Graded Signal Functions for ARTMAP Neural Networks

This study presents an analysis of a modified ARTMAP neural network in which a graded signal function replaces the standard choice-by-difference function. The modifications are introduced mathematically and the performance of the system is studied on two benchmark examples. It is shown that the modified ARTMAP system achieves classification accuracy superior to that of standard ARTMAP, while retaining comparable complexity of the internal code.Office of Naval Research and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (N00014-95-1-0409, N00014-1-95-0657

A soundtrack to the insurrection : street music, marching bands and popular protest

What happens in social movements when people actually move, how does the mobile moment of activism contribute to mobilisation? Are they marching or dancing? How is the space of action, the street itself, altered, re-sounded? The employment of street music in the very specific context of political protest remains a curiously under-researched aspect of cultural politics in social movements.... By looking at the marching bands of different socio- political and cultural contexts, primarily British, I aim to further current understanding of the idea and history of street music itself, as well as explore questions of the construction or repositioning of urban space via music'how the sound of music can alter spaces'; participation, pleasure and the political body; subculture and identity

A normalised seawater strontium isotope curve: possible implications for Neoproterozoic-Cambrian weathering rates and the further oxygenation of the Earth

The strontium isotope composition of seawater is strongly influenced on geological time scales by changes in the rates of continental weathering relative to ocean crust alteration. However, the potential of the seawater 87Sr/86Sr curve to trace globally integrated chemical weathering rates has not been fully realised because ocean 87Sr/86Sr is also influenced by the isotopic evolution of Sr sources to the ocean. A preliminary attempt is made here to normalise the seawater 87Sr/86Sr curve to plausible trends in the 87Sr/86Sr ratios of the three major Sr sources: carbonate dissolution, silicate weathering and submarine hydrothermal exchange. The normalised curve highlights the Neoproterozoic-Phanerozoic transition as a period of exceptionally high continental influence, indicating that this interval was characterised by a transient increase in global weathering rates and/or by the weathering of unusually radiogenic crustal rocks. Close correlation between the normalised 87Sr/86Sr curve, a published seawater δ34S curve and atmospheric pCO2 models is used here to argue that elevated chemical weathering rates were a major contributing factor to the steep rise in seawater 87Sr/86Sr from 650 Ma to 500 Ma. Elevated weathering rates during the Neoproterozoic-Cambrian interval led to increased nutrient availability, organic burial and to the further oxygenation of Earth's surface environment. Use of normalised seawater 87Sr/86Sr curves will, it is hoped, help to improve future geochemical models of Earth System dynamics

Subcultural and social innovations in the campaign for nuclear disarmament

In times of war and rumours of peace, when ‘terrorism’ and ‘torture’ are being revisited and redefined, one of the things some of us should be doing is talking and writing about cultures of peace. In what follows, I ask questions about the place of culture in protest by considering the cluster of issues around the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) from its founding in London in 1958. I look at instances of (sub)cultural innovation within the social and political spaces CND helped make available during its two high periods of activity and membership: the 1950s (campaigning against the hydrogen bomb) and the 1980s (campaigning against U.S.-controlled cruise missiles). What particularly interests me here is tracing the reticence and tensions within CND to the (sub)cultural practices with which it had varying degrees of involvement or complicity. It is not my wish to argue in any way that there was a kind of dead hand of CND stifling cultural innovation from within; rather I want to tease out ambivalences in some of its responses to the intriguing and energetic cultural practices it helped birth. CND was founded at a significant moment for emerging political cultures. Its energies and strategies contributed to the rise of the New Left, to new postcolonial identities and negotiations in Britain, and to the Anti-Apartheid Movement. In what ways did it attempt to police the ‘outlaw emotions’ it helped to release

Emergency plans in schools: Individualised disaster planning for students with impaired vision

In light of recent disasters, families, schools and communities are developing plans to manage school response. Few students have individualised safety plans built into their IEPs and most schools do not have inclusive plans for safety in the event of disaster. Carefully considered emergency plans, which address the needs of all students, could bring peace of mind to families and school personnel, could prevent the exacerbation of disability and could save lives. Disabled children are at great risk for displacement during rapid evacuations and slowed reunification with families following a disaster, among other disaster related risks. The objective of this research is to provide literature based recommendations for research and practice for safety planning in schools for children with impaired vision. - See more at: http://mro.massey.ac.nz/handle/10179/7516?show=full#sthash.B2F75Q1f.dpuffalsePublishe

Radical gardening: politics, idealism & rebellion in the garden

'War is the natural occupation of man … war-and gardening.' Winston Churchill to Siegfried Sassoon, 1918 In the common public perception, contemporary gardening is understood as suburban, as leisure activity, as television makeover opportunity. Its origins are seen as religious or spiritual (Garden of Eden), military (the clipped lawn, the ha-ha and defensive ditches), aristocratic or monarchical (the stately home, the Royal Horticultural Society). Radical Gardening travels an alternative route, through history and across landscape, linking propagation with propaganda. For everyday garden life is not only patio, barbecue, white picket fence, topiary, herbaceous border.… From window box to veggie box, from political plot to flower power, this book uncovers and celebrates moments, movements, gestures, of a people's approach to gardens and gardening. It weaves together garden history with the counterculture, stories of individual plants with discussion of government policy, the social history of campaign groups with the pleasure and dirt of hands in the earth, as well as media, pop and art references, to offer an informing and inspiring new take on an old subject