Towards a cultural critique of the digital humanities

"In this article the author tries to articulate a critical assessment of the current geopolitical assets of Digital Humanities. This critique is based firstly on data about the composition of various government organs, institutions and the principal journals in the field, and secondly on a general reflection on the cultural, political and linguistic bias of digital standards, protocols and interfaces. These reflections suggest that DH is not only a discipline and an academic discourse dominated materially by an Anglo-American élite and intellectually by a mono-cultural view, but also that it lacks a theoretical model for reflecting critically on its own instruments. The author concludes by proposing the elaboration of a different model of DH, based on the concept of knowledge as a commons and the cultivation of cultural margins, as opposed to its present obsession with large-scale digitization projects and 'archiving fever', that leads to an increase in our dependency on the products of private industry and, of course, on their funding." (author's abstract

Advances in Character Recognition

This book presents advances in character recognition, and it consists of 12 chapters that cover wide range of topics on different aspects of character recognition. Hopefully, this book will serve as a reference source for academic research, for professionals working in the character recognition field and for all interested in the subject

EAST-WEST CULTURAL DIFFERENCES IN VISUAL ATTENTION TASKS: IDENTIFYING MULTIPLE MECHANISMS AND DEVELOPING A PREDICTIVE MODEL

Past research has identified East-West differences in visual attention associated with holistic versus analytic perception and reasoning strategies (Nisbett et al., 2001; Boduroglu et al., 2009). These cross-cultural differences might stem from several different mechanisms, which may include: interference suppression, response inhibition, attention to detail vs. object configuration, stimulus centrality vs. eccentricity, number of visual distractors (e.g., display set size or clutter), and others. Although research has shown East-West differences, the results sometimes appear inconsistent with each other, or they lack clear predictions from underlying theories. For example, evidence of a preference for cluttered displays (Wang et al., 2012), evidence for being vulnerable to peripheral distractors (Masuda et al., 2008a), as well as evidence for greater sensitivity to distraction by global information (McKone et al., 2010) are all taken as evidence for the same cultural difference, even if they may be inconsistent with one another (i.e., Easterners prefer displays that are likely to lead to more distraction). This dissertation is comprised of three related efforts: (1) two empirical research studies using multiple visual attentional tasks intended to identify East-West cultural differences in visual attention, (2) identification of the five cultural mechanisms, which are derived from previous cross-cultural studies on general philosophy, visual attention, and bilingualism, aimed at constructing a basis for hypotheses testing, and (3) a computational predictive modeling effort attempting to produce best classification and derive minimal predictors using machine learning schema, along with cross-validating empirical task results. Results reveal inconsistent support for many possible explanations of East-West differences (including bilingual effects, general attentional differences, visual centrality vs. eccentricity) with one explanation finding support in several tasks (detail vs. object configuration). This conclusion is most strongly supported by a global-local interference task (Navon, 1977; McKone et al., 2010) in both experiments conducted, indicating that Easterners were better able to ignore the object information and attend to the contextual detail than Westerners. This conclusion was also supported by results from the dot flicker task and the predictive model. The overall findings suggest that, instead of focusing on high-level descriptive accounts of cultural difference, future research should attempt to investigate how specific attention mechanisms and strategies may differ across cultures

Mining complex trees for hidden fruit : a graph–based computational solution to detect latent criminal networks : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Information Technology at Massey University, Albany, New Zealand.

The detection of crime is a complex and difficult endeavour. Public and private organisations – focusing on law enforcement, intelligence, and compliance – commonly apply the rational isolated actor approach premised on observability and materiality. This is manifested largely as conducting entity-level risk management sourcing ‘leads’ from reactive covert human intelligence sources and/or proactive sources by applying simple rules-based models. Focusing on discrete observable and material actors simply ignores that criminal activity exists within a complex system deriving its fundamental structural fabric from the complex interactions between actors - with those most unobservable likely to be both criminally proficient and influential. The graph-based computational solution developed to detect latent criminal networks is a response to the inadequacy of the rational isolated actor approach that ignores the connectedness and complexity of criminality. The core computational solution, written in the R language, consists of novel entity resolution, link discovery, and knowledge discovery technology. Entity resolution enables the fusion of multiple datasets with high accuracy (mean F-measure of 0.986 versus competitors 0.872), generating a graph-based expressive view of the problem. Link discovery is comprised of link prediction and link inference, enabling the high-performance detection (accuracy of ~0.8 versus relevant published models ~0.45) of unobserved relationships such as identity fraud. Knowledge discovery uses the fused graph generated and applies the “GraphExtract” algorithm to create a set of subgraphs representing latent functional criminal groups, and a mesoscopic graph representing how this set of criminal groups are interconnected. Latent knowledge is generated from a range of metrics including the “Super-broker” metric and attitude prediction. The computational solution has been evaluated on a range of datasets that mimic an applied setting, demonstrating a scalable (tested on ~18 million node graphs) and performant (~33 hours runtime on a non-distributed platform) solution that successfully detects relevant latent functional criminal groups in around 90% of cases sampled and enables the contextual understanding of the broader criminal system through the mesoscopic graph and associated metadata. The augmented data assets generated provide a multi-perspective systems view of criminal activity that enable advanced informed decision making across the microscopic mesoscopic macroscopic spectrum

A functional and ontogenetic skull analysis of the extant rhinoceroses and Teleoceras major, an extinct Miocene North American rhinoceros

Functional and ontogenetic skull differences among extant rhinoceroses and the extinct North American rhinoceros Teleoceras major were investigated to assess the unknown feeding ecology of Teleoceras. Ontogenetic skull sequences of the extant Indian rhino (Rhinoceros unicornis), Sumatran rhino (Dicerorhinus sumatrensis), white rhino (Ceratotherium simum), and black rhino (Diceros bicornis), and the extinct Miocene North American rhino T. major were gathered for both qualitative and quantitative assessments. Eleven functional characters related to specific feeding ecologies in extant perissodactyls were morphologically described, and each species’ skull development was described in detail. Nineteen linear skull measurements were taken across all specimens of all ages to statistically investigate functional and developmental differences among the species. Specimens were also photographically documented for geometric morphometric analyses of ontogenetic shape transformations. Functional character results indicated that T. major was likely a grazer based on its high number of grazing characters, such as its large posterior maxilla, broad jugal, and strong mandibular angle. Teleoceras major and the extant grazer C. simum also shared grazing character states, such as an anterior jugal extension, a low occiput, and a deep mandibular body. Ontogenetic comparisons revealed both shared and distinct patterns among the species. The rhino species all shared early cranial lengthening, similar timing in horn and tusks development, and strong adult development of the masseter and temporalis attachment areas. Distinctions in the species’ ontogenies are in the occiput, zygomatic arch, mandibular angle, and mandibular body, which are all characters related to feeding ecology. Early development of masseter attachment areas in T. major and the temporalis attachment areas in C. simum are understood as differing adaptations to grazing feeding ecologies