Hypotheses, evidence and relationships: The HypER approach for representing scientific knowledge claims

Biological knowledge is increasingly represented as a collection of (entity-relationship-entity) triplets. These are queried, mined, appended to papers, and published. However, this representation ignores the argumentation contained within a paper and the relationships between hypotheses, claims and evidence put forth in the article. In this paper, we propose an alternate view of the research article as a network of 'hypotheses and evidence'. Our knowledge representation focuses on scientific discourse as a rhetorical activity, which leads to a different direction in the development of tools and processes for modeling this discourse. We propose to extract knowledge from the article to allow the construction of a system where a specific scientific claim is connected, through trails of meaningful relationships, to experimental evidence. We discuss some current efforts and future plans in this area

Analysis of the Argumentative Process of Students to a Social Dilemma related to Genetic Content

Background: Studies on argumentation in science education have been devoted to the theoretical aspects of the quality of the arguments or the contributions and limitations of the proposals or learning environments, among others. Objectives: In particular, our study seeks to analyze the argumentative process of high school students as they experience an argumentation activity about the disciplinary content of genetics and biotechnology. Design: The intervention process was carried out through the course “Dialogues on Genetics”, which lasted six weeks and had 16 class hours, however, in order to achieve our objective, we have analyzed the data collected for the Activity 8, entitled “Social dilemma related to consumption and production of genetically modified food”. Setting and Participants: For this study, participated 12 students, between 15 and 18 years old, in the 3rd grade of the High-School-Integrated Vocational Course on Fishery Resources of IFRN - Campus Macau. Data collection and analysis: The collected data consisted of the audio and video recording, which was organized by using the software ELAN, and the written record of the consensual argument prepared by each group. Results: Analysing the dialogue data involved in the preparation of a consensual argument by a group of students, we identify three stages of the argumentative process, namely, (I) proposition, (II) negotiation, and (III) agreement. Conclusions: We evidenced that, following this three-part model, the argumentative process repeats itself until the group reaches a consensus or withdraws from trying to persuade the peer with a counter-claim

Projecting uncertainty: Visualising text-worlds in three statements from the Meredith Kercher murder case

This article uses Text World Theory (Werth 1999; Gavins 2007) in conjunction with VUE (Visual Understanding Environment) concept mapping software to analyze three statements from the trial of Amanda Knox, convicted in 2009 of the murder of Meredith Kercher. We compare the cognitive structures of the statements and use the insights gained to guide an examination of their individual linguistic features and associated potential interpretative effects. In the first two dictated statements, Knox is projected as an actor responsible for the reported actions/events that implicate her in the crime, whereas in the third statement (hand-written in English), she is projected as a sensor, presenting more prominent epistemic uncertainty and indicating bewilderment. We argue that using VUE diagramming software extends the scope of Text World Theory, by increasing its capacity for managing analytically lengthy and complex datasets

BG Group and “Conditions” to Arbitral Jurisdiction

Although the Supreme Court has over the last decade generated a robust body of arbitration caselaw, its first decision in the area of investment arbitration under a Bilateral Investment Treaty was only handed down in 2014. BG Group v. Argentina was widely anticipated and has attracted much notice, and general approval, on the part of the arbitration community. In this paper we assess the Court’s decision from two different perspectives—the first attempts to situate it in the discourse of the American law of commercial arbitration; the second considers it in light of the expectations of the international community surrounding the proper construction of Conventions between states. Our initial goal had been to write jointly, with the hope that we could bridge our differences to find, if not common, at least neighboring, ground. On some points we did so, but ultimately our divergent appreciations of the proper way to interpret the condition precedent in the investment treaty in BG Group overcame the idealism with which we commenced the project. Nonetheless we have decided to present the two papers together to emphasize the dichotomous approaches to treaty interpretation that two moderately sensible people, who inhabit overlapping but non-congruent interpretive communities, can have.The Kay Bailey Hutchison Center for Energy, Law, and Busines

In, out and through digital worlds. Hybrid-transitions as a space for children's agency

