Snake and Snake Robot Locomotion in Complex, 3-D Terrain

Snakes are able to traverse almost all types of environments by bending their elongate bodies in three dimensions to interact with the terrain. Similarly, a snake robot is a promising platform to perform critical tasks in various environments. Understanding how 3-D body bending effectively interacts with the terrain for propulsion and stability can not only inform how snakes move through natural environments, but also inspire snake robots to achieve similar performance to facilitate humans. How snakes and snake robots move on flat surfaces has been understood relatively well in previous studies. However, such ideal terrain is rare in natural environments and little was understood about how to generate propulsion and maintain stability when large height variations occur, except for some qualitative descriptions of arboreal snake locomotion and a few robots using geometric planning. To bridge this knowledge gap, in this dissertation research we integrated animal experiments and robotic studies in three representative environments: a large smooth step, an uneven arena of blocks of large height variation, and large bumps. We discovered that vertical body bending induces stability challenges but can generate large propulsion. When traversing a large smooth step, a snake robot is challenged by roll instability that increases with larger vertical body bending because of a higher center of mass. The instability can be reduced by body compliance that statistically increases surface contact. Despite the stability challenge, vertical body bending can potentially allow snakes to push against terrain for propulsion similar to lateral body bending, as demonstrated by corn snakes traversing an uneven arena. This ability to generate large propulsion was confirmed on a robot if body-terrain contact is well maintained. Contact feedback control can help the strategy accommodate perturbations such as novel terrain geometry or excessive external forces by helping the body regain lost contact. Our findings provide insights into how snakes and snake robots can use vertical body bending for efficient and versatile traversal of the three-dimensional world while maintaining stability

Dynamical systems : mathematical and numerical approaches

Proceedings of the 13th Conference „Dynamical Systems - Theory and Applications" summarize 164 and the Springer Proceedings summarize 60 best papers of university teachers and students, researchers and engineers from whole the world. The papers were chosen by the International Scientific Committee from 315 papers submitted to the conference. The reader thus obtains an overview of the recent developments of dynamical systems and can study the most progressive tendencies in this field of science

Diseases of the Head

"Diseases of the Head is an anthology of essays from contemporary philosophers, artists, and writers working at the crossroads of speculative philosophy and speculative horror. At once a compendium of multivocal endeavors, a breviary of supposedly illicit ponderings, and a travelogue of philosophical exploration, this collection centers itself on the place at which philosophy and horror meet. Employing rigorous analysis, incisive experimentation, and novel invention, this anthology asks about the use that speculation can make of horror and horror of speculation, about whether philosophy is fictional or fiction philosophical, and about the relationship between horror, the exigencies of our world and time, and the future developments that may await us in philosophy itself. From philosophers working on horrific themes, to horror writers influenced by heresies in the wake of post-Kantianism, to artists engaged in projects that address monstrosity and alienation, Diseases of the Head aims at nothing less than a speculative coup d'état. Refusing both total negation and absolute affirmation, refusing to deny everything or account for everything, refusing the posture of critique and the posture of all-encompassing unification, this collection of essays aims at exposition and construction, analysis and creation – it desires to fight for some thing, but not everything, and not nothing. And it desires, most of all, to speak from the position of its own insufficiency, its own partiality, its own under-determinacy, which is always indicative of the practice of thinking, of speculation. Considering themes of anonymity, otherness and alterity, the gothic, extinction and the world without us, the end times, the apocalypse, the ancient and the world before us, and the uncanny or unheimlich, among other motifs, this anthology seeks to articulate the cutting edge which can be found at the intersection of speculative philosophy and speculative horror.

