Audiovisual representations of Artificial Intelligence in Dystopian Tech Societies: Scaremongering or Reality? The Cases of Black Mirror (Charlie Brooker, 2011), Ex Machina (Alex Garland, 2017) and Her (Spike Jonze, 2014)

La intel·ligència artificial ha estat un concepte que captiva la humanitat des de fa mil·lennis. Des de l'antiguitat, els humans estan obsessionats amb la idea de crear un ésser humà artificial perfecte amb diferents objectius, com ara la companyia o l'ajuda domèstica, i han escrit sobre ells en textos antics de diverses cultures. Això va evolucionar cap a la literatura de protofantasia o protociència-ficció a l’alta edat mitjana. Tanmateix, no va ser fins al segle XIX que la influent obra de Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (1818), va reunir diferents aspectes de la creació artificial de vida humana artificial en el debat d’una comprensió psicològica social més àmplia. Amb l'arribada dels mitjans audiovisuals al segle XX, aquestes representacions dels humanoides creats artificialment o d'altres creacions amb cert grau de consciència han poblat tant la gran pantalla com la televisió. Aquesta tesi se centra en les connexions socials d'aquestes representacions de la Intel·ligència Artificial, a partir de la sèrie de televisió Black Mirror (Charlie Brooker, 2011), així com en les pel·lícules Ex Machina (Alex Garland, 2014) i Her (Spike Jonze, 2014), per tal d’analitzar la relació entre la Intel·ligència Artificial i els humans des de perspectives i paradigmes diversos. L’anàlisi audiovisual de les obres seleccionades és seguida d’una exploració de com s’estan produint aquests recents avenços tecnològics en la nostra societat actual, per relacionar-los amb les advertències que proposen les obres seleccionades i que ofereixen una lectura per al futur que requereix la implementació de normatives estrictes sobre la Intel·ligència Artificial per tal d’alleujar les angoixes humanes respecte a la tecnologia. Paraules clau: Intel·ligència artificial, tecnologia, ciència ficció, distopia, estudis cinematogràfics, societat.La inteligencia artificial es un concepto que fascina a la humanidad durante milenios. Desde la antigüedad, los humanos han estado obsesionados con la idea de crear un humano artificial perfecto para diferentes fines, como la compañía o la ayuda doméstica, y han escrito sobre ello en textos fundacionales de diversas culturas. Esto se convirtió progresivamente en literatura de protofantasía o proto-ciencia ficción en la Alta Edad Media. Sin embargo, no fue hasta el siglo XIX cuando la influyente obra Frankenstein (1818) de Mary Shelley reunió diferentes aspectos de la creación de un ser humano artificial, discutidos dentro de una comprensión psicológica y social más amplia. Con la llegada de los medios audiovisuales en el siglo XX, estas representaciones de humanoides creados artificialmente o de otras creaciones con cierto grado de conciencia han poblado tanto la gran pantalla como la televisión. Esta tesis se centra en las conexiones sociales de dichas representaciones de la Inteligencia Artificial, centrándose en la serie de televisión Black Mirror (Charlie Brooker, 2011), así como en las películas Ex Machina (Alex Garland, 2014) y Her (Spike Jonze, 2014), analizando las relaciones entre la Inteligencia Artificial y los humanos desde una variedad de perspectivas y paradigmas diferentes. El análisis audiovisual de las obras seleccionadas va seguido de una exploración sobre cómo estos avances tecnológicos recientes se están produciendo en nuestra sociedad actual, vinculándolos con las advertencias que formulan las obras seleccionadas y ofreciendo una lectura de futuro que requiere la implementación de una estricta normativa en torno a la Inteligencia Artificial para aliviar las ansiedades humanas sobre la tecnología. Palabras clave: inteligencia artificial, tecnología, sociedad, ciencia ficción, distopía, estudios cinematográficos.Artificial Intelligence has been a concept that has infatuated humankind for millennia. Since antiquity, humans have been obsessed with the idea of creating a perfect artificial human for different aims such as companionship or domestic help, and ancient cultures have devoted foundational texts to the artificial human. This literary occupation gradually evolved into proto-fantasy or proto-Science Fiction literature in the early middle ages. However, it wasn’t until the 19th century that Mary Shelley’s influential work Frankenstein (1818) brought together different aspects of creating an artificial human discussed within a broader social and psychological understanding. With the advent of audiovisual media in the 20th century, such representations of artificially created humanoids or other creations with some degree of consciousness have populated both the silver screen and television. This thesis focuses on the societal connections between such representations of Artificial Intelligence, focusing on the TV show Black Mirror (Charlie Brooker, 2011) as well as the films Ex Machina (Alex Garland, 2014) and Her (Spike Jonze, 2014) by analyzing the Artificial Intelligence - human relationships from a variety of different perspectives and paradigms. The audiovisual analyses of the selected works are then followed by an examination of how such recent technological developments are taking place in our current society. These texts under examination exhort us to beware the potential dangers of AI technology, which require implementation of strict regulations around the Artificial Intelligence framework in order to alleviate human anxieties about technology. Keywords: Artificial Intelligence, technology, technology and society, Science Fiction, dystopia, film studies, society

