. After a brief review of the historical development of the German concept of intention, the author shows that dolus eventualis consists of two components: the cognitive element, which (as in the common law) (...) considers the state of the accused's knowledge that the offence may occur, and a volitional or dispositional element which is unknown to the common law. The author concludes that the volitional or dispositional element is not plausible, and that in any harmonization of concepts of intention in the criminal law of the European countries such an element should not be adopted. (shrink)

Ecological theory is built upon assumptions about the fundamental nature of organism-environment interactions. We argue that two mutually exclusive sets of such assumptions are available and that they have given rise to alternative approaches to studying ecology. The fundamentally different premises of these approaches render them irreconcilable with one another. In this paper, we present the first logical formalisation of these two paradigms.The more widely-accepted approach - which we label the demographic paradigm - includes both population ecology and community ecology (...) (synecology). Demographic ecology assumes that the environment is relatively stable and that biotic processes, governed predominantly by resource availability, are the most important of ecological and evolutionary influences. Moreover, ecological processes are assumed to translate into directional selection pressures that drive significant evolutionary change on a local scale through the process of optimisation. (shrink)

Why and under what conditions are individuals altruistic to family and friends in their social networks? Evolutionary psychology suggests that such behaviour is primarily the product of adaptations for kin- and reciprocal altruism, dependent on the degree of genetic relatedness and exchange of benefits, respectively. For this reason, individuals are expected to be more altruistic to family members than to friends: whereas family members can be the recipients of kin and reciprocal altruism, friends can be the recipients of reciprocal altruism (...) only. However, there is a question about how the effect of kinship is implemented at the proximate psychological level. One possibility is that kinship contributes to some general measure of relationship quality (such as ‘emotional closeness’), which in turn explains altruism. Another possibility is that the effect of kinship is independent of relationship quality. The present study tests between these two possibilities. Participants (N= 111) completed a self-report questionnaire about their willingness to be altruistic, and their emotional closeness, to 12 family members and friends at different positions in their extended social networks. As expected, altruism was greater for family than friends, and greater for more central layers of the network. Crucially, the results showed that kinship made a significant unique contribution to altruism, even when controlling for the effects of emotional closeness. Thus, participants were more altruistic towards kin than would be expected if altruism was dependent on emotional closeness alone – a phenomenon we label a ‘kinship premium’. These results have implications for the ongoing debate about the extent to which kin relations and friendships are distinct kinds of social relationships, and how to measure the ‘strength of ties’ in social networks. (shrink)

Psychiatry's relation to the rest of medicine is ambivalent. Its legitimacy as a specialty is often conceived as being closely linked to its fidelity to the fundamental paradigms of medicine, especially the centrality of diagnosis and the association of diagnosis with treatment indications. However, as Gagné-Julien notes, a major impetus behind the quest for a solution to the demarcation problem in psychiatry is "growing concerns regarding over-medicalization". Although it could appear that these two considerations point in opposite directions, both arguably (...) would be served by what Gagné-Julien labels "a satisfying definition" of mental disorder. Such a... (shrink)

By any measure, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., led a full and remarkable life. He was tall and exceptionally attractive, especially as he aged, with piercing eyes, a shock of white hair, and prominent moustache. He was the son of a famous father, a thrice-wounded veteran of the Civil War, a Harvard-educated member of Brahmin Boston, the acquaintance of Longfellow, Lowell, and Emerson, and for a time a close friend of William James. He wrote one of the classic works of American (...) legal scholarship, The Common Law, and he served with distinction on the Supreme Court of the United States. He was actively involved in the Court's work into his nineties. In Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, G. Edward White, the acclaimed biographer of Earl Warren and one of America's most esteemed legal scholars, provides a rounded portrait of this remarkable jurist. We see Holmes's early life in Boston and at Harvard, his ambivalent relationship with his father, and his harrowing service during the Civil War. White examines Holmes's curious, childless marriage and he includes new information on Holmes's relationship with Clare Castletown. White not only provides a vivid portrait of Holmes's life, but examines in depth the inner life and thought of this preeminent legal figure. There is a full chapter devoted to The Common Law, for instance, and throughout the book, there is astute commentary on Holmes's legal writings. Indeed, White reveals that some of the themes that have dominated 20th-century American jurisprudence--including protection for free speech and the belief that "judges make the law"--originated in Holmes's work. Perhaps most important, White suggests that understanding Holmes's life is crucial to understanding his work, and he continually stresses the connections between Holmes's legal career and his personal life. For instance, his desire to distinguish himself from his father and from the "soft" literary culture of his father's generation drove him to legal scholarship of a particularly demanding kind. White's biography of Earl Warren was hailed by Anthony Lewis on the cover of The New York Times Book Review as "serious and fascinating," and The Los Angeles Times noted that "White has gone beyond the labels and given us the man." In Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, White has produced an equally serious and fascinating biography, one that again goes beyond the labels and gives us the man himself. (shrink)

The intention here is that of giving a formal underpinning to the idea of ‘meaning-is-use’ which, even if based on proofs, it is rather different from proof-theoretic semantics as in the Dummett–Prawitz tradition. Instead, it is based on the idea that the meaning of logical constants are given by the explanation of immediate consequences, which in formalistic terms means the effect of elimination rules on the result of introduction rules, i.e. the so-called reduction rules. For that we suggest an extension (...) to the Curry– Howard interpretation which draws on the idea of labelled deduction, and brings back Frege’s device of variable-abstraction to operate on the labels (i.e., proof-terms) alongside formulas of predicate logic. (shrink)

