Global Search with Bernoulli Alternation Kernel for Task-oriented Grasping Informed by Simulation

We develop an approach that benefits from large simulated datasets and takes full advantage of the limited online data that is most relevant. We propose a variant of Bayesian optimization that alternates between using informed and uninformed kernels. With this Bernoulli Alternation Kernel we ensure that discrepancies between simulation and reality do not hinder adapting robot control policies online. The proposed approach is applied to a challenging real-world problem of task-oriented grasping with novel objects. Our further contribution is a neural network architecture and training pipeline that use experience from grasping objects in simulation to learn grasp stability scores. We learn task scores from a labeled dataset with a convolutional network, which is used to construct an informed kernel for our variant of Bayesian optimization. Experiments on an ABB Yumi robot with real sensor data demonstrate success of our approach, despite the challenge of fulfilling task requirements and high uncertainty over physical properties of objects.Comment: To appear in 2nd Conference on Robot Learning (CoRL) 201

Cartographies of Place: Navigating the Urban

Book Review of Cartographies of Place: Navigating the Urban

When Birth Control Hurts You: An Essure Investigation

Thousands of women report having suffered from injuries and malfunctions related to Essure permanent birth control, including chronic pain, heavy bleeding, migration, or perforation. Many of these women also claim that Essure has caused nickel allergies, hair loss, bloating, rashes, unintended pregnancies, and death. What was promised to be an easy solution has become a life-altering problem. As patient complaints have increased, experts have gone back and studied the science behind the approval of the Essure device. Their findings are startling: There were flaws with the studies that supported the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the device, the experts claim. Furthermore, the FDA, which is now puzzling out what to do about the problem, may be grossly underestimating the magnitude of the problem. In the meantime, doctors continue implanting the devices

A pilot fidelity study of Listen-Empathize-Agree-Partner (LEAP) with Assertive Community Treatment (ACT) mental health clinicians

The primary objective of this study was to examine clinicians' fidelity to a promising new clinical intervention known as Listen-Empathize-Agree-Partner (LEAP) that addresses issues of poor insight, therapeutic alliance, and treatment adherence prevalent in the schizophrenia population. A secondary purpose of this study was to assess the factor structure of a measure developed to examine the core principles of the LEAP method. Forty-eight mental health clinicians working in Assertive Community Treatment (ACT) programs randomized into intervention and control groups were assessed for fidelity to the LEAP method via the LEAP Fidelity Measure (LFM), a self-report instrument. Results revealed a three-factor structure of this measure which were labeled "Reflective Listening, Delaying and Opining," "Partnering on Shared Goals," and "Client-Centered Listening and Empathizing." Multivariate Analyses of Variance indicated that clinicians who were trained in LEAP had significantly higher levels of fidelity to the "Reflective Listening, Delaying and Opining" and "Partnering on Shared Goals" components than clinicians who were not trained in this method. There were no significant differences between the groups on the "Client-Centered Listening and Empathizing" component. Analyses did not reveal significant gender differences or effects based on years of general and specific ACT clinical experience between the two groups. However, in a post hoc analysis, a modest correlation between gender and fidelity to the "Client-Centered Listening and Empathizing" component showed that male clinicians tended to report higher fidelity to this specific set of interventions when compared to their female counterparts. These results are discussed within the context of feasibility in training and implementing LEAP in real-world community mental health clinical settings. Additionally, limitations of this study and implications for future research are discussed

Open Ears, Open Mind, Open Heart: Active Listening

Active listening is the act of listening with all senses– the body, the mind, and the soul. It means empathizing with another person and finding that place within ourselves where we can listen beyond our initial judgements and personal feelings. It is listening beyond words and allowing our souls to understand, connect, and accept one another. Active listening sparks internal purity eliminating all types of judgement and allowing us to truly take in what another person has to offer. It is “an experience of language as a bodily felt process” in which we have a felt understanding rather than a cognitive understanding (Levin, 1998, p. 319). Active listening has the potential to create transformation by eliminating internal imbalance allowing us to act in ways that limit bias and create raw, genuine experiences in which we open ourselves to one another and allow people to see each other for who we are as individuals

The Relationship Between Bipolar Disorder and Epilepsy: Challenging the Dichotomy of Mental and Physical Health

Abstract The body of literature associating epilepsy with mood disorders is vast and can be traced as far back as Hippocrates. The comorbidity of the two is notoriously high. The prevalence of depressive symptoms among people with epilepsy has been widely reported for decades, though these symptoms may not be considered or treated as successfully in people with epilepsy as they are in their non-epileptic counterparts. More recently, evidence has been found suggesting that psychiatric symptoms may serve as a precursor to epilepsy. The episodic nature of the illnesses and their congruent model of progression suggest a possible connection. The goal of this literature review is to present evidence of the relationship between the two disorders. Similarities in pathophysiology, structural changes associated with the conditions, and biochemical abnormalities link these two disorders and challenge the distinction between “psychological” and “neurologic” illness. Keywords: bipolar disorder, epilepsy, depression, comorbidity, catamenial epilepsy, antidepressants, anticonvulsant

Higgs Pair Production: Choosing Benchmarks With Cluster Analysis

New physics theories often depend on a large number of free parameters. The precise values of those parameters in some cases drastically affect the resulting phenomenology of fundamental physics processes, while in others finite variations can leave it basically invariant at the level of detail experimentally accessible. When designing a strategy for the analysis of experimental data in the search for a signal predicted by a new physics model, it appears advantageous to categorize the parameter space describing the model according to the corresponding kinematical features of the final state. A multi-dimensional test statistic can be used to gauge the degree of similarity in the kinematics of different models; a clustering algorithm using that metric may then allow the division of the space into homogeneous regions, each of which can be successfully represented by a benchmark point. Searches targeting those benchmark points are then guaranteed to be sensitive to a large area of the parameter space. In this document we show a practical implementation of the above strategy for the study of non-resonant production of Higgs boson pairs in the context of extensions of the standard model with anomalous couplings of the Higgs bosons. A non-standard value of those couplings may significantly enhance the Higgs pair production cross section, such that the process could be detectable with the data that the Large Hadron Collider will collect in Run 2.Comment: Editorial changes, improvements in figures and changes in the appendi