Midnight Express as a Product of Hollywood Orientalism

The concept of Orientalism has been a forthcoming issue in film studies, be it the (mis)representation of minority groups in Hollywood, or white-washing people of color characters in remakes of films from “the Orient”, or through a complete omission of representation of these characters. Ideology is a great aspect in shaping the views of the masses, and as they become more embedded in cultural devices such as films, the more soft power they deploy and the more problematic they become. In Foucauldian terms, knowledge about the Orient is produced through films made by the Occident, and thanks to their infinite capital and wide distribution networks, the West, particularly America, is far more successful in retaining a cross-cultural dominance through this power/knowledge structure.This paper aims to deconstruct the motives behind Oliver Stone & Alan Parker’s 1978 film Midnight Express, in terms of putting Turkey and Turkish people in the Oriental position and putting Western and White characters in the Occidental epistemological positions. Some questions this paper tackles include “How does Orientalism work in the context of Film Studies? Does the Gaze grant a monolithic and unidirectional look at the Orient instead of the Occident?

Minimizing sum of completion times on a single machine with sequence-dependent family setup times

This paper presents a branch-and-bound (B&B) algorithm for minimizing the sum of completion times in a singlemachine scheduling setting with sequence-dependent family setup times. The main feature of the B&B algorithm is a new lower bounding scheme that is based on a networkformulation of the problem. With extensive computational tests, we demonstrate that the B&B algorithm can solve problems with up to 60 jobs and 12 families, where setup and processing times are uniformly distributed in various combinations of the [1,50] and [1,100] ranges

Masif, sandviç ve çerçeve tasarım kurgusuna sahip hazır cephe panellerin ısı, ses ve yangın performansı özellikleri

Many reasons such as the Industrial Revolution and the need for rapid building production after the Second World War have led to an acceleration of developments in the construction sector and new construction systems have emerged. These construction systems have brought forth the need for new facade designs. Prefabricated facade panels designed with the aim of quickly closing a building whose structure is completed so that it is least affected by external environmental conditions and ensuring that the facades created can exhibit good performance are also among these innovations. In this study, thermal and sound insulation, and fire resistance performance characteristics of prefabricated facade panels with wood, concrete, metal, or terracotta-based structure material, made with three different design concepts as massive, sandwich, and frame, were examined. The study is considered important because it examines the characteristics of facade elements aimed at improving the quality of the indoor environment.Endüstri Devrimi, malzeme- yapım olanaklarının artması ve II. Dünya Savaşı’nın ardından gelen hızlı yapı üretimi ihtiyacı gibi pek çok neden; yapı sektöründe meydana gelen gelişmelerin hızlanmasına neden olmuş ve beraberinde teknolojinin gelişmesi ile yeni yapım sistemleri ortaya çıkmıştır. Bu yapım sistemleri ise yeni cephe tasarımı ihtiyacını doğurmuştur. Zamanla cepheler yapının dış kabuğu olarak ana taşıyıcı sistemden ayrılmış ve farklı performans gereksinimlerini karşılamaya yönelik olarak gelişmiştir. Strüktürü tamamlanmış bir yapının, dış çevre koşullarından en az etkilenmesi için hızla kapatılması ve oluşturulan cephelerin iyi bir performans sergileyebilmesi amacı ile tasarlanan hazır cephe panelleri de bu yenilikler arasındadır. Yapılan bu çalışma ile; masif, sandviç ve çerçeve olmak üzere üç farklı tasarım kurgusu ile üretilmiş; ahşap, beton, metal veya pişmiş toprak esaslı taşıyıcı malzemeye sahip hazır cephe panellerinin; ısı yalıtımı, ses yalıtımı ve yangın dayanımı performans özellikleri incelenmiştir. Çalışma cephe elemanlarının iç ortam kalitesini iyileştirmeye yönelik özelliklerini incelediği için önemli görülmektedir

