641 research outputs found
Pneumonia in Bighorn Sheep: Testing the Super-Spreader Hypothesis
Following introduction of pneumonia, disease can persist in bighorn sheep (Ovis canadensis) populations for decades as annual or sporadic pneumonia epidemics in lambs. Recurring years of depressed recruitment due to high rates of pneumonia-induced mortality in juveniles is a major obstacle to population recovery. Management strategies for resolving this problem have so far been elusive. We are investigating the feasibility of removing individual âsuper-spreadersâ to improve lamb survival. Individual variation in infection and transmission is well documented in human diseases (e.g. âTyphoid Maryâ). We are testing the hypothesis that pneumonia epidemics in lambs are initiated by transmission of pathogens from a few âchronic-shedderâ ewes. We have completed the first year of a 5-year project in the Hells Canyon region of Idaho, Oregon, and Washington, and in a captive population at South Dakota State University. Through repeated testing of free-ranging individuals in Hells Canyon, we have identified individual differences in shedding of Mycoplasma ovipneumoniae, a primary pathogen in the bighorn sheep respiratory disease complex. We also found that when penned separately in captivity, lambs of ewes that consistently tested positive (chronic shedders) were infected and died of pneumonia, whereas lambs born to ewes from an infected population that tested negative (non-shedders), were not infected and survived. Over the next 4 years we plan to 1) continue and expand testing of free-ranging and captive animals, 2) determine whether removal of chronic-shedder ewes improves lamb survival in free-ranging populations, 3) expand and replicate chronic-shedder commingling experiments in captivity, and 4) establish and monitor a new population founded with non-shedders from an infected population
Mythical Thinking, Scientific Discourses and Research Dissemination
This article focuses on some principles for understanding. By taking Anna Mikulakâs article âMismatches between âscientificâ and ânon-scientificâ ways of knowing and their contributions to public understanding of scienceâ (IPBS 2011) as a point of departure, the idea of demarcation criteria for scientific and non-scientific discourses is addressed. Yet this is juxtaposed with mythical thinking, which is supposed to be the most salient trait of non-scientific discourses. The author demonstrates how the most widespread demarcation criterion, the criterion of verification, is self-contradictory, not only when it comes to logic, but also in the achievement of isolating natural sciences from other forms of knowledge. According to Aristotle induction is a rhetorical device and as far as scientific statements are based on inductive inferences, they are relying on humanities, which rhetoric is a part of. Yet induction also has an empirical component by being based on sense-impressions, which is not a part of the rhetoric, but the psychology. Also the myths are understood in a rhetorical (LĂŠvi-Strauss) and a psychological (Cassirer) perspective. Thus it is argued that both scientific and non-scientific discourses can be mythical
Movement Timing and Invariance Arise from Several Geometries
Human movements show several prominent features; movement duration is nearly independent of movement size (the isochrony principle), instantaneous speed depends on movement curvature (captured by the 2/3 power law), and complex movements are composed of simpler elements (movement compositionality). No existing theory can successfully account for all of these features, and the nature of the underlying motion primitives is still unknown. Also unknown is how the brain selects movement duration. Here we present a new theory of movement timing based on geometrical invariance. We propose that movement duration and compositionality arise from cooperation among Euclidian, equi-affine and full affine geometries. Each geometry posses a canonical measure of distance along curves, an invariant arc-length parameter. We suggest that for continuous movements, the actual movement duration reflects a particular tensorial mixture of these canonical parameters. Near geometrical singularities, specific combinations are selected to compensate for time expansion or compression in individual parameters. The theory was mathematically formulated using Cartan's moving frame method. Its predictions were tested on three data sets: drawings of elliptical curves, locomotion and drawing trajectories of complex figural forms (cloverleaves, lemniscates and limaçons, with varying ratios between the sizes of the large versus the small loops). Our theory accounted well for the kinematic and temporal features of these movements, in most cases better than the constrained Minimum Jerk model, even when taking into account the number of estimated free parameters. During both drawing and locomotion equi-affine geometry was the most dominant geometry, with affine geometry second most important during drawing; Euclidian geometry was second most important during locomotion. We further discuss the implications of this theory: the origin of the dominance of equi-affine geometry, the possibility that the brain uses different mixtures of these geometries to encode movement duration and speed, and the ontogeny of such representations
