843 research outputs found

    Climate Change and Critical Agrarian Studies

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    Climate change is perhaps the greatest threat to humanity today and plays out as a cruel engine of myriad forms of injustice, violence and destruction. The effects of climate change from human-made emissions of greenhouse gases are devastating and accelerating; yet are uncertain and uneven both in terms of geography and socio-economic impacts. Emerging from the dynamics of capitalism since the industrial revolution — as well as industrialisation under state-led socialism — the consequences of climate change are especially profound for the countryside and its inhabitants. The book interrogates the narratives and strategies that frame climate change and examines the institutionalised responses in agrarian settings, highlighting what exclusions and inclusions result. It explores how different people — in relation to class and other co-constituted axes of social difference such as gender, race, ethnicity, age and occupation — are affected by climate change, as well as the climate adaptation and mitigation responses being implemented in rural areas. The book in turn explores how climate change – and the responses to it - affect processes of social differentiation, trajectories of accumulation and in turn agrarian politics. Finally, the book examines what strategies are required to confront climate change, and the underlying political-economic dynamics that cause it, reflecting on what this means for agrarian struggles across the world. The 26 chapters in this volume explore how the relationship between capitalism and climate change plays out in the rural world and, in particular, the way agrarian struggles connect with the huge challenge of climate change. Through a huge variety of case studies alongside more conceptual chapters, the book makes the often-missing connection between climate change and critical agrarian studies. The book argues that making the connection between climate and agrarian justice is crucial

    NeuroGame: neural mechanisms underlying cognitive improvement in video gamers

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    The video game market represents an influential and profitable industry. But concerns have been raised how video games impact on the human mind. There are reservations that video gaming may be addictive and foster aggressive behaviour. In contrast, a convincing body of research indicates that playing video games may improve cognitive processing. The exact mechanism thereof is not entirely understood. Most research suggests that video games train individuals in learning how to employ attentional control to focus on processing relevant information, while being able to suppress irrelevant information. Thus, video game players acquire the ability of being able to develop strategies to process information more efficiently. However, no algorithmic solution therefore has been provided yet. Thus, it is not clear which and how attentional control functions contribute to these effects. Moreover, neural mechanisms thereof are not well understood. We hypothesized that alterations in alpha power, i.e., modulations in brain oscillatory activity around 10 Hz, represent a promising neural substrate of video gaming effects. This was because, alpha activity represents an established neural correlate of attention processing given that its amplitude modulation corresponds to alterations in information processing. We investigated this by relating differential cognitive processing in video game players to changes in alpha power modulation. Moreover, we tried to imitate this effect using non-invasive brain stimulation. We were successful in achieving the former but not the latter. We provide a reasonable explanation for this. Thus, our results mostly support our hypothesis according to which altered alpha power may account for gaming effects

    Growing Psychology at Home: Reflections on Indigenous Psychology

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    This dissertation reflects on the indigenous Psychology movement, which emerged in reaction to the international spread of American Psychology after the Second World War, but whose literature began to expand from 1990 notably and has continued to do so to the present. These reflections adopt an analytical framework following the stages of critique, reconstruction, and creation. In the first, different definitions and meanings of indigenous Psychology and distinctions among its cognate terms (indigenized, indigenizing, and indigenization) are critiqued and reconstructed. Starting from the generic definition of indigenous Psychology as Psychology specific to a particular culture, the relationship between the notions of psychology and culture are discussed. Because the most fundamental critique levelled by indigenous psychologists at the current discipline of Psychology is at the individualistic framework it employs and depends on, individualism is conceptually analyzed by dividing it into its various components. Following from each critique exposing confusions in basic concepts such as indigeneity, culture and individualism, the dissertation proceeds in the second stage to reconstruct these to a certain extent by proposing some clarifying analytical distinctions. Finally, in the last stage, the dissertation aims to put the notion of indigenous Psychology on a more concrete case-specific basis by pointing to the lack of indigenization of Psychology in Türkiye and concludes by proposing an undergraduate course syllabus on the historical development of Psychology in Türkiye

    DESIGN AND MIXING PERFORMANCE OF PASSIVE MICROMIXERS: A CRITICAL REVIEW

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    This study extracts and reports notable findings on passive micromixers by conducting an exhaustive review of designs, their features, and mixing performance. The study has covered the relevant articles on passive micromixers published from 2010 to 2020. The analysis of filtered and selected articles sums up passive micromixers into four categories: designed inlets, designed mixing-channel, lamination-based, and flow obstacles-based. The prominent mixing channel categories identified in the study are split-and-recombine (SAR), convergent-divergent (C-D), and mixed (SAR, C-D, and others). Moreover, differences in mixing channel designs, number of inlets, and evaluation methods have been used in comparing the mixing performance of passive micromixers. The SAR and the obstacles-based micromixers were found to outperform the others. The designs covered in the present review show significant improvements in the mixing index. However, these studies were conducted in an isolated environment, and most of the time, their fabrication and device integration issues were ignored. The assortment and critical analysis of micromixers based on their design features and flow parameters will be helpful to researchers interested in designing new passive micromixers for microfluidic applications

    Dialogue without barriers. A comprehensive approach to dealing with stuttering

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    Security Analysis: A Critical Thinking Approach