Çoruh Nehri’ndeki ağır metal kirliliğinin değerlendirilmesi

In this study, the pollution assessment of the water, total suspended solids, and sediment samples collected from the Çoruh River was carried out. For this purpose; aluminium, chromium, manganese, iron, cobalt, nickel, copper, zinc, cadmium, and lead were measured in these samples. The water and sediment quality indices were used for the evaluation of the obtained data. When water quality index values were evaluated, it was determined that the river was in the poor water quality class. According to enrichment factor, the Çoruh River sediments in this study are classified as deficiency to minimal enrichment for chromium and nickel, as moderate enrichment for manganese, iron, and cobalt, as significant enrichment for copper and zinc, as very high enrichment for cadmium and lead. Pollution loading index results also showed that the sediment quality deteriorated and it had a high metal load. It suggests that the reason for these pollution factors in the sediment is due to the mining activities in the region. As a result, it was determined that the water and sediment quality of the Çoruh River should be monitored with a regular monitoring program.Bu çalışmada Çoruh Nehri'nden toplanan su, askıda katı madde ve sediment örneklerinin kirlilik değerlendirmesi yapılmıştır. Bu amaç için toplanan numunelerde alüminyum, krom, manganez, demir, kobalt, nikel, bakır, çinko, kadmiyum ve kurşun konsantrasyonları ölçülmüştür. Elde edilen verilerin değerlendirilmesinde su ve sediment kalite indeksleri kullanılmıştır. Su kalitesi indeks değerleri incelendiğinde nehrin kötü su kalitesi sınıfında olduğu belirlendi. Sediment zenginleştirme faktörüne göre krom ve nikel açısından düşük düzeyde zenginleşme, manganez, demir ve kobalt için değiştirilebilir derecede zenginleşme, bakır ve çinko için önemli derecede zenginleşme, kadmiyum ve kurşun için çok yüksek düzey zenginleşmeye tespit edilmiştir. Kirlilik yükleme indeksi sonuçları da sediment kalitesinin bozulduğunu ve yüksek metal yüküne sahip olduğunu göstermiştir. Sedimentteki bu kirlilik faktörlerinin nedeninin bölgedeki madencilik faaliyetlerinden kaynaklandığını düşünülmektedir. Sonuç olarak, Çoruh Nehri'nin su ve sediment kalitesinin düzenli bir izleme programı ile izlenmesi gerektiği belirlenmiştir

Education and "Categorical Inequalities": Manifestation of Segregation in Six Country Contexts in Europe

This article deals with the educational arrangements and the multiple inequalities that they reproduce from a comparative perspective. Drawing on a qualitative study conducted in six countries (Austria, Hungary, Netherlands, Portugal, Turkey, and the UK) as part of a multinational research project concerning justice in Europe, the article explores the mechanisms through which education sustains and reproduces "categorical inequalities." Although equal access to education is granted by constitutional laws as well as by incorporation of international treaties in the national legal frameworks, it is commonly the educational arrangements that identify the features of access to good quality education in a given context. Dealing with different country cases that have their path dependencies in the arrangements of education, the article provides insights on understanding how different features of segregation in education operate as mechanisms of exclusion for students from a disadvantaged background. Hence, the disadvantages manifest themselves concerning socio‐economic status, ethnicity, race, and minority background. By focusing on the country‐based debates around school segregation, which goes together with the segregated character of urban settings and school choice patterns, the article shows how the institutional context with or without residency‐based registration rules and different types of schools with different resources perpetuate multiple inequalities. In a context where educational arrangements operate as a mechanism of sustaining categorical inequalities, identity‐based differences, combined with economic disadvantages lead to a situation where students from vulnerable and minority groups face multiple forms of exclusion

