New Technologies’ Promise to the Self and the Becoming of the Sacred: Insights from Georges Bataille’s Concept of Transgression

This article draws on Georges Bataille’s concept of transgression, a key element in Bataille’s theory of the sacred, to highlight structural implications of the way the self-empowerment ethos of new technologies suffuses the digital tracking culture. Pointing to the original conceptual stance of transgression, worked out against prohibition, I first argue that, beyond a critique of new technologies’ promise of self-empowerment as coming at the expense of an acknowledgement of the ultimate taboo—death—is the problem of the sanitizing of the tension between the crossing of the line of the symbolic taboo and prohibition; this undermines a “libidinal investment” towards the sacred, which is central in Bataille’s theory. Second, focussing on “eroticism”, since this embodies the emancipative potential of the Bataillean sacred, I argue that while a fear of eroticism marks out the digital technological realm, this is covered up by the blurring of boundaries between pleasure, fun and sex(iness) that currently governs our experience with technological devices

Harmonic moment dynamics in Laplacian growth

Harmonic moments are integrals of integer powers of z = x+iy over a domain. Here the domain is an exterior of a bubble of air growing in an oil layer between two horizontal closely spaced plates. Harmonic moments are a natural basis for such Laplacian growth phenomena because, unlike other representations, these moments linearize the zero surface tension problem (Richardson, 1972), so that all moments except the lowest one are conserved in time. For non-zero surface tension, we show that the the harmonic moments decay in time rather than exhibiting the divergences of other representations. Our laboratory observations confirm the theoretical predictions and demonstrate that an interface dynamics description in terms of harmonic moments is physically realizable and robust. In addition, by extending the theory to include surface tension, we obtain from measurements of the time evolution of the harmonic moments a value for the surface tension that is within 20% of the accepted value.Comment: 10 pages, 7 figure

Population genetics of abnormal haemoglobins in Burkina Faso, West Africa

Les fréquences géniques des hémoglobines A (HbA), HbS et HbC, ont été étudiées au Burkina-Faso (BF) ainsi que dans une région avoisinante du Niger : Ayorou. La fréquence d'HbS est plus élevée dans le Sahel (Nord du BF et Ayorou) que dans la zone de savane. L'inverse est trouvé pour HbC. Les résultats essentiels de ce travail sont : (a) la confirmation d'un pic de la fréquence génique de HbC dans le centre du BF (plateau Mossi); (b) une corrélation négative entre les fréquences de HbS et HbC. Cavalli-Sforza et Bodmer ont observé que cette corrélation atteint une intensité significativement différente de celle qui est attendue, par suite de la relation allélique entre HbS et HbC; (c) la comparaison de ces résultats avec les données rassemblées par Livingstone montre une modification de la valeur sélective des différents génotypes au cours des dernières années. Les individus AS ont une valeur sélective plus basse et les AA et SS en ont une plus haute. Nos données sont favorables à l'hypothèse du relâchement partiel de la sélection dans cette région. (Résumé d'auteur

Transmission tree of the highly pathogenic avian influenza (H5N1) epidemic in Israel, 2015

The transmission tree of the Israeli 2015 epidemic of highly pathogenic avian influenza (H5N1) was modelled by combining the spatio-temporal distribution of the outbreaks and the genetic distance between virus isolates. The most likely successions of transmission events were determined and transmission parameters were estimated. It was found that the median infectious pressure exerted at 1 km was 1.59 times (95% CI 1.04, 6.01) and 3.54 times (95% CI 1.09, 131.75) higher than that exerted at 2 and 5 km, respectively, and that three farms were responsible for all seven transmission events. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13567-016-0393-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users