The intention here is that of giving a formal underpinning to the idea of 'meaning-is-use' which, even if based on proofs, it is rather different from proof-theoretic semantics as in the Dummett-Prawitz tradition. Instead, it is based on the idea that the meaning of logical constants are given by the explanation of immediate consequences, which in formalistic terms means the effect of elimination rules on the result of introduction rules, i. e. the so-called reduction rules. For that we suggest an (...) extension to the Curry-Howard interpretation which draws on the idea of labelled deduction, and brings back Frege's device of variable-abstraction to operate on the labels (i. e., proof-terms) alongside formulas of predicate logic. (shrink)

Informed by the investigative thrust of phenomenological inquiry and the ‘phenomenology of intersubjectivity’, the overarching aim of this article is to provide an accurate illumination of the experience of being diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder, and thus being ‘a labelled individual’. This article is based on research that sought to understand the impact of the psychiatric label upon labelled individuals interpersonal and intersubjective presence as experienced outside the psychiatric institution. The principle question asked was: “What is the experience of being (...) a labelled individual in the world?”. It was discovered that psychiatric labelling unfolds as a disconnection and dislocation from co-existence with others. Moreover, labelling had the effect of robbing such individuals of their subjectivity, rendering them lonely, misunderstood and viewed as somehow defective, disabled and wrong. Indo-Pacific Journal of Phenomenology , Volume 3, Edition 1, November 2003. (shrink)

The topic of developing professionalism dominated the content of many academic medicine publications and conference agendas during the past decade. Calls to address the development of professionalism among medical students and residents have come from professional societies, accrediting agencies, and a host of educators in the biomedical sciences. The language of the professionalism movement is now a given among those in academic medicine. We raise serious concerns about the professionalism discourse and how the specialized language of academic medicine disciplines has (...) defined, organized, contained, and made seemingly immutable a group of attitudes, values, and behaviors subsumed under the label of "professionalism." In particular, we argue that the professionalism discourse needs to pay more attention to the academic environment in which students are educated, that it should articulate specific positive behaviors, that the theory of professionalism must be constructed from a dialogue with those we are educating, and that this theoretical and practical discourse must aim at a deeper understanding of social justice and the role of medicine within a just society. (shrink)

To build cultures of peace, one must often lay aside the "expert" label and become a student in the world who is willing to learn from other cultures in pursuit of peace. To set up an intercultural dialogue on this topic, the Committee for the Psychological Study of Peace, in conjunction with the University for Peace and the Institute for Psychological Research of the University of Costa Rica, sponsored the 6th International Symposium on the Contribution of Psychology to Peace. This (...) special issue extends the dialogue which began at the Symposium. Aiming to help define the role and contributions of psychologists in building cultures of peace, the articles in this issue address: *topics relating to human rights; *how psychologists can contribute to democratization; *how psychology has much to say on the causes and dynamics of intolerance and the processes of building tolerance in the context of intergroup relations; *how psychology can contribute to understanding and fostering nonviolence; *how cultures of peace will not be possible without a concerted effort to bring about global environmental security and that our failure to restore environmental health is fundamentally a psychological problem; and *psychologically informed policies for the promotion of cultures of peace, including the importance of gender equity. (shrink)

Emotion expressions convey valuable information about others’ internal states and likely behaviours. Accurately identifying expressions is critical for social interactions, but so is perceiver confidence when decoding expressions. Even if a perceiver correctly labels an expression, uncertainty may impair appropriate behavioural responses and create uncomfortable interactions. Past research has found that perceivers report greater confidence when identifying emotions displayed by cultural ingroup members, an effect attributed to greater perceptual skill and familiarity with own-culture than other-culture faces. However, the current research (...) presents novel evidence for an ingroup advantage in emotion decoding confidence across arbitrary group boundaries that hold culture constant. In two experiments using different stimulus sets participants not only labeled minimal ingroup expressions more accurately, but did so with greater confidence. These results offer novel evidence that ingroup advantages in emotion decoding confidence stem partly from social-cognitive processes. (shrink)

This study examines the specificvalues held by consumers towards organic andconventionally produced meat, with particularreference to moral issues surrounding foodanimal production. A quota sample of 30 femalesfrom both a rural and an urban area of Scotland, were interviewed. Overall, there was lowcommitment towards the purchase of organicmeats and little concern for ethical issues.Price and product appearance were the primarymeat selection criteria, the latter being usedas a predictor of eating quality. Manyattitude-behavior anomalies were identified,mainly as a result of respondents' cognitivedissonance and (...) lack of understanding regardingmeat production criteria underpinning meatquality marks, e.g., Soil Association label.Responsibilities for ethical issues appeared tobe delegated by the consumer to the meatretailer or government. This raises issuesabout educating consumers and bringingconsumers closer to understanding meatproduction systems. A conceptual framework isproposed that illustrates the significance ofconsumer involvement in how meat-purchasingdecisions are approached in terms of theevaluation of tangible and or intangiblequality attributes. The results also point tothe need for further research into thoseaspects of quality that individuals tend toaddress at the level of the citizen,rather than at the point of purchase. (shrink)

