Enhancing Solidarity and Cooperation Social Identity Theory and China\u27s Involvement in Africa

China has increasingly intensified engagement with Africa since 2000. In 2001, trade between Africa and China was at $10.6 billion. In 2011, trade had exploded to over$160 billion.1 Chinese investment in Africa has grown from tens of millions of dollars to over $10 billion.2 This surge of trade and investment in Africa has not yet been matched by any other global power. Recently, Hu Jintao doubled China’s loan commitment to Africa to over$20 billion. This increase of trade and investment reflects a growing Chinese influence in Africa.3 What caused this increased Chinese interest in a continent that has been overlooked by the rest of the world? As China increases its influence among the world’s major powers, many argue that it will soon confront the United States. Whether or not this happens will be determined by how successful China is at creating new “friends” in the international system. As the United States’ primacy maintains a high level of cultural and economic influence throughout the world, China may have to create new economic, political, and social norms in order to attract new partners. These partners will help offset the United States’ dominating influence over the global political order. This paper argues that an increased level of trade and investment in Africa is one of China’s strategies to create a new identity by engaging in Social Creativity, as Social Identity Theory (SIT) specifies. First, current theories of why China is engaging in Africa will be evaluated. This evaluation includes theories of Liberalism, Colonialism/Neo-colonialism, and Neo-realism. The most effective at answering the question of why China invests so heavily in Africa is neo-realism, arguing that China engages Africa to ascertain resources and gain a geopolitical advantage in the region,. However, this does not fully explain Chinese behavior in the region. The paper will then explain the origins and applications of Social Identity Theory in explaining China’s Africa policy. After laying out the theoretical discussion, the paper will analyze two case studies. The first is a comprehensive look at China’s behavior and policy towards Africa as a group of states. The second is an investigation of how SIT applies on a micro level, using statements and news sources to analyze the case of Zimbabwe

Impact of Program Review on IPE Programming and Assessment

Purpose: Efforts to measure the effectiveness of Interprofessional Practice and Education (IPE) are challenging. We will present how formal program review can measure IPE effectiveness and lead to improvements in programming and assessment. Background: Western University of Health Sciences requires program review of curricular programs. The IPE curriculum recently underwent program review. External reviewers shared the results of their evaluations with university administration and deans. Their specific recommendations led to a retreat and development of a vision statement for IPE and the development of a new clinical assessment tool. Description of Intervention: After program review and receipt of the reviewers’ recommendations a full day retreat was held with senior administration and Deans from all health professions programs. Through these efforts a new IPE program vision statement was re-stated with reaffirmed commitments from all present. Preliminary Results: A shared vision statement was developed and finalized, which led to re-prioritizing core and key competencies to be used in the IPE curriculum. The revised core competencies were circulated via electronic survey to clinical practice sites where preceptors provided feedback and comments so that the competencies adequately defined measurable skills and behaviors could be used as assessment tools during clinical rotations. Relevance to Interprofessional Education or Practice: Program review can have an impact on the development of a shared university IPE vision and the identification of measurable IPE behaviors and skills important to the field. Recommendation for future investigation or incorporation into education: Outcomes from the new assessment tool will be compiled and analyzed with respect to use in clinical education across health professions. Learning Objectives: 1) Describe how formal university program review can used to renew senior administration commitment to IPE and to improve assessment practices. 2) Reflect on how program review can be instituted in any institution with an IPE program

The Transmission of Western Science Into China 1840-1900.

This thesis examines the process, practice and issues surrounding the transmission of Western science into China 1840-1900. It opens with a discussion of the previous (Jesuit) transmission of Western science, and the nature of the Chinese paradigms which the Jesuits tried to displace. The nineteenth-century Western chemical paradigms which were to be transmitted are then considered, together with the rapidly changing nature of the subject and the consequent problems for the translators and their readers. The context of the transmission in China is discussed, especially the nature of the kaozheng [evidential research] scholarly community in the Jiangnan region of China which, I hope to show, played an important role in the reception of science. The special problems of translation from Western languages into Chinese are then dealt with, including the transliteration of terms and the creation of new characters. Parallels are drawn with the methods of the Buddhist translators and of the early nineteenth-century Chinese geographers. There follow studies of the translation of chemical terminology, of a selection of important science textbooks, and of two Western agents of transmission, John Fryer and Calvin Mateer. The lives of Chinese scientists Li Shanlan, Xu Shou, Xu Jianyin and Hua Hengfang are studied, followed by a chapter on the new institutions which they and the Westerners created. The remarkably rich popular science literature such as Gezhi Huibian is then analysed, and conclusions drawn about the nature of 3 popular interest in science in this period. The intellectual impact of Western science in the last decade of the century is considered, especially the effects on the thinking of Tan Sitong and Kang Youwei. Finally, general conclusions are elaborated and the significance of the transmission is assessed

Recurrent Variational Autoencoders for Learning Nonlinear Generative Models in the Presence of Outliers

This paper explores two useful modifications of the recent variational autoencoder (VAE), a popular deep generative modeling framework that dresses traditional autoencoders with probabilistic attire. The first involves a specially-tailored form of conditioning that allows us to simplify the VAE decoder structure while simultaneously introducing robustness to outliers. In a related vein, a second, complementary alteration is proposed to further build invariance to contaminated or dirty samples via a data augmentation process that amounts to recycling. In brief, to the extent that the VAE is legitimately a representative generative model, then each output from the decoder should closely resemble an authentic sample, which can then be resubmitted as a novel input ad infinitum. Moreover, this can be accomplished via special recurrent connections without the need for additional parameters to be trained. We evaluate these proposals on multiple practical outlier-removal and generative modeling tasks involving nonlinear low-dimensional manifolds, demonstrating considerable improvements over existing algorithms.Y. Wang and J. Aston are sponsored by the EPSRC Centre for Mathematical Imaging in Healthcare, EP/N014588/1

Microscopy and chemical analyses reveal flavone-based woolly fibres extrude from micron-sized holes in glandular trichomes of Dionysia tapetodes.

