Exploring the Front Touch Interface for Virtual Reality Headsets

In this paper, we propose a new interface for virtual reality headset: a touchpad in front of the headset. To demonstrate the feasibility of the front touch interface, we built a prototype device, explored VR UI design space expansion, and performed various user studies. We started with preliminary tests to see how intuitively and accurately people can interact with the front touchpad. Then, we further experimented various user interfaces such as a binary selection, a typical menu layout, and a keyboard. Two-Finger and Drag-n-Tap were also explored to find the appropriate selection technique. As a low-cost, light-weight, and in low power budget technology, a touch sensor can make an ideal interface for mobile headset. Also, front touch area can be large enough to allow wide range of interaction types such as multi-finger interactions. With this novel front touch interface, we paved a way to new virtual reality interaction methods

Cognitive science and epistemic openness

Recent findings in cognitive science suggest that the epistemic subject is more complex and epistemically porous than is generally pictured. Human knowers are open to the world via multiple channels, each operating for particular purposes and according to its own logic. These findings need to be understood and addressed by the philosophical community. The current essay argues that one consequence of the new findings is to invalidate certain arguments for epistemic anti-realism

Qualities, objects, sorts, and other treasures : gold digging in English and Arabic

In the present monograph, we will deal with questions of lexical typology in the nominal domain. By the term "lexical typology in the nominal domain", we refer to crosslinguistic regularities in the interaction between (a) those areas of the lexicon whose elements are capable of being used in the construction of "referring phrases" or "terms" and (b) the grammatical patterns in which these elements are involved. In the traditional analyses of a language such as English, such phrases are called "nominal phrases". In the study of the lexical aspects of the relevant domain, however, we will not confine ourselves to the investigation of "nouns" and "pronouns" but intend to take into consideration all those parts of speech which systematically alternate with nouns, either as heads or as modifiers of nominal phrases. In particular, this holds true for adjectives both in English and in other Standard European Languages. It is well known that adjectives are often difficult to distinguish from nouns, or that elements with an overt adjectival marker are used interchangeably with nouns, especially in particular semantic fields such as those denoting MATERIALS or NATlONALlTIES. That is, throughout this work the expression "lexical typology in the nominal domain" should not be interpreted as "a typology of nouns", but, rather, as the cross-linguistic investigation of lexical areas constitutive for "referring phrases" irrespective of how the parts-of-speech system in a specific language is defined

Molyneux’s Question in Berkeley’s Theory of Vision

I propose a reading of Berkeley's Essay towards a New Theory of Vision in which Molyneux-type questions are interpreted as thought experiments instead of arguments. First, I present the general argumentative strategy in the NTV, and provide grounds for the traditional reading. Second, I consider some roles of thought experiments, and classify Molyneux-type questions in the NTV as constructive conjectural thought experiments. Third, I argue that (i) there is no distinction between Weak and Strong Heterogeneity theses in the NTV; (ii) that Strong Heterogeneity is the basis of Berkeley's theory; and (iii) that Molyneux-type questions act as illustrations of Strong Heterogeneity

This body of art: The singular plural of the feminine

I explore the possibility that the feminine, like art, can be thought in terms of Jean-Luc Nancy’s concept of the singular plural. In Les Muses, Nancy claims that art provides for the rethinking of a technë not ruled by instrumentality. Specifically, in rethinking aesthetics in terms of the debates laid out by Kant, Hegel and Heidegger, he resituates the ontological in terms of the specificity of the techniques of each particular artwork; each artwork establishes relations particular to its world or worlds. What is at stake in the singular plural is the multiplicity of relations that are lost in the unifying gestures that arise out of radical oppositions. I rethink the singular plural through a phenomenological encounter with Barb Hunt’s artwork, Antipersonnel, a collection of hand-knitted replicas of antipersonnel landmines

Contact mechanics of and Reynolds flow through saddle points: On the coalescence of contact patches and the leakage rate through near-critical constrictions

We study numerically local models for the mechanical contact between two solids with rough surfaces. When the solids softly touch either through adhesion or by a small normal load $L$, contact only forms at isolated patches and fluids can pass through the interface. When the load surpasses a threshold value, $L_c$, adjacent patches coalesce at a critical constriction, i.e., near points where the interfacial separation between the undeformed surfaces forms a saddle point. This process is continuous without adhesion and the interfacial separation near percolation is fully defined by scaling factors and the sign of $L_c-L$. The scaling factors lead to a Reynolds flow resistance which diverges as $(L_c-L)^\beta$ with $\beta = 3.45$. Contact merging and destruction near saddle points becomes discontinuous when either short-range adhesion or specific short-range repulsion are added to the hard-wall repulsion. These results imply that coalescence and break-up of contact patches can contribute to Coulomb friction and contact aging.Comment: 6 pages, 6 figures, submitted to Euro. Phys. Let

Santa Clara Review, vol. 105, no. 1

https://scholarcommons.scu.edu/sc_review/1019/thumbnail.jp

Composite Structures that Change Shape in Response to Changes in Temperature

The present invention is a composite structure that changes shape as temperatures change. The composite structure utilizes a flexible substrate. The flexible substrate is static and does not change shape by itself in response to changes in temperature. A supports structure is affixed to the flexible substrate. The support structure is made from bi-layer films that change shape in response to changes in temperature. The support structures are formed into complex shapes that are smaller than the flexible substrates they support. As a result, when the support structure are affixed to the flexible substrates, the support structures cause the flexible substrates to buckle, bend and twist as the support structures change shape with temperature. The support structures can be designed so as to cause the specific changes in the flexible substrate to as to mimic the natural blooming movements of a flower petal or leaf.Published versio

Laminated PAINT

Though we may not perceive it, we are surrounded by material-in-flux. Inert materials degrade and the events that comprise our natural and social environments causally thread into a duration that unifies us in our incomprehension. Sounds reveal ever-present vibrations of the landscape: expressions of the flexuous ground on which we stand

A Welcome Abuse : Notes on Finding Community Through the Battered Book

The book-body and the flesh-body live in tangent. Or such should be the case, if we allow the book to live with us and not under glass, in plastic sleeves, in a safe, under lock and key in a climate-controlled, neutrally lit niche. If we welcome damaged goods into our home and release them into the homes of others. We can learn a lot about ourselves and our fellow readers by considering a story’s casings: patience, for one thing. That community extends beyond the immediate and into the virtual, for another. That we all want to be roughed up. For what is an untouched book but an unlived life