BackgroundThis paper highlights the issues that one of the 90 Italian Research Ethics Committees (RECs) might encounter during the approval phase of a clinical trial to identify corrective and preventive actions for promoting a more efficient review process and ensuring review quality. Publications on the subject from Italy and the rest of Europe are limited; encouraging constructive debate can improve RECs’ service to the subject of the clinical trial.MethodsWe retrospectively reviewed a cohort of 822 clinical trial protocols, initially reviewed by (...) REC, from June 2014 to December 2018. Data collected for each protocol were type of trial, sample size, use of placebo, number and kind of revisions requested by the REC before approval, and time taken for approval. Data for each protocol were collected by a trained clinical research assistant using the REC’s files and electronic archives.ResultsAlmost 45% of the reviewed studies (374/822) required clarifications, significant changes to the documentation, or minor changes before final approval.ConclusionsPreventive measures are needed to reduce the number of requested corrections and thus also the time required for approval, while maintaining review quality. All critical points and proposals presented in this paper require harmonization through updates to European regulations, as regulatory harmonization produces better compliance with rules and reduces the number of changes required before the trials’ final approval. Such updates include the development of standardized formats for informed consent, the verification of any evidence in favor of using off-label treatments over placebo as comparators, using multidisciplinary staff in clinical trials with children and adolescents, improving the legal definition of RECs to assign responsibilities and ensure independence, and providing guidance for RECs to engage clinical research assistants in internal audits. (shrink)

The ArgumentIs genetic counseling a form of eugenics? To some extent, the answer depends upon how the terms “eugenics” and “genetic counseling” are defined. This paper reviews the eugenic implications of four models of genetic counseling. The complexities of slapping the eugenic label on genetic counseling are illustrated with three cases drawn from clinical practice. However, even though genetic counseling is not always a eugenic activity, genetic counselors work in a medical/ financial setting that has the net eugenic effect of, (...) and profits from, reducing the number of people with genetic disorders. (shrink)

We argue that a responsible analysis of today's evidence-based risk assessments and risk debates in biology demands a critical or metascientific scrutiny of the uncertainties, assumptions, and threats of error along the manifold steps in risk analysis. Without an accompanying methodological critique, neither sensitivity to social and ethical values, nor conceptual clarification alone, suffices. In this view, restricting the invitation for philosophical involvement to those wearing a "bioethicist" label precludes the vitally important role philosophers of science may be able to (...) play as bioevidentialists. The goal of this paper is to give a brief and partial sketch of how a metascientific scrutiny of risk evidence might work. (shrink)

Professor Strawson's paper is refreshing in content as well as refreshingly intemperate. It is salutary to be reminded that even the Type Identity Theory does not entail physicalism as that doctrine is usually understood (since c-fiber firings are not by definition purely physical). And it's fun to consider versions of panpsychism. I can see why Strawson finds his position hard to classify (p. 7), and I sympathize. In my title I have cast my own vote for '?-ism' on the grounds (...) that any familiar label would be either misleading or unwieldy. My main purpose here is to assess Strawson's case for panpsychism and then to offer some objections to panpsychism, but first I want to answer an interesting and serious charge he makes against me. (shrink)

The placebo effect, in recent years, has been the focus of extensive scientific inquiry and public fascination, as reflected in articles in the news media. Authors writing about placebo effects often mention the goal of harnessing the placebo effect for the benefit of patients in clinical practice. This suggests that the placebo effect is like a powerful horse, which needs to be put in harness in order to do useful work. However, developing an accurate understanding of what has been labelled, (...) often misleadingly, as the "placebo effect" and taking advantage of this phenomenon have been hampered by the conceptual muddle surrounding this topic. To continue the equine metaphor... (shrink)

We analyse theories and research approaches in ecology and find that they fall into two internally homogeneous groups of linked ideas, each comprising a unique set of premises. The two sets of interpretive statements are thus mutually exclusive; they constitute alternative theoretical developments in ecology and should not be seen as complementary. They can, therefore, be considered two paradigms (Kuhn, 1962). Our interpretation is supported by the minimal overlap, if any, in the premises and research directions of the two approaches. (...) We label the dominant group of ideas the demographic paradigm and the less developed one the autecological paradigm. The internal logic of the demographic paradigm of ecology is strongly developed and consistent. Its premises and logic extend into current models of population genetics, biogeography, palaeontology, evolutionary theory and conservation biology. Nevertheless, many phenomena contradict the premises of the demographic paradigm; these contradictions cannot be accommodated within its theoretical framework without major disruptions in logic ensuing. Such phenomena can, in contrast, be understood in terms of the autecological paradigm. Because the status and strengths of the autecological paradigm are generally unrecognised and because autecology is frequently misrepresented in the literature, we redefine its premises and clarify its structure and aims as an aid to its future development. (shrink)

This chapter examines the stages of processing meta‐theory (SPM) that has guided construction of theories in psychology during the past 350 years, from philosopher René Descartes in seventeenth‐century France to neuropsychologists Carl Wernicke and Paul Broca in nineteenth‐century Europe to psychologists Dominic Massaro and Alan Baddeley in late twentieth‐century America and Britain. The most basic SPM assumptions are that processing and storage of information take place within a finite number of autonomous modules or stages, and that some stages are sequentially (...) ordered with respect to others. Flowcharts typically summarize these assumptions. The traditional stages of processing for verbal information are comprehension, storage, retrieval, and production. SPM flowcharts can add new stages and can alter old labels to represent new types of information processing, but whatever the labels, the stages must be finite in number, distinct, independent, and sequentially ordered between input and output. (shrink)

