Normative Reality: Reasons Fundamentalism, Irreducibility, and Metaethical Noncentralism

Reasons fundamentalists assert that normative reality is constituted by exemplifications of the normative reasons relation: an irreducible, sui generis relation that strongly supervenes on non-normative reality. In this dissertation, I argue that reasons fundamentalists cannot explain why exemplifications of the normative reasons relation strongly supervene on non-normative reality. Irreduciblists about normativity can avoid this problem by asserting, contra the reasons fundamentalist, that normative reality is constituted by exemplifications of thick properties, which provide material for a conceptual analysis of normative reasons. The theory that results analyzes normative reasons for action as answers to questions why an action promotes a thick property. Nearly every normative theorist affirms what I call Additive Normative Supervenience (ANS): Normatively discernible worlds must be non-normatively discernible. ANS asserts that, if Edward Snowden is morally good, then Snowden's counterparts in worlds that are indiscernible in all non-normative respects must be good. Reasons fundamentalists struggle to explain why ANS is true. I consider and reject potential explanations of ANS that appeal to conceptual entailment and a posteriori necessity. Rosen has recently offered an argument against ANS. Rejecting ANS, however, problematizes irreduciblist accounts of normative explanation and normative epistemology. Irreduciblists can avoid this dilemma by arguing that ANS is either incoherent or false and adopting an alternative formulation of normative supervenience. Bilgrami's arguments against the intelligibility of normative supervenience doctrines purport to show that ANS is in fact unintelligible, and Merricks' arguments against the supervenience of consciousness on microphysical properties can be extended to show that ANS is false. Neither argument, however, establishes the falsity or unintelligibility of a modified formulation of normative supervenience, Transformative Normative Supervenience (TNS): Normatively discernible worlds must be descriptively discernible, where descriptive discernibility is just discernibility with respect to non-normative properties or thick normative properties. Irreduciblists can explain the truth of TNS by adopting non-centralism about normative reasons--that is to say, by maintaining, contra the reasons fundamentalist, that normative reality is constituted most fundamentally by exemplifications of thick properties. This allows the irreduciblist to provide an account of normative explanation and normative epistemology, analyze normative reasons in terms of thick properties, and preserve buck-passing accounts of thin normative properties. Scanlon has argued that the reasons relation is a four-place relation, relating the facts that are reasons for an agent to perform an action in a given circumstance. I argue that facts are also reasons for an action with respect to a thick property that that action will promote, in contrast to sets of distinct actions that the agent could perform instead. The resulting six-place relation turns out to be an instance of the relation that holds between why-questions and answers. What it is to be a normative reason for an agent to do something is to be a correct answer to a question why that agent's doing that action will promote a thick property. Decades ago, Anscombe had also suggested that reasons were answers to why-questions of a certain kind. The attractiveness of this position has been relatively underappreciated in the philosophy of normative reasons, in part because Anscombe had offered the reasons- as-answers thesis as a thesis about motivating reasons rather than normative reasons. The reasons-as-answers thesis also provides resources for those irreduciblists about reasons who reject my non-centralist conclusions to avoid the wrong kind of reason problem for buck- passing accounts of normativity: they can distinguish between right and wrong kinds of reasons by distinguishing between answers to distinct kinds of why-questions

Designing an L-THIA Model for ArcGIS 10.2 Using Python 2.7

L-THIA (Long-Term Hydrologic Impact Analysis) is a mature model available as a spreadsheet, a web-based spatial model and as an add-in to the popular geographic information system (GIS) software system ArcGIS 10. The model generally has a method to determine an area of analysis such as a watershed, and then populates the watershed with data on soil and landuse. The model generally requires precipitation data for a long term and uses assumptions about the relationship between landuse, soil, and the chemistry of surface runoff passing across the various landscapes. Input data are landuse and soil map layers and long-term precipitatio

Going South: Tracing Race and Region in the Post-Emancipation Black Atlantic

The demise of American slavery in 1865 put black Americans in motion to an unprecedented degree. Freed slaves and their descendants migrated from the plantations in the rural South to destinations around the globe. Travelling in a variety of new roles – as missionaries, journalists, agronomists, scientists, athletes, performers, entrepreneurs and political activists – African Americans gained international visibility, inspiring other oppressed populations in the colonial world to struggle for their liberation

Unique Pattern of Enzootic Primate Viruses in Gibraltar Macaques

Because Gibraltar's macaques (Macaca sylvanus) have frequent contact with humans, we assayed 79 macaques for antibodies to enzootic primate viruses. All macaques were seronegative for herpesvirus B, simian T-cell lymphotropic virus, simian retrovirus, simian immunodeficiency virus, and rhesus cytomegalovirus. Seroprevalence of simian foamy virus reached 88% among adult animals