BackgroundDionysia tapetodes, a small cushion-forming mountainous evergreen in the Primulaceae, possesses a vast surface-covering of long silky fibres forming the characteristic "woolly" farina. This contrasts with some related Primula which instead form a fine powder. Farina is formed by specialized cellular factories, a type of glandular trichome, but the precise composition of the fibres and how it exits the cell is poorly understood. Here, using a combination of cell biology (electron and light microscopy) and analytical chemical techniques, we present the principal chemical components of the wool and its mechanism of exit from the glandular trichome.ResultsWe show the woolly farina consists of micron-diameter fibres formed from a mixture of flavone and substituted flavone derivatives. This contrasts with the powdery farina, consisting almost entirely of flavone. The woolly farina in D. tapetodes is extruded through specific sites at the surface of the trichome's glandular head cell, characterised by a small complete gap in the plasma membrane, cell wall and cuticle and forming a tight seal between the fibre and hole. The data is consistent with formation and thread elongation occurring from within the cell.ConclusionsOur results suggest the composition of the D. tapetodes farina dictates its formation as wool rather than powder, consistent with a model of thread integrity relying on intermolecular H-bonding. Glandular trichomes produce multiple wool fibres by concentrating and maintaining their extrusion at specific sites at the cell cortex of the head cell. As the wool is extensive across the plant, there may be associated selection pressures attributed to living at high altitudes

Identity gripping or identity flight? Two distinct experiences correlated with self-reported depression in retired professional ice hockey players

This study presents qualitative data on the retirement experiences of retired professional ice hockey players and the relationship of these experiences to self-reported depressive symptoms and measures of athletic identity. Data were obtained from an online survey sent to retired professional hockey players within the Professional Hockey Players’ Association (PHPA) database. A total of 213 retired players completed the qualitative section of the survey and were included in the study. Former players expressed an array of responses to questions about the best and most difficult parts of their athletic retirement experiences, and what they believe would help future generations of retiring hockey players. Within these responses, there were two distinct patterns of identity-based challenges among depressed former players. One subset of depressed former players, captured by our proposed term athletic identity flight, scored lower in athletic identity, and emphasized positive aspects of retirement related to “building a new identity.” A second subset of depressed former players, who we described with the term athletic identity gripping, noted an identity crisis upon retiring and retained a strong athletic identity post-career. Non-depressed former players in our sample were more likely to emphasize the importance of career support to help future retiring hockey players, whereas depressed former players emphasized the importance of mental health support. Our findings may inform future preventative interventions to assist retiring hockey players in their end-of-athletic-career transition and suggest the value of tailoring interventions based on the strength of athletic identity and the presence of depressive symptoms

An integrated, probabilistic model for improved seasonal forecasting of agricultural crop yield under environmental uncertainty

We present a novel forecasting method for generating agricultural crop yield forecasts at the seasonal and regional-scale, integrating agroclimate variables and remotely-sensed indices. The method devises a multivariate statistical model to compute bias and uncertainty in forecasted yield at the Census of Agricultural Region (CAR) scale across the Canadian Prairies. The method uses robust variable-selection to select the best predictors within spatial subregions. Markov-Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) simulation and random forest-tree machine learning techniques are then integrated to generate sequential forecasts through the growing season. Cross-validation of the model was performed by hindcasting/backcasting and comparing forecasts against available historical data (1987–2011) for spring wheat (Triticum aestivum L.). The model was also validated for the 2012 growing season by comparing forecast skill at the CAR, provincial and Canadian Prairie region scales against available statistical survey data. Mean percent departures between wheat yield forecasted were under-estimated by 1–4% in mid-season and over-estimated by 1% at the end of the growing season. This integrated methodology offers a consistent, generalizable approach for sequentially forecasting crop yield at the regional-scale. It provides a statistically robust, yet flexible way to concurrently adjust to data-rich and data-sparse situations, adaptively select different predictors of yield to changing levels of environmental uncertainty, and to update forecasts sequentially so as to incorporate new data as it becomes available. This integrated method also provides additional statistical support for assessing the accuracy and reliability of model-based crop yield forecasts in time and space

How dо pesticides get into honey?

Honey is nature’s sweetest gift. But did you know that honey may contain pesticides? Farmers use pesticides to kill pests that harm their crops. But pesticides also hurt honey bees and other beneficial insects. Furthermore, when bees collect nectar from flowers which received pesticide treatments, these chemicals make their way into the honey. In the past, scientists found neonicotinoids (a class of pesticides) in about half of the honey samples collected in the United Kingdom. Since 2014, the European Union banned neonicotinoids in flowering crops that bees visit. We wanted to know how effective this policy was. Does UK honey still contain neonicotinoids? Here, we collected and tested honey samples from beekeepers across the UK. We found that about a fifth of all honey contained neonicotinoids. These chemicals are not at dangerous levels for human health but may harm the bees in the long run