This article surveys and classifies the kinds of appeal to the Bible made in recent theological discussions of ecology and environmental ethics. These are, first, readings of `recovery', followed by two types of readings of `resistance'. The first of these modes of resistance entails the exercise of suspicion against the text, a willingness to resist it given a commitment to a particular (ethical) reading perspective. The second, by contrast, entails a resistance to the contemporary ethical agenda, given a perceived commitment (...) to the Bible. This initial typology and the various reading strategies surveyed are then subjected to criticism, as part of an attempt to begin to develop an ecological hermeneutic, a hermeneutic which operates between recovery and resistance with an approach that may be labelled `revision', `reformation' or `reconfiguration'. (shrink)

In spite of its carefully planned - and fully justified - modesty, the title of this book might very well surprise more than one potential reader. It is not normal to see such controversial concepts as "Renaissance," "Renaissance Thought," "Spanish Renaissance," or even "Spanish Thought" freely linked together in the crowded intimacy of one single printed line. The author of these essays is painfully aware of the com plexity of the ground he has dared to cover. He is also aware (...) that all the assumptions and connotations associated with the title of this book have been the subject of great controversy among scholars of high repute who claimed (and probably had) revealing insight into human affairs and ideas. That these pages have been written at all therefore needs some justification. I am convinced that certain of the disputes among historians of ideas do not touch upon matters of substance, but rather reveal the taste and intellectual idiosyncracies of their authors. Much of the disagreement is, I think, a matter of aesthetics. Those who find special gratification in well-defined labels, clear-cut schemes, and compre hensive generalizations, can hardly bear the company of those who insist upon detail, complexity, and organic growth. The nightmarish dilemma, still unresolved, between Unity and Diversity, between the Universal and the Individual, haunts the History of Ideas. (shrink)

In his long and illuminating paper [1] Joe Barback defined and showed to be non-vacuous a class of infinite regressive isols he has termed “complete y torre” isols. These particular isols a enjoy a property that Barback has since labelled combinatoriality. In [2], he provides a list of properties characterizing the combinatoria isols. In Section 2 of our paper, we extend this list of characterizations to include the fact that an infinite regressive isol X is combinatorial if and only if (...) its associated Dekker semiring D satisfies all those Π2 sentences of the anguage LN for isol theory that are true in the set ω of natural numbers. of the various function and relation symbols of LN via the “lifting ” to D of their Σ1 definitions in ω coincide with their interpretations via isolic extension.) We also note in Section 2 that Π2-correctness, for semirings D, cannot be improved to Π 3-correctness, no matter how many additional properties we succeed in attaching to a combinatoria isol; there is a fixed equation image sentence that blocks such extension. In Section 3, we provide a proof of the existence of combinatorial isols that does not involve verification of the extremely strong properties that characterize Barback's CT isols. (shrink)

Nucleic acid hybridization is being increasingly used in viral diagnosis. Most of the assays described so far for this purpose require the use of radioactive probes. Their replacement by Non‐radioactive assays has many advantages and makes the technique feasible in routine diagnostic work. Non‐radioactive assays have had limited use but their diagnostic value has been demonstrated for a number of virus infections. They have the main advantages of employing stable probes, of avoiding safety hazards and of being easy and rapid (...) to perform with limited laboratory facilities. Their main disadvantage compared to radioactive assays is in having relatively low sensitivity. Improvements in probe construction, in labelling and detecting methods, in sample treatment and in hybridization conditions may well increase their usefulness. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Thomas Merton’s Bangkok Lecture of December 1968Archbishop Rembert G. Weakland, OSBPreparations for the Meeting and its PurposeAfter being elected abbot primate of the Benedictine Confederation in September 1967, I was encouraged by discovering that the Benedictines and the two branches of the Cistercians (those of the Common Observance and those of the Strict Observance, or Trappists) worked together on missionary issues through an office in Paris called Aide à (...) l’Implantation Monastique (AIM).1 After World War II many new monastic foundations were made in the developing countries of Africa, Asia, and South America, commonly referred to as the Third World. These fledgling monasteries needed special care that frequently could not be provided by their founding monasteries in Europe or the United States. AIM sought to fill that gap. There existed an unwritten agreement among the three superiors of the two branches of the Cistercians and the abbot primate that the historical differences in the West among those following the Rule of Saint Benedict would not be emphasized in the new areas of expansion.One of the purposes for establishing AIM was to plan and organize meetings of monks and nuns in those vast areas of the world.2 Thus, AIM and its staff acted as the prime instrument for pulling together all the threads that went into the meeting in Bangkok in December 1968. They ultimately were responsible for selecting inculturation as the main theme to be treated.At that time, I noticed that this theme was frequently being discussed among us Superiors General in Rome, especially among those religious congregations with newer foundations in the developing countries of Asia, Africa, and South America.3 Many came to realize that this theme was important, not only for newer houses, but also for older ones in the Third World, as they too were rethinking how they engaged the cultures in which they had been implanted. We superiors devoted many meetings to this theme, bringing in experts in theology and anthropology to reflect with us on current thinking and to animate our discussions. Because of the positive treatment at Vatican Council II of the other great religions of the world, this theme was “in the air” at that time. In the Far East the question of inculturation for Catholic missionaries was not a new one in itself, as Christians had been posing it since the time of the first missionary efforts in China and Japan centuries before. For monks, however, it was being asked for the first time and with some urgency. Monasticism [End Page 91] posed questions of adaptation and accommodation in cultures already possessing deeply rooted manifestations of a similar way of life that went under the same label. Thus, since there was already a concept of monasticism and the existence of monks in Asian cultures, the Bangkok meeting was an occasion for reexamining the question of inculturation.At that same time there was a heightened sensitivity to any sign of a residual colonialism in many parts of the Third World. When Western groups made no attempt at inculturation, it was interpreted as old European cultural colonialism, or, as some were beginning to say, new American economic imperialism.When some Benedictine and Cistercian superiors in Asia suggested inculturation as the theme for this meeting, they added the suggestion that superiors of the founding monasteries in Europe and the United States should attend the meeting and interact with the superiors of the local houses. These superiors felt it was important for the founding superiors to gain a better understanding of the issues involved in cultural adaptation and that they be willing to give to the local superiors a broader berth for future developments. For this to occur, the presence of experts at the meeting was also imperative. It was then that Merton’s name was suggested. It was rightly felt that he was well informed about both Eastern and Western forms of monasticism and would be a font of insights and a ready guide for the discussions. In addition, his views—everyone agreed—would be well accepted by the Western superiors. Since the two languages of the meeting were to be French and English, Merton could also... (shrink)