This article discusses a Transition Programme to support the inclusion of mature students in Higher Education. The Transition Programme was designed and it is currently provided by a Higher Education institution in Surrey, South-East of England. An outcome of innovative educational leadership, the Transition Programme’ successfully solved the paradox of selection for admission to Higher Education programmes, in particular with regard to mature students. The English Higher Education system offers an interesting case for discussion, being caught between the principle of inclusiveness within a ‘widening participation’ agenda and the contrasting selective principle of ‘recruiting with integrity’. The article is motivated by two main aims. The first aim is to contextualize sociologically, within a discussion on the related concepts of hope, trust and risk, the motivations underpinning mature applicants’ choice to enter Higher Education. The second aim of the article is to argue for the capability of educational leadership to generate positive change supporting mature applicants’ trust in hope for a successful inclusion in Higher Education

Laruelle Qua Stiegler: On Non-Marxism and the Transindividual

Alexander R. Galloway and Jason R. LaRiviére’s article “Compression in Philosophy” seeks to pose François Laruelle’s engagement with metaphysics against Bernard Stiegler’s epistemological rendering of idealism. Identifying Laruelle as the theorist of genericity, through which mankind and the world are identified through an index of “opacity,” the authors argue that Laruelle does away with all deleterious philosophical “data.” Laruelle’s generic immanence is posed against Stiegler’s process of retention and discretization, as Galloway and LaRiviére argue that Stiegler’s philosophy seeks to reveal an enchanted natural world through the development of noesis. By further developing Laruelle and Stiegler’s Marxian projects, I seek to demonstrate the relation between Stiegler's artefaction and “compression” while, simultaneously, I also seek to create further bricolage between Laruelle and Stiegler. I also further elaborate on their distinct engagement(s) with Marx, offering the mold of synthesis as an alternative to compression when considering Stiegler’s work on transindividuation. In turn, this paper seeks to survey some of the contemporary theorists drawing from Stiegler (Yuk Hui, Al-exander Wilson and Daniel Ross) and Laruelle (Anne-Françoise Schmidt, Gilles Grelet, Ray Brassier, Katerina Kolozova, John Ó Maoilearca and Jonathan Fardy) to examine political discourse regarding the posthuman and non-human, with a particular interest in Kolozova’s unified theory of standard philosophy and Capital

Learning biographies in a European space for social mediation

Within the framework of a European Erasmus+ project, trainee mediators were interviewed about their experience. The encounters took place in unstructured, in-depth qualitative biographical-narrative interviews, in which individuals who are engaged in dialogic interaction create shared understanding and give meaning to their stories. The interview is interactive, co-constructed. The detail of the interview language documents how meaning-making takes place, and how this is affected by group belonging, ethnic or cultural discourses, as well as gender, age, professional and educational relationships, and so on. The interview is sensitive to language resources and their use in the co-construction of meaning. This paper, using extracts from one biographical narrative, shows that the languaged form that these narratives of the biographical learning of mediators take can offer insight into the learning processes triggered by learning in communities of practice, and that the creation of a common space of experience can be heard as it emerges in biographical talk. Biographical resources, biographicity, and their relationship with language and society are considered, and in the interview narratives the creation of a learning space, a space for the development and unfolding of notions and practices of mediation can be observed, heard and shared

Information scraps: how and why information eludes our personal information management tools

In this paper we describe information scraps -- a class of personal information whose content is scribbled on Post-it notes, scrawled on corners of random sheets of paper, buried inside the bodies of e-mail messages sent to ourselves, or typed haphazardly into text files. Information scraps hold our great ideas, sketches, notes, reminders, driving directions, and even our poetry. We define information scraps to be the body of personal information that is held outside of its natural or We have much still to learn about these loose forms of information capture. Why are they so often held outside of our traditional PIM locations and instead on Post-its or in text files? Why must we sometimes go around our traditional PIM applications to hold on to our scraps, such as by e-mailing ourselves? What are information scraps' role in the larger space of personal information management, and what do they uniquely offer that we find so appealing? If these unorganized bits truly indicate the failure of our PIM tools, how might we begin to build better tools? We have pursued these questions by undertaking a study of 27 knowledge workers. In our findings we describe information scraps from several angles: their content, their location, and the factors that lead to their use, which we identify as ease of capture, flexibility of content and organization, and avilability at the time of need. We also consider the personal emotive responses around scrap management. We present a set of design considerations that we have derived from the analysis of our study results. We present our work on an application platform, jourknow, to test some of these design and usability findings