Charge transfer to solvent dynamics in iodide aqueous solution studied at ionization threshold

We explore the early-time electronic relaxation in NaI aqueous solution exposed to a short UV laser pulse. Rather than initiating the charge transfer reaction by resonant photoexcitation of iodide, in the present time-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy study the charge-transfer-to-solvent (CTTS) states are populated via electronic excitation above the vacuum level. By analyzing the temporal evolution of electron yields from ionization of two transient species, assigned to CTTS and its first excited state, we determine both their ultrafast population and relaxation dynamics. Comparison with resonant- excitation studies shows that the highly excited initial states exhibit similar relaxation characteristics as found for resonant excitation. Implications for structure and dynamical response of the hydration cage are discussed

Topological kink plasmons on magnetic-domain boundaries.

Two-dimensional topological materials bearing time reversal-breaking magnetic fields support protected one-way edge modes. Normally, these edge modes adhere to physical edges where material properties change abruptly. However, even in homogeneous materials, topology still permits a unique form of edge modes - kink modes - residing at the domain boundaries of magnetic fields within the materials. This scenario, despite being predicted in theory, has rarely been demonstrated experimentally. Here, we report our observation of topologically-protected high-frequency kink modes - kink magnetoplasmons (KMPs) - in a GaAs/AlGaAs two-dimensional electron gas (2DEG) system. These KMPs arise at a domain boundary projected from an externally-patterned magnetic field onto a uniform 2DEG. They propagate unidirectionally along the boundary, protected by a difference of gap Chern numbers ([Formula: see text]) in the two domains. They exhibit large tunability under an applied magnetic field or gate voltage, and clear signatures of nonreciprocity even under weak-coupling to evanescent photons

Population dynamics of rhesus macaques and associated foamy virus in Bangladesh.

Foamy viruses are complex retroviruses that have been shown to be transmitted from nonhuman primates to humans. In Bangladesh, infection with simian foamy virus (SFV) is ubiquitous among rhesus macaques, which come into contact with humans in diverse locations and contexts throughout the country. We analyzed microsatellite DNA from 126 macaques at six sites in Bangladesh in order to characterize geographic patterns of macaque population structure. We also included in this study 38 macaques owned by nomadic people who train them to perform for audiences. PCR was used to analyze a portion of the proviral gag gene from all SFV-positive macaques, and multiple clones were sequenced. Phylogenetic analysis was used to infer long-term patterns of viral transmission. Analyses of SFV gag gene sequences indicated that macaque populations from different areas harbor genetically distinct strains of SFV, suggesting that geographic features such as forest cover play a role in determining the dispersal of macaques and SFV. We also found evidence suggesting that humans traveling the region with performing macaques likely play a role in the translocation of macaques and SFV. Our studies found that individual animals can harbor more than one strain of SFV and that presence of more than one SFV strain is more common among older animals. Some macaques are infected with SFV that appears to be recombinant. These findings paint a more detailed picture of how geographic and sociocultural factors influence the spectrum of simian-borne retroviruses

Measurements of the Composite Fermion masses from the spin polarization of 2-D electrons in the region 1<ν<21<\nu<2

Measurements of the reflectivity of a 2-D electron gas are used to deduce the polarization of the Composite Fermion hole system formed for Landau level occupancies in the regime 1<\nu<2. The measurements are consistent with the formation of a mixed spin CF system and allow the density of states or `polarization' effective mass of the CF holes to be determined. The mass values at \nu=3/2 are found to be ~1.9m_{e} for electron densities of 4.4 x 10^{11} cm^{-2}, which is significantly larger than those found from measurements of the energy gaps at finite values of effective magnetic field.Comment: 4 pages, 3 fig

hydrogen bonds and nuclear dynamics

Knowledge about the hydrogen bond network of water is essential for understanding its anomalies as well as its special role for biochemical systems. Different types of x-ray spectroscopy allow probing of the molecular orbitals of water, revealing the electronic structure which reflects the hydrogen bond conformations. In this work a recently developed high-resolution x-ray emission spectrometer was used in combination with the microjet technique for recording spectra of liquid H2O and D2O and their mixtures with acetonitrile. Variation of the nuclear dynamics via isotope substitution and variation of the hydrogen bond conformation via dissolution in acetonitrile was investigated. These two effects have two clearly distinguishable spectral fingerprints