Communication and interaction today happen in simply one mouse click away. Language and self-expression do not only develop as a recognized tool for oneself but is an avenue for others’ re-expression and identification. Through using Twitter, the elaboration of social interaction becomes easier and accessible. It becomes the primary method of doing things together and establishes a shared meaning that becomes the common ground of understanding by individuals and groups alike. The study aims to analyze the tweets of Kris Aquino, (...) known as the Philippines’ Queen of Multimedia using speech act categories of Searle and predict the meaning based on the speech acts committed. The study used content analysis for it represents systematic and objective means of describing and quantifying phenomena. The results showed that most tweets contained the ‘assertive’ label which refers to ‘those kinds of speech acts that state what the speaker believes to be the case or not’. Further, her influence as a public figure contributed to the forceful implication of realizing the speech act reflected by her readers. Since impression is reality and intention cannot be quantified, what the general audience perceives on a certain person serves to be the truth. Thus, misinterpretation develops due to poor judgment on the elucidation in the tweets of the posters, readers and vice-versa. Keywords - Sociolinguistics, speech act theory, Twitter, micro-blogging, SNS, qualitative, content analysis, Philippines. (shrink)

As one of the bare handful of scholars working on Schelling, I should heartily like to accept Professor Harris's argument, for all these black cows hang around one's neck more heavily than did the albatross on the ancient mariner's. I find myself obliged, however, to closely test his argument. I regret that, viewed in the context of the whole of the Phenomenology's Preface, Harris's argument is not fully convincing. I shall argue that, since the Preface's plain intent is to contrast (...) the vitalism of a method of thought that is spirit's coming into its own with all styles of fixated propositional thinking, the “formalism” Hegel attacks is a loose aggregate of the philosophical styles of Fichte, Schelling, Reinhold and Bardili. Hegel is content to leave the label loose and unspecified and not to name names. It is not strictly fair to let the scope of the term resonate upon Schelling's “first scientific grasp of the idea”, at least not for an author who knew Schelling's work so well. But as Harris points out, it is not fair to Hegel for his public to read him with the sole, simplistic question of what positions he supports and what positions he rejects. (shrink)

Fluorescence imaging has become an indispensable tool in cell and molecular biology. GFP‐like fluorescent proteins have revolutionized fluorescence microscopy, giving experimenters exquisite control over the localization and specificity of tagged constructs. However, these systems present certain drawbacks and as such, alternative systems based on a fluorogenic interaction between a chromophore and a protein have been developed. While these systems are initially designed as fluorescent labels, they also present new opportunities for the development of novel labeling and detection strategies. This review (...) focuses on new labeling protocols, actuation methods, and biosensors based on fluorogenic protein systems. (shrink)

Open peer commentary on the article “Second-Order Cybernetics as a Fundamental Revolution in Science” by Stuart A. Umpleby. Upshot: The process of writing a discussion case study requires that a researcher become embedded in the domain being studied; it entails constructing a reality as it is perceived by the participants; it demands a high level of humility, since complex environments have a tendency to thwart rational reasoning processes. Unfortunately, these very characteristics lead conventional researchers to disparage case writing, even questioning (...) whether it warrants the label of “research.” The propositions of second-order cybernetics offer a glimmer of hope to those of us who continue to write cases, as they inform us that what we are doing is science, just a different flavor of science. (shrink)

No one who has read with reasonable attention the Works and Days, the Theogony, the Shield, and even the fragments of the lost Hesiodic poems, can have failed to notice a peculiar feature. Again and again a passage, be it longer or shorter, is followed by what may be called, if not a true ‘doublet,’ at least an ‘echo’—a second passage reproducing the general idea, and often the more prominent verbal details of the preceding lines. In fact, in these poems (...) we have a series of variants or alternate versions. Editors of the Hesiodic works have indeed drawn attention to many of these ‘echoes,’ but they have been content to let the matter rest when they have drawn a distinction between ‘prima’ and ‘altera recensio,’ and have labelled one or other of them as ‘spurious.’ Yet this feature in the Hesiodic vulgate is surely of the highest interest and importance. How came these variant passages to be ‘stitched’ together, and when was the stitching done? (shrink)

