The use of Web Ontology Language (OWL) to Combine Extant Controlled Vocabularies in Biodiversity Informatics Appears Redundant

Implementation of PESI requires data to be combined from multiple source databases. Some of the shared fields in the source databases used different controlled vocabularies of terms. OWL DL was investigated as a mechanism to build an extensible, shared ontology of species occurrence terms that permitted the source database to continue using and extending their own vocabularies whilst formally mapping to a more generic shared vocabulary. The merits of this approach were explored and it was concluded that the building of such a complex mapping ontology probably wasn't worthwhile. The level of semantic complexity involved outweighed the costs of simply imposing a flat list of well defined terms onto data suppliers. The main problem with exiting vocabularies appear to be the overloading of terms. A candidate list of terms was proposed

A yes vote in the Scottish referendum would start a serious debate about independence for Wales

Roger Sculley argues that while independence for Wales does not presently enjoy significant backing, this would change with a Yes vote in the Scottish independence referendum. It would offer a clear example to which advocates of independence could point and would alter the fundamental character of the UK rump that remained

The Finance Acts 1998 and 2000: can the owners of agricultural land continue to gain from their capital disposals?

This paper seeks to analyse and discuss, from the perspective of the owners of agricultural land, the main changes to the Capital Gains Tax regime introduced in the Finance Act 1998 and subsequently amended in the Finance Act 2000. The replacement of indexation with a new Taper relief is examined, along with the phasing out of Retirement relief, and the interaction of Taper relief with Rollover relief. The opportunity for tax mitigation by the owners of agricultural land is critically examined

Can’t Take a Joke? The Asymmetrical Nature of the Politicized Sense of Humor

In an effort to tease out possible expressions of dispositional differences in people of different political ideologies, this study uses media preference and consumption data from the 2008 National Annenberg Election Survey (NAES08-Online) to examine characteristics of audiences for a range of television shows and genres. The individual shows include two political satires, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, and The Colbert Report; a late-night comedy/variety show, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno; a hospital-based ensemble situation comedy, Scrubs; two animated comedies, The Simpsons, and The Family Guy; and two action-oriented dramas, 24, and CSI: Miami. The genres include comedies, dramas, sports and documentaries. The results of a series of one-way ANOVAs and regression analyses supported the hypotheses that conservatives do not enjoy humor as much as liberals, and that they enjoy political humor even less than non-political humor

Epsilon factors as algebraic characters on the smooth dual of GLn\mathrm{GL}_n

Let $K$ be a non-archimedean local field and let $G = \mathrm{GL}_n(K)$. We have shown in previous work that the smooth dual $\mathbf{Irr}(G)$ admits a complex structure: in this article we show how the epsilon factors interface with this complex structure. The epsilon factors, up to a constant term, factor as invariant characters through the corresponding complex tori. For the arithmetically unramified smooth dual of $\mathrm{GL}_n$, we provide explicit formulas for the invariant characters.Comment: 12 pages. Minor improvements, new titl

Letters to Roger Voisin

Letters to Voisin praising a performance by the Boston Symphony Orchestra in Reykjavik, Iceland in 1955. One is from Russell L. Riley, Director of the International Education Exchange Service, Department of State; and the other is from Naomi Huber, Cultural Affairs Officer, United States Foreign Service