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    Security Analysis: A Critical-Thinking Approach is for anyone desiring to learn techniques for generating the best answers to complex questions and best solutions to complex problems. It furnishes current and future analysts in national security, homeland security, law enforcement, and corporate security an alternative, comprehensive process for conducting both intelligence analysis and policy analysis. The target audience is upper-division undergraduate students and new graduate students, along with entry-level practitioner trainees. The book centers on a Security Analysis Critical-Thinking Framework that synthesizes critical-thinking and existing analytic techniques. Ample examples are provided to assist readers in comprehending the material. Newly created material includes techniques for analyzing beliefs and political cultures. The book also functions as an introduction to Foreign Policy and Security Studies.https://encompass.eku.edu/ekuopen/1005/thumbnail.jp

    Design of a single-particle detection system for strong-field QED experiments

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    One of the most intriguing physics processes that remain untested is the pure photon electron-positron pair production via quantum-vacuum fluctuations described by the nonlinear Breit-Wheeler theory. These fluctuations generate virtual pairs that can be turned into observable particles by applying strong electric fields above the Schwinger critical limit of \num{1.3d18}~V/m~\cite{Schwinger.1951, Ritus.1985}. Despite the advent of high-intense lasers, the critical limit is still far beyond achievable. However, such fields can be achieved on the rest frame of the real particles after the collision of a high-energy γ\gamma-ray photons with the laser beam. To diagnose the created pairs, this thesis describes the design of a particle detection system capable of successfully probing the single leptons created from strong-field quantum electrodynamics (SF-QED) interactions at the upcoming SF-QED experiments E-320 at FACET-II and FOR2783 at CALA. The designed detection system is composed of tracking layers made of LYSO:Ce scintillating screens and a Cherenkov calorimeter that, having their signals combined, can identify a positive event with a confidence level above 99%. At the E-320 experiment, electron beams generated by the FACET-II linear accelerator with an energy of 13~GeV collide with an intense laser beam of \anot \approx 10, and nonlinear Breit-Wheeler pairs are produced in the nonperturbative full quantum regime of SF-QED interaction (\chie > 1 and \anot > 1). About 100 electron-positron pairs per shot are expected to be created. According to Monte-Carlo simulations of the experimental layout, the detection system will be placed on a region permeated by a shower of x-rays and few-MeV γ\gamma-photons, however, a signal-to-noise ratio of \SNRsig \approx 18 on the detectors is achieved

    Endogenous measures for contextualising large-scale social phenomena: a corpus-based method for mediated public discourse

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    This work presents an interdisciplinary methodology for developing endogenous measures of group membership through analysis of pervasive linguistic patterns in public discourse. Focusing on political discourse, this work critiques the conventional approach to the study of political participation, which is premised on decontextualised, exogenous measures to characterise groups. Considering the theoretical and empirical weaknesses of decontextualised approaches to large-scale social phenomena, this work suggests that contextualisation using endogenous measures might provide a complementary perspective to mitigate such weaknesses. This work develops a sociomaterial perspective on political participation in mediated discourse as affiliatory action performed through language. While the affiliatory function of language is often performed consciously (such as statements of identity), this work is concerned with unconscious features (such as patterns in lexis and grammar). This work argues that pervasive patterns in such features that emerge through socialisation are resistant to change and manipulation, and thus might serve as endogenous measures of sociopolitical contexts, and thus of groups. In terms of method, the work takes a corpus-based approach to the analysis of data from the Twitter messaging service whereby patterns in users’ speech are examined statistically in order to trace potential community membership. The method is applied in the US state of Michigan during the second half of 2018—6 November having been the date of midterm (i.e. non-Presidential) elections in the United States. The corpus is assembled from the original posts of 5,889 users, who are nominally geolocalised to 417 municipalities. These users are clustered according to pervasive language features. Comparing the linguistic clusters according to the municipalities they represent finds that there are regular sociodemographic differentials across clusters. This is understood as an indication of social structure, suggesting that endogenous measures derived from pervasive patterns in language may indeed offer a complementary, contextualised perspective on large-scale social phenomena

    Dialogue without barriers. A comprehensive approach to dealing with stuttering

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    The book Dialogue without barriers: A comprehensive approach to dealing with stuttering is the result of Norwegian-Polish cooperation undertaken in the project LOGOLab – Dialogue without barriers. Three partners have been involved in the production of this book, namely, the University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland, the UiT Arctic University of Norway in Tromsø, and the Agere Aude Foundation for Knowledge and Social Dialogue. The project was implemented under the Education Program financed by the EEA Grants (EEA / 19 / K1 / D1 / W / 0031). The EEA Grants represent the contribution of Iceland, Liechtenstein, and Norway towards a green, competitive, and inclusive Europe. The most important goal of the LOGOLab project was to raise the standards of speech-language therapy in stuttering by incorporating the principles of Evidence-based practice, taking into account the assumptions of inclusive education and community-based model of intervention. An essential strategy for achieving this goal has become the dissemination of reliable and up-to-date knowledge about stuttering, and the development of appropriate social attitudes towards stuttering. The improvement of the quality of academic education for speech-language therapy students and of vocational training for certified speech-language therapists should also be mentioned. An additional aim was to provide reliable information for leaders of the self-help movement, who support people with stuttering non-institutionally
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