We present a complete and cut-free proof-system for a fragment of MTL, where modal operators are only labelled by bounded intervals with rational endpoints.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Reinventing the Wheel: A Buddhist Response to the Information AgeMichael C. BarnhartReinventing the Wheel: A Buddhist Response to the Information Age. By Peter D. Hershock. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1999. Pp. xi + 308.Perhaps one of the most interesting, paradoxical, and—in Peter Hershock's way of thinking, in Reinventing the Wheel: A Buddhist Response to the Information Age — predictable aspects of the digital "revolution" is (...) the degree to which information technology becomes less a means to an end and more an end in itself. Take, for example, the humble phenomenon of the "techno-bore." Such people, having acquired some new electronic gizmo, spend all their time talking about the thing, especially savoring such conversations with like-minded techno-bores, who go on in equal and endless length about their latest toys. Rather than becoming a tool for organizing one's affairs, the digital assistant becomes one's main affair. Or, consider the case of the Internet. Although the "Web" is supposed to put us in touch with each other, say, by making e-mail possible, we find ourselves either unable to cope with the avalanche of mail that comes over the portal and thus unable to respond to it all (or at all), or we spend much more time on our mail than we ever did, thus making the mail itself a nuisance and consequently much less useful than formerly.Of course, none of this is unique to computers and the digital workplace. The same complaints have been voiced in regard to cars, television (and radio, too), modern medicine, and industrialization—in fact, the whole gamut of innovations that we label "technology." Indeed, although information technology is Hershock's main target, it represents only the perfection of a form that has been developing for some time and which he often refers to with the phrase "technologies of control." That is, cars, televisions, blenders, can openers, and computers are tools that are put to use in order to make our lives easier; they accomplish this purpose by putting some element of the world, some range of things, more directly under our control and, importantly, by limiting our involvement with them as well. We make things more tractable, more subject to our wanting (as distinct, Hershock says, from our desiring, which involves an element of respect for the desired), and thus more an extension of ourselves rather than obdurate and resistant things. For example, insofar as a sledgehammer makes breaking rocks easier, it makes rocks and their sizes and shapes more a function of our will, less a reflection of their nature, and distances us also from the material thing. To touch a rock with one's hands is an entirely different experience, a much more intimate experience than touching it with a hammer. In a curious way, says Hershock, the rock becomes more "iconic." In other words, it becomes more representation—our representation—and less a thing-in-itself. The computer and its screen "icons" simply push this envelope to its logical end, reducing all things to "buttons" that can be pushed at will, as our wants dictate. [End Page 414]The more things become iconic, the more they become an extension of our will. But the more they become an extension of our will, the more they become "us." That is, insofar as I successfully "technologize" my world, the more my world becomes simply a reflection of what I want. The situation is not so different from that of the absolute dictator who purges all dissenting voices from his or her realm. The realm becomes the leader—Stalin's Russia or Hitler's Germany, for example. And as we well know from Orwell, such power corrupts absolutely and completely, corrupts both the ruler and the ruled, reducing citizens and ruler to an infantile level. Two related phenomena attend such a development, Hershock tells us: narcissism and nihilism. We become more narcissistic because we become more obsessed with our wants as a reflection of our world. We become more nihilistic because our world of wants is intrinsically meaningless: it reflects what we want, not why we want it, no larger purpose. In short... (shrink)

Taking regular walks when living with Parkinson’s disease has beneficial effects on movement and quality of life. Yet, patients usually show reduced physical activity compared to healthy older adults. Using auditory stimulation such as music can facilitate walking but patients vary significantly in their response. An individualized approach adapting musical tempo to patients’ gait cadence, and capitalizing on these individual differences, is likely to provide a rewarding experience, increasing motivation for walk-in PD. We aim to evaluate the observance, safety, tolerance, (...) usability, and enjoyment of a new smartphone application. It was coupled with wearable sensors and delivered individualized musical stimulation for gait auto-rehabilitation at home. Forty-five patients with PD underwent a 1-month, outdoor, uncontrolled gait rehabilitation program, using the BeatWalk application. The music tempo was being aligned in real-time to patients’ gait cadence in a way that could foster an increase up to +10% of their spontaneous cadence. Open-label evaluation was based on BeatWalk use measures, questionnaires, and a six-minute walk test. Patients used the application 78.8% of the prescribed duration and enjoyed it throughout the program. The application was considered “easy to use” by 75% of the patients. Pain, fatigue, and falls did not increase. Fear of falling decreased and quality of life improved. After the program, patients improved their gait parameters in the six-minute walk test without musical stimulation. BeatWalk is an easy to use, safe, and enjoyable musical application for individualized gait rehabilitation in PD. It increases “walk for exercise” duration thanks to high observance.Clinical Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT02647242. (shrink)

