Drawing Boundaries

In “On Drawing Lines on a Map” (1995), I suggested that the different ways we have of drawing lines on maps open up a new perspective on ontology, resting on a distinction between two sorts of boundaries: fiat and bona fide. “Fiat” means, roughly: human-demarcation-induced. “Bona fide” means, again roughly: a boundary constituted by some real physical discontinuity. I presented a general typology of boundaries based on this opposition and showed how it generates a corresponding typology of the different sorts of objects which boundaries determine or demarcate. In this paper, I describe how the theory of fiat boundaries has evolved since 1995, how it has been applied in areas such as property law and political geography, and how it is being used in contemporary work in formal and applied ontology, especially within the framework of Basic Formal Ontology

France\u27s Financial Crisis: Analyzing the Role of the Finance Minister

The downfall of France\u27s Old Regime and the beginning of the French Revolution were largely caused by the financial crisis plaguing France. Since the Seven Year\u27s War, France\u27s finances had suffered and were spiraling out of control. The finances were kept largely by the country\u27s appointed finance minister. France would go through a host of these finance ministers up to the Revolution. The most notable was Jacques Necker who receives more detailed analysis. Tracing the administrations of these finance ministers helps explain an important factor leading to the French Revolution

Effects of Water Released From Stratified and Unstratified Reservoirs on the Downstream Water Quality

Water quality samples were collected from the Little River system in Pine Creek Lake, Oklahoma, and Gillham Lake, Arkansas, and their associated tailwaters during the winter (reservoirs unstratified) and summer (reservoirs stratified) of 1980. Downstream water quality was not affected by reservoir water releases while the reservoirs were unstratified. When the reservoirs were stratified water quality in the tailwaters was dependent on the release depth of the water. The practice of flushing out a tailwater following an extended low flow period should be examined on a site by site basis. Anoxic water released from a reservoir may contain high amounts of certain chemicals that may be detrimental to downstream aquatic life

being [t]here

When you awoke from the dream, in your early thirties, you knew, as you’ve never known anything else in all your seventy-plus years, that what you’d found was real. The dream began with you sitting in a church, head bowed in prayer. Your eyes opened slowly, and you noticed that you were wearing brilliantly colored, beaded moccasins. You stood abruptly, pushed open the mahogany gate that separated the pew from the center aisle of the church, and began to run. The dream then proposed a seemingly endless and entirely quotidian set of difficulties in The City, and led eventually to an arduous climb through a pathless woods, where you passed an unfinished house—framed out but not yet sided—and where (after how many false sightings of the summit?) you squeezed with great difficulty between two tall boulders, and suddenly emerged on the edge of a wondrous canyon. Below you flowed a wide, glistening river, and in the center of the river, partly submerged, sat a throne-like granite armchair. You awoke to the rest of your life with a gasp, exhilarated by the shimmering iridescence of the water in the dream and tantalized by the mystery of the chair. You have looked for that river ever since. [excerpt

Survey of the Arkansas Campanulaceae (Including the Lobeliaceae)

This paper is a summary of the Campanulaceae of Arkansas, based on the material on file in the University of Arkansas herbarium. A key to the species is included, followed by an alphabetical listing by genus and species of the taxa in the Campanulaceae known to occur in the state. After each taxon, the following information is included in this order: blooming period (as indicated on our material), known distribution in general terms (NW-northwest, E-east, G-general, C- central, etc.), habitat, chromosome number (as reported in Darlington & Wylie, 1955; in the Index to Plant Chromosome Numbers, Vol. I.II, and Supplement; and in Vol. 50 of Regnum Vegebabile), synonymy in double parentheses (this is minimized), citation of two specimens, and in some cases comments about the particular taxon. All of the taxa have been previously reported from the state. One species previously listed for the state is excluded. The survey includes 12 species in 4 genera. The distribution of most of the taxa is probably more extensive than indicated. Differences in the key to the species, as compared to Steyermark (1963) or McVaugh (1943), reflect overlap in characters of Lobelia appendiculata and L. spicata observed in the study of Arkansas material

Comparisons between swing phase characteristics of race walkers and distance runners

The aim of this study was to analyze swing characteristics during race walking and to compare these with distance running. The rules of race walking demand that no visible flight time should occur and the stance leg must be straightened from initial contact to midstance. Previous research has not examined whether these rules also have an effect on swing and what consequences might arise. Ten male race walkers and ten male distance runners walked or ran respectively on an instrumented treadmill for 10 km with two in-dwelling force plates. Trials lasted 30 seconds and simultaneous 2D video data were recorded and digitized at 125 Hz. The moment of inertia of the thigh, shank, foot and whole lower limb was calculated using the parallel axis theorem. The distance runners were faster with longer strides, although cadence was not different. The race walkers had shorter swing times, longer contact times, and smaller maximum knee flexion angles (100° ± 6) than the distance runners (56° ± 6). The smaller knee flexion angles in race walkers meant they experienced greater swing leg moment of inertia than the distance runners but there were few associations in either group between knee flexion angle or moment of inertia with key performance parameters. Swing phase kinematics in race walking are restricted by the rules of the event and result in knee angular motions different from those in distance running, preventing race walkers from reaching the speeds attainable by distance runners