Diseases of the Head

"Diseases of the Head is an anthology of essays from contemporary philosophers, artists, and writers working at the crossroads of speculative philosophy and speculative horror. At once a compendium of multivocal endeavors, a breviary of supposedly illicit ponderings, and a travelogue of philosophical exploration, this collection centers itself on the place at which philosophy and horror meet. Employing rigorous analysis, incisive experimentation, and novel invention, this anthology asks about the use that speculation can make of horror and horror of speculation, about whether philosophy is fictional or fiction philosophical, and about the relationship between horror, the exigencies of our world and time, and the future developments that may await us in philosophy itself. From philosophers working on horrific themes, to horror writers influenced by heresies in the wake of post-Kantianism, to artists engaged in projects that address monstrosity and alienation, Diseases of the Head aims at nothing less than a speculative coup d'état. Refusing both total negation and absolute affirmation, refusing to deny everything or account for everything, refusing the posture of critique and the posture of all-encompassing unification, this collection of essays aims at exposition and construction, analysis and creation – it desires to fight for some thing, but not everything, and not nothing. And it desires, most of all, to speak from the position of its own insufficiency, its own partiality, its own under-determinacy, which is always indicative of the practice of thinking, of speculation. Considering themes of anonymity, otherness and alterity, the gothic, extinction and the world without us, the end times, the apocalypse, the ancient and the world before us, and the uncanny or unheimlich, among other motifs, this anthology seeks to articulate the cutting edge which can be found at the intersection of speculative philosophy and speculative horror.

Bowdoin Orient v.126, no.1-23 (1997-1998)

https://digitalcommons.bowdoin.edu/bowdoinorient-1990s/1010/thumbnail.jp

Maritime expressions:a corpus based exploration of maritime metaphors

This study uses a purpose-built corpus to explore the linguistic legacy of Britain’s maritime history found in the form of hundreds of specialised ‘Maritime Expressions’ (MEs), such as TAKEN ABACK, ANCHOR and ALOOF, that permeate modern English. Selecting just those expressions commencing with ’A’, it analyses 61 MEs in detail and describes the processes by which these technical expressions, from a highly specialised occupational discourse community, have made their way into modern English. The Maritime Text Corpus (MTC) comprises 8.8 million words, encompassing a range of text types and registers, selected to provide a cross-section of ‘maritime’ writing. It is analysed using WordSmith analytical software (Scott, 2010), with the 100 million-word British National Corpus (BNC) as a reference corpus. Using the MTC, a list of keywords of specific salience within the maritime discourse has been compiled and, using frequency data, concordances and collocations, these MEs are described in detail and their use and form in the MTC and the BNC is compared. The study examines the transformation from ME to figurative use in the general discourse, in terms of form and metaphoricity. MEs are classified according to their metaphorical strength and their transference from maritime usage into new registers and domains such as those of business, politics, sports and reportage etc. A revised model of metaphoricity is developed and a new category of figurative expression, the ‘resonator’, is proposed. Additionally, developing the work of Lakov and Johnson, Kovesces and others on Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT), a number of Maritime Conceptual Metaphors are identified and their cultural significance is discussed

A Holmes and Doyle Bibliography, Volume 6: Periodical Articles, Subject Listing, By De Waal Category

This bibliography is a work in progress. It attempts to update Ronald B. De Waal’s comprehensive bibliography, The Universal Sherlock Holmes, but does not claim to be exhaustive in content. New works are continually discovered and added to this bibliography. Readers and researchers are invited to suggest additional content. Volume 6 presents the periodical literature arranged by subject categories (as originally devised for the De Waal bibliography and slightly modified here)

A Holmes and Doyle Bibliography, Volume 9: All Formats—Combined Alphabetical Listing

This bibliography is a work in progress. It attempts to update Ronald B. De Waal’s comprehensive bibliography, The Universal Sherlock Holmes, but does not claim to be exhaustive in content. New works are continually discovered and added to this bibliography. Readers and researchers are invited to suggest additional content. This volume contains all listings in all formats, arranged alphabetically by author or main entry. In other words, it combines the listings from Volume 1 (Monograph and Serial Titles), Volume 3 (Periodical Articles), and Volume 7 (Audio/Visual Materials) into a comprehensive bibliography. (There may be additional materials included in this list, e.g. duplicate items and items not yet fully edited.) As in the other volumes, coverage of this material begins around 1994, the final year covered by De Waal's bibliography, but may not yet be totally up-to-date (given the ongoing nature of this bibliography). It is hoped that other titles will be added at a later date. At present, this bibliography includes 12,594 items