ObjectivesTo describe reporting of informed consent in pragmatic trials, justifications for waivers of consent and reporting of alternative approaches to standard written consent. To identify factors associated with (1) not reporting and (2) not obtaining consent.MethodsSurvey of primary trial reports, published 2014–2019, identified using an electronic search filter for pragmatic trials implemented in MEDLINE, and registered in ClinicalTrials.gov.ResultsAmong 1988 trials, 132 (6.6%) did not include a statement about participant consent, 1691 (85.0%) reported consent had been obtained, 139 (7.0%) reported a (...) waiver and 26 (1.3%) reported consent for one aspect (eg, data collection) but a waiver for another (eg, intervention). Of the 165 trials reporting a waiver, 76 (46.1%) provided a justification. Few (53, 2.9%) explicitly reported use of alternative approaches to consent. In multivariable logistic regression analyses, lower journal impact factor (p=0.001) and cluster randomisation (p<0.0001) were significantly associated with not reporting on consent, while trial recency, cluster randomisation, higher-income country settings, health services research and explicit labelling as pragmatic were significantly associated with not obtaining consent (all p<0.0001).DiscussionNot obtaining consent seems to be increasing and is associated with the use of cluster randomisation and pragmatic aims, but neither cluster randomisation nor pragmatism are currently accepted justifications for waivers of consent. Rather than considering either standard written informed consent or waivers of consent, researchers and research ethics committees could consider alternative consent approaches that may facilitate the conduct of pragmatic trials while preserving patient autonomy and the public’s trust in research. (shrink)

Health-care professionals in end-of-life care are frequently confronted with patients who seem to be ‘ambivalent’ about treatment decisions, especially if they express a wish to die. This article investigates this phenomenon by analysing two case stories based on narrative interviews with two patients and their caregivers. First, we argue that a respectful approach to patients requires acknowledging that coexistence of opposing wishes can be part of authentic, multi-layered experiences and moral understandings at the end of life. Second, caregivers need to (...) understand when contradictory statements point to tensions in a patient’s moral experience that require support. Third, caregivers should be careful not to negatively label or even pathologize seemingly contradictory patient statements. (shrink)

This is a fine book that sticks with its stated ambition of introducing critical theory. It is meant for Anglo-American philosophers, who have had little interest in and less enthusiasm for, those loosely grouped under the label. Held lays out the details of each critical theorist's work, and avoids the sweeping, provocative slogans that mar other introductory texts. His book's exegesis has more breadth and depth than, say, Schroyer's The Critique of Domination; his work's assessment more balance and support than, (...) say, Slater's Origin and Significance of the Frankfurt School. Held does not match Jay's flair for spotting a unifying theme amid a welter of data. These two authors differ in purpose, however. Jay's outstanding The Dialectical Imagination locates CT broadly within social and political theory, while Held's book situates it more narrowly within the philosophical tradition. (shrink)

In this paper we focus our attention on tableau methods for propositional interval temporal logics. These logics provide a natural framework for representing and reasoning about temporal properties in several areas of computer science. However, while various tableau methods have been developed for linear and branching time point-based temporal logics, not much work has been done on tableau methods for interval-based ones. We develop a general tableau method for Venema's \cdt\ logic interpreted over partial orders (\nsbcdt\ for short). It combines (...) features of the classical tableau method for first-order logic with those of explicit tableau methods for modal logics with constraint label management, and it can be easily tailored to most propositional interval temporal logics proposed in the literature. We prove its soundness and completeness, and we show how it has been implemented. (shrink)

Given the pervasiveness of gene sharing in evolution and the extent of homology across the tree of life, why is everything not homologous with everything else? The continuity and overlapping genetic contributions to diverse traits across lineages seem to imply that no discrete determination of homology is possible. Although some argue that the widespread overlap in parts and processes should be acknowledged as “partial” homology, this threatens a broad base of presumed comparative morphological knowledge accepted by most biologists. Following a (...) long scientific tradition, we advocate a strategy of “theoretical articulation” that introduces further distinctions to existing concepts to produce increased contrastive resolution among the labels used to represent biological phenomena. We pursue this strategy by drawing on successful patterns of reasoning from serial homology at the level of gene sequences to generate an enriched characterization of serial homology as a hierarchical, phylogenetic concept. Specifically, we propose that the concept of serial homology should be applied primarily to repeated but developmentally individualized body parts, such as cell types, differentiated body segments, or epidermal appendages. For these characters, a phylogenetic history can be reconstructed, similar to families of paralogous genes, endowing the notion of serial homology with a hierarchical, phylogenetic interpretation. On this basis, we propose a five-fold theoretical classification that permits a more fine-grained mapping of diverse trait-types. This facilitates answering the question of why everything is not homologous with everything else, as well as how novelty is possible given that any new character possesses evolutionary precursors. We illustrate the fecundity of our account by reference to debates over insect wing serial homologs and vertebrate paired appendages. (shrink)

In many regions around the world, those at highest risk for acquiring HIV are young adults and adolescents. Young men who have sex with men in the USA are the group at greatest risk for HIV acquisition, particularly if they are part of a racial or ethnic minority group.1 Adolescent girls and young women have the highest incidence rates of any demographic subgroup in sub-Saharan Africa.2 To reverse the global AIDS pandemic’s toll on these high-risk groups, it is important to (...) deploy the most effective HIV prevention tools to young MSM in the USA, to adolescent girls and young women in sub-Saharan Africa, and to any other adolescents and young adults at high risk for HIV as products are proven to be safe and efficacious. Although prevention interventions with proven efficacy, such as oral pre-exposure prophylaxis, are available,3–8 they have not been sufficient to stem the tide and an expanded prevention toolkit is urgently needed to serve these populations. The field of HIV prevention continues to identify promising leads in the development of new biomedical prevention products, either delivering antiviral drug topically or systemically. The dapivirine ring has been shown to provide modest protection and is currently being tested in open label studies while injectable cabotegravir is being tested in a large efficacy trial for preventing HIV acquisition. Advances in the field of HIV prevention mean that scientists and regulators must plan for how they will bring prevention tools to populations at high risk for HIV as they conduct efficacy and effectiveness trials. For instance, safety data from younger age groups can also be used in combination with efficacy data from adult studies, where appropriate, as bridging studies to expand labelling to younger ages. If these …. (shrink)