Bi-Criteria Simulated Annealing Algorithms for the Robust University Course Timetabling Problem

A bi-criteria version of the curriculum-based university timetabling problem of ITC-2007 is solved using a multi-objective simulated annealing (MOSA) algorithm that identifies an approximation to the optimal Pareto front. The two criteria are the penalty function as defined in ITC-2007 and a robustness function. The robustness function assumes one disruption occurs in the form of a period of an event (lecture) becoming infeasible for that event. The parameters of the MOSA algorithm are set using the Iterated FRace algorithm and then its performance is tested against a hybrid MOGA algorithm developed by the authors. The results show that MOSA provides better approximation fronts than the hybrid MOGA

Analysis of the embodied and operational energy of wood-based prefabricated panels produced with different design concepts according to vernacular

Prefabricated facade panels are building components that evolve with technology and offer a wide range of material possibilities. These panels can be constructed using wood, metal, concrete, or terracotta-based materials and are designed based on three concepts: massive, sandwich, and frame. In recent years, as sustainable design takes the spotlight, it is crucial to consider not only energy consumption and carbon emissions from heating and cooling but also the carbon emissions associated with the materials used in construction. This study aims to analyze prefabricated facade panels with wooden structures in terms of operational and embodied energy, providing guidance to designers in selecting suitable concepts. Calculations were conducted on a selected sample building. Compared to the traditional Baghdadi wall, the sandwich panel scenario with PUR insulation material resulted in energy savings of 53.21 percent. The massive CLT panel, which lacks insulation material or cladding, showed the lowest energy gain at 15.91 percent. Considering the overall emissions in the analysis, it has been determined that embodied carbon emissions have a greater impact than operational carbon emissions. Therefore, it is essential to emphasize the significant role of material selection for prefabricated facade panels in reducing carbon emissions

Network decomposition-based lower and upper bounds for the discrete time-cost tradeoff problem

In project management, the project duration can often be compressed by accelerating some of its activities at an additional expense. This is the so-called time-cost tradeoff problem which has been extensively studied in the past. However, the discrete version of the problem which is of great practical relevance, did not receive much attention so far. Given a set of modes (time-cost pairs) for each activity, the objective of the discrete time-cost tradeoff problem is to select a mode for each activity so that the total cost is minimized while meeting a given project deadline. The discrete time-cost tradeoff problem is a strongly NP-hard optimization problem for general activity networks. In terms of what current state-of-art-algorithms can do, instances with (depending on the structure of the network and the number of processing alternatives per activity) no more than twenty to fifty activities can be solved to optimality in reasonable amount of time. Hence, heuristics must be employed to solve larger instances. To evaluate such heuristics, lower bounds are needed. The aim of this paper is to provide such lower bounds using column generation techniques based on "network decomposition". We will show that a heuristic solution can be derived from that result as well. Furthermore, a computational study is provided to demonstrate that the presented bounds are tight and that large and hard instances can be solved in short run-time

Novel Surrogate Measures Based on a Similarity Network for Neural Architecture Search

We propose two novel surrogate measures to predict the validation accuracy of the classification produced by a given neural architecture, thus eliminating the need to train it, in order to speed up neural architecture search (NAS). The surrogate measures are based on a solution similarity network, where distance between solutions is measured using the binary encoding of some graph sub-components of the neural architectures. These surrogate measures are implemented within local search and differential evolution algorithms and tested on NAS-Bench-101 and NAS-Bench-301 datasets. The results show that the performance of the similarity-network-based predictors, as measured by correlation between predicted and true accuracy values, are comparable to the state-of-the-art predictors in the literature, however they are significantly faster in achieving these high correlation values for NAS-Bench-101. Furthermore, in some cases, the use of these predictors significantly improves the search performance of the equivalent algorithm (differential evolution or local search) that does not use the predictor