So What Do You Do? Experimenting with Space for Social Creativity
This chapter investigates the relationship between physical space and processes of creative thinking and action. The authors build on organizational and sociological literature about social space and aesthetics, then illustrate how the latter two aspects influenced each other in five action experiments. Small mixed groups explored how they would use a studio to facilitate social innovation and to strengthen the link between the Max Stern Jezreel Valley College in Israel and the surrounding communities. Analysis of the video recordings identified seven configurations of social space that changed over time as the participants engaged in the task. The authors suggest that the undifferentiated and unencrusted nature of the space was both a source of uncertainty and potential for the participants. Some groups generated more innovative processes and products than others. The study also offers insights into the importance of embodied action and verbal discourse in innovative processes
State work and the testing concours of citizenship
Anyone trying to be a citizen has to pass through a set of practices trying to be a state. This paper investigates some of the ways testing practices calibrate citizens, and in doing so, perform âthe state.â The paper focuses on three forms of citizenship testing, which it considers exemplary forms of âstate work,â and which all, in various ways, concern âmigration.â First, the constitution of a âborder crossing,â which requires an identity test configured by deceptibility. Second, the Dutch asylum process, in which âbeing gayâ can, in certain cases, be reason for being granted asylum, but where âbeing gayâ is also the outcome of an examination organized by suspicion. And third, the Dutch measurement of immigrantsâ âintegration,â which is comprised of a testing process in which such factishes as âbeing a member of societyâ and âbeing modernâ surface. Citizenship is analyzed in this paper as accrued and (re)configured along a migration trajectory that takes shape as a testing concours, meaning that subjects become citizens along a trajectory of testing practices. In contributing both to work on states and citizenship, and to work on testing, this paper thus puts forward the concept of citizenship testing as state work, where âstate work is the term for that kind of labor that most knows itself as comparison, equivalency, and exchange in the social realmâ (Harney, 2002, pp. 10â11). Throughout the testing practices discussed here, comparison, equivalency, and exchange figure prominently as the practical achievements of crafting states and citizens
Worlded object and its presentation: A MÄori philosophy of language
In an era concerned with the survival of Indigenous languages, language as a general phenomenon needs to be thought of as thoroughly connected to oneâs worldview. In this article, I propose a different conception of language that sides more with what I call âthe worlding of thingsâ than linguistics. To foreshadow my speculations on language, I consider the possibility that, within the representation of one entity in perception, there exist all other entities. An entity is hence âworldedââa key aspect of the term âwhakapapaâ. I then turn to think about language as a general phenomenon for MaĚori, and its complex ability to world an entity even as it adumbrates that thingâs backdrop. I consider the verb âto beâ in that light, arguing that MaĚori identify language as a sort of gathering of entities rather than an instrument for singling out one thing as thoroughly and separably evident. This article is therefore as much about the full participation of the world as it is about language; it also aims to counter the belief that language is merely a conveyor of ideas
Empiricism Without the Senses: How the Instrument Replaced the Eye
On receiving news of Galileoâs observations of the four satellites of Jupiter and the rugged face of the moon through his newly invented perspicillum, Kepler in great excitement exclaimed: Therefore let Galileo take his stand by Keplerâs side. Let the former observe the moon with his face turned skyward, while the latter studies the sun by looking down at a screen (lest the lens injure his eyes). Let each employ his own device, and from this partnership may there some day arise an absolutely perfect theory of the distances. This Hollywood-like scene of the two astronomers marching hand in hand toward the dawn of a new scientific era was no attempt by Kepler to appropriate Galileoâs success or to diminish the novelty of the telescope. On the contrary, Kepler repeatedly asserted how short sighted he was in misjudging the potential for astronomical observations inherent in lenses, and how radically Galileoâs instrument transformed the science of astronomy. It was a deep sense of recognition that beyond their different scientific temperaments and projects, they shared a common agenda of a new mode of empirical engagement with the phenomenal world: the instrument. For Kepler and Galileo, empirical investigation was no longer a direct engagement with nature, but an essentially mediated endeavor. The new instruments were not to assist the human senses, but to replace them
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