Plausibility and Probability in Juridical Proof

This note discusses three issues that Allen and Pardo believe to be especially problematic for a probabilistic interpretation of standards of proof: (1) the subjectivity of probability assignments; (2) the conjunction paradox; and (3) the non-comparative nature of probabilistic standards. I offer a reading of probabilistic standards that avoids these criticisms

Photographs of sculpture: Greek slave’s ‘complex polyphony’, 1847 - 1877

This article explores some of the representations, iterations, and appearances of Hiram Powers’s Greek Slave in London in the decades after its first exhibition in 1845, years in which a variety of new ‘engines of the fine arts’ were fuelling a widening market for art objects of all kinds, and popular culture could turn statues into celebrities appearing everywhere — exhibitions, photographers’ studios, newspapers, tableau-vivant shows, even confectionery shops. The article’s focus is on how sculpture was used in the reception and understanding of photography as a new medium of reproduction, and how the materiality of specific photographic ‘objects’ — daguerreotypes, paper prints, and stereographs — interacted with that of sculpture to affect the viewer, at a time when sculptural objects themselves blurred the boundaries between original and reproduction. The article ends with an analysis of stereoscopic cards of Greek Slave, as the first photographic reproductions that could really compete with wood engravings and statuettes in the dissemination and circulation of statues, arguing for their pleasurable interactivity as key to their success

The Greek slave and photography in Britain

This essay explores some of the photographs of Hiram Powers’s Greek Slave sculpture taken and/or circulated in Britain in the nineteenth century. The statue’s popularity at the time makes it an effective case study through which to evaluate the early successes and failures of photography as a means of reproducing works of sculpture in the years before photographs could be efficiently printed in books and magazines through halftone reprographic techniques. As a visual essay, this piece invites the reader to look at the photographs as such—to focus on their materiality as objects made from various combinations of silver, metal, paper, leather, and card. In discussing the particular qualities of photographs in the form of daguerreotypes, calotypes, and stereoscopic slides, we will also see how these techniques allow for an experience that cannot be fully conveyed by their later reproductions

La gestione dei volatili in un centro di recupero per animali selvatici

Il lavoro di tesi si è incentrato sulle attività di un centro di recupero per animali selvatici ed esotici ed in particolare sulla gestione dei volatili. Abbiamo predisposto un protocollo di lavoro inerente alla gestione alimentare, sanitaria e igienico-sanitaria delle strutture degli uccelli selvatici autoctoni, e sono state fatte delle indagini statistiche relative alla sopravvivenza degli esemplari ricoverati nel centro e sono stati confrontati i giovani e gli adulti

Profile Evidence, Fairness, and the Risks of Mistaken Convictions

Many oppose the use of profile evidence against defendants at trial, even when the statistical correlations are reliable and the jury is free from prejudice. The literature has struggled to justify this opposition. We argue that admitting profile evidence is objectionable because it violates what we call “equal protection”—that is, a right of innocent defendants not to be exposed to higher ex ante risks of mistaken conviction compared to other innocent defendants facing similar charges. We also show why admitting other forms of evidence, such as eyewitness, trace, and motive evidence, does not violate equal protection

Neuronal modulation in the prefrontal cortex in a transitive inference task: evidence of neuronal correlates of mental schema management

When informed that A > B and B > C, humans and other animals can easily conclude that A > C. This remarkable trait of advanced animals, which allows them to manipulate knowledge flexibly to infer logical relations, has only recently garnered interest in mainstream neuroscience. How the brain controls these logical processes remains an unanswered question that has been merely superficially addressed in neuroimaging and lesion studies, which are unable to identify the underlying neuronal computations. We observed that the activation pattern of neurons in the prefrontal cortex (PFC) during pair comparisons in a highly demanding transitive inference task fully supports the behavioral performance of the two monkeys that we tested. Our results indicate that the PFC contributes to the construction and use of a mental schema to represent premises. This evidence provides a novel framework for understanding the function of various areas of brain in logic processes and impairments to them in degenerative, traumatic, and psychiatric pathologies. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT: In cognitive neuroscience, it is unknown how information that leads to inferential deductions are encoded and manipulated at the neuronal level. We addressed this question by recording single-unit activity from the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex of monkeys that were performing a transitive inference (TI) task. The TI required one to choose the higher ranked of two items, based on previous, indirect experience. Our results demonstrated that single-neuron activity supports the construction of an abstract, mental schema of ordered items in solving the task and that this representation is independent of the reward value that is experienced for the single items. These findings identify the neural substrates of abstract mental representations that support inferential thinking