Adults are skilled at using language to construct/negotiate identity and to signal affiliation with others, but little is known about how these abilities develop in children. Clearly, children mirror statistical patterns in their local environment (e.g., Canadian children using zed instead of zee), but do they flexibly adapt their linguistic choices on the fly in response to the choices of different peers? To address this question, we examined the effect of group membership on 7‐ to 9‐year‐olds' labeling of objects in (...) a trivia game, exploring whether they were more likely to use a particular label (e.g., sofa vs. couch) if members of their “team” also used that label. In a preregistered study, children (N = 72) were assigned to a team (red or green) and were asked during experimental trials to answer questions—which had multiple possible answers (e.g., blackboard or chalkboard)—after hearing two teammates and two opponents respond to the same question. Results showed that children were significantly more likely to produce labels less commonly used by the community (i.e., dispreferred labels) when their teammates had produced those labels. Crucially, this effect was tied to group membership, and could not be explained by children simply repeating the most recently used label. These findings demonstrate how social processes (i.e., group membership) can guide linguistic variation in children. (shrink)

This work presents a novel approach to forecast streaming big time series based on nearest similar patterns. This approach combines a clustering algorithm with a classifier and the nearest neighbours algorithm. It presents two separate stages: offline and online. The offline phase is for training and finding the best models for clustering, classification and the nearest neighbours algorithm. The online phase is to predict big time series in real time. In the offline phase, data are divided into clusters and a (...) forecasting model based on the nearest neighbours is trained for each cluster. In addition, a classifier is trained using the cluster assignments previously generated by the clustering algorithm. In the online phase, the classifier predicts the cluster label of an instance, and the proper nearest neighbours model according to the predicted cluster label is applied to obtain the final prediction using the similar patterns. The algorithm is able to be updated incrementally for online learning from data streams. Results are reported using electricity consumption with a granularity of |$10$| minutes for 4-hour-ahead forecasting and compared with well-known online benchmark learners, showing a remarkable improvement in prediction accuracy. (shrink)

The Monty Hall Problem (MHP), a process of two-stage decision making, was presented in atypical form via a custom software game. Differing from the normal three-box MHP, the game added one additional box on-screen for each game—culminating on game 23 with 25 on-screen boxes to initially choose from. A total of 108 participants played 23 games (trials) in one of four conditions; (1) “Vanish” condition—all non-winning boxes totally removed from the screen; (2) “Empty” condition—all non-winning boxes remain on-screen, but with (...) an “empty” label on them; (3) “Steroids” condition—all non-winning boxes removed from the screen, with initially chosen box becoming 25% larger; (4) “Steroids2” condition—all non-winning boxes removed from the screen, box not currently chosen becomes 25% larger. Results indicate second-stage on-screen presence of boxes influences switching; with their absence having the opposite effect. Size manipulation appears to elicit demand characteristics resulting in indeterminate influence. (shrink)

This paper argues that in modern biotechnology, naturalness as an argument contributed to a stalemate in public debate about innovative technologies. Naturalness in this is often placed opposite to human disruption. It also often serves as a label that shapes moral acceptance or rejection of agricultural innovative technologies. The cause of this lies in the use of nature as a closed, static reference to naturalness, while in fact ‘‘nature’’ is an open and dynamic concept with many different meanings. We propose (...) an approach for a dynamic framework that permits an integrative use of naturalness in debate, by connecting three sorts of meaning that return regularly in the arguments brought forward in debate; cultural, technological, and ecological. We present these as aspects of nature that are always present in the argument of naturalness. The approach proposes a dynamic relation between these aspects, formed by gradients of naturalness, which in turn are related to ethical concerns. In this way we come to an overview that makes it possible to give individual arguments a relative place and that does justice to the temporality of the concept of nature and the underlying ethical concerns stakeholders have in respect to innovation in agriculture. (shrink)

Affiliation is both an antecedent and a consequence of emotional mimicry (i.e. imitating a counterpart’s emotional expression). Thus, interacting with a disliked partner can decrease emotional mimicry, which in turn can further decrease liking. This perpetuating circle has not been investigated in the context of mental health stigma yet. The present study tested the influence of the label “schizophrenia” on liking, interpersonal closeness, and emotional mimicry. In an online experiment (n = 201), participants recruited from the general population saw several (...) videos of actors displaying emotional expressions. Actors were described with one of four labels: “schizophrenia”, “healthy”, “diabetes”, and a negative adjective (e.g. “hot-tempered”). Emotional mimicry was measured using OpenFace 2.2. Liking and interpersonal closeness were assessed with questionnaires. Overall, compared to other labels, participants reported less liking and interpersonal closeness to the actor with the schizophrenia label. However, no effect on emotional mimicry was found. The decreased liking of the schizophrenia actors was explained by a lack of knowledge about schizophrenia and the explicit stigma of schizophrenia. Our study contributes to the literature by highlighting the need to reduce the stigma of schizophrenia. (shrink)