Conceptions and action orientations toward the environment of academic groups. Motivational, political, disciplinary and institutional elements

Este trabajo analiza en forma comparada concepciones sobre el entorno y estrategias de interacción con agentes externos de grupos de investigación de dos universidades nacionales ubicadas en el conurbano sur de Buenos Aires, Argentina. A través del análisis de documentos y de la realización de entrevistas, se busca mostrar cómo tales concepciones y estrategias se comprenden a la luz de coyunturas políticas particulares, dimensiones subjetivas y/o grupales, dinámicas cognitivas-disciplinares del área de incumbencia y dimensiones institucionales.This paper compares the conceptions of environment and the interactional strategies with external agents supported by academic groups of two national universities situated in the south suburb of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Through documentary analysis and personal interviews here it is displayed how conceptions and strategies can be understood in the light of political situations, subjective and collective dimensions, cognitive and institutional dynamics.Fil: Di Bello, Mariana Eva. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Quilmes. Departamento de Ciencias Sociales. Instituto de Estudios Sociales de la Ciencia y la Tecnología; ArgentinaFil: Romero, Lucía. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Quilmes. Departamento de Ciencias Sociales. Instituto de Estudios Sociales de la Ciencia y la Tecnología; Argentin

Marker identification and classification of cancer types using gene expression data and SIMCA

Objectives. High-throughput technologies are radically boosting the understanding of living systems, thus creating enormous opportunities to elucidate the biological processes of cells in different physiological states. In particular, the application of DNA microarrays to monitor expression profiles from tumor cells is improving cancer analysis to levels that classical methods have been unable to reach. However, molecular diagnostics based on expression profiling requires addressing computational issues as the overwhelming number of variables and the complex, multi-class nature of tumor samples. Thus, the objective of the present research has been the development of a computational procedure for feature extraction and classification of gene expression data.Methods. The Soft Independent Modeling of Class Analogy (SIMCA) approach has been implemented in a data mining scheme, which allows the identification of those genes that are most likely to confer robust and accurate classification of samples from multiple tumor types.Results: The proposed method has been tested on two different microarray data sets, namely Golub's analysis of acute human leukemia [1] and the small round blue cell tumors study presented by Khan et al. [2]. The identified features represent a rational and dimensionally reduced base for understanding the biology of diseases, defining targets of therapeutic intervention, and developing diagnostic tools for classification of pathological states.Conclusions: The analysis of the SIMCA model residuals allows the identification of specific phenotype markers. At the some time, the class analogy approach provides the assignment to multiple classes, such as different pathological conditions or tissue samples, for previously unseen instances

Redox cell signaling and hepatic progenitor cells.

Hepatic diseases are widespread in the world and organ transplantation is currently the only treatment for liver failure. New cell-based approaches have been considered, since stem cells may represent a possible source to treat liver diseases. Acute and chronic liver diseases are characterized by high production of reactive oxygen and nitrogen species, with consequent oxidative modifications of cellular macromolecules and alteration of signaling pathways, metabolism and cell cycle. Although considered harmful molecules, reactive species are involved in cell growth and differentiation processes, modulating the activity of transcription factors, which take part in stemness/proliferation. It is conceivable that redox balance may regulate the development of hepatic progenitor cells, function and survival in synchrony with metabolism during chronic liver diseases. This review aims to summarize diverse redox-sensitive signaling pathways involved in stem cell fate, highlighting the important role of hepatic progenitor cells as a possible source to treat end-stage liver disease for organ regeneration