Compositional strategy of the book of Judges: an inductive, rhetorical study

Under historical critical scholarship, the book of Judges is generally considered a composite work comprising three distinct and essentially unrelated sections. The central section (2:6-16:31), redacted out of traditional source material, is believed to be originally a part of the larger Deuteronomistic History that runs from Deuteronomy to Kings. The prologue (1:1-2:5) and epilogue (17:1-21:25), on the other hand, are seen as independent compositions that are only artificially appended onto the central section at a later stage of the book's redactional history.In the last two decades, there has been an increasing tendency for the book to be read synchronically as an integrated whole. Although synchronic scholars have drawn attention to the presence of thematic links that connect the different sections of the book, they have yet to justify their integrative approach by exploring whether such links are established by design, and if so, whether they imply compositional unity for the book as a whole in its current canonical form. The present thesis thus seeks to remedy this lack.In Chapter 1, the present thesis is placed in its historical context as scholarship on Judges in the past century is critically surveyed. In Chapters 2-4, rhetorical links between the prologue and the epilogue, the epilogue and central section, and the prologue and central sections are respectively examined in detail. As the evidence seems to suggest that such links are established by conscious design, the implication is that at the compositional level, a closer relationship than has been recognised thus far may indeed exist between the three sections.Recognising that any claim of compositional unity for Judges would inevitably have to answer questions regarding apparent discrepancies in viewpoints within the book, in Chapter 5, the issue of kingship, concerning which critical scholars have discerned divergent voices within the book, is explored. Specifically, it is argued that the "king" referred to in the allegedly pro-monarchic refrain cannot be a reference to the Israelite monarchy to come, but is more likely a reference to YHWH's kingship over His people. Such an understanding would therefore eliminate the problem of divergent viewpoints within the bookIn the final chapter, the various observations and conclusions drawn in previous chapters are brought together, and a case is put forth that the person responsible for the selection and arrangement of the material in the central section must have been the very same person who composed the prologue and epilogue of Judges. This means that the current canonical form of Judges may indeed be a unified piece of composition that can justifiably be read as an integrative whole. Moreover, based on the rhetorical concerns discernible through the various links, it is also possible to identify the implied rhetorical agenda of the book as a call for the rerecognition of the kingly authority of YHWH. This would constitute an implied solution to the progressive deterioration witnessed throughout the book, both at the national and leadership level

Electrostatic solvation free energies of charged hard spheres using molecular dynamics with density functional theory interactions

Determining the solvation free energies of single ions in water is one of the most fundamental problems in physical chemistry and yet many unresolved questions remain. In particular, the ability to decompose the solvation free energy into simple and intuitive contributions will have important implications for models of electrolyte solution. Here, we provide definitions of the various types of single ion solvation free energies based on different simulation protocols. We calculate solvation free energies of charged hard spheres using density functional theory interaction potentials with molecular dynamics simulation (DFT-MD) and isolate the effects of charge and cavitation, comparing to the Born (linear response) model. We show that using uncorrected Ewald summation leads to unphysical values for the single ion solvation free energy and that charging free energies for cations are approximately linear as a function of charge but that there is a small non-linearity for small anions. The charge hydration asymmetry (CHA) for hard spheres, determined with quantum mechanics, is much larger than for the analogous real ions. This suggests that real ions, particularly anions, are significantly more complex than simple charged hard spheres, a commonly employed representation.Comment: 28 pages, 5 figure

Real single ion solvation free energies with quantum mechanical simulation

Single ion solvation free energies are one of the most important properties of electrolyte solutions and yet there is ongoing debate about what these values are. Only the values for neutral ion pairs are known. Here, we use DFT interaction potentials with molecular dynamics simulation (DFT-MD) combined with a modified version of the quasi-chemical theory (QCT) to calculate these energies for the lithium and fluoride ions. A method to correct for the error in the DFT functional is developed and very good agreement with the experimental value for the lithium fluoride pair is obtained. Moreover, this method partitions the energies into physically intuitive terms such as surface potential, cavity and charging energies which are amenable to descriptions with reduced models. Our research suggests that lithium's solvation free energy is dominated by the free energetics of a charged hard sphere, whereas fluoride exhibits significant quantum mechanical behavior that cannot be simply described with a reduced model.Comment: 13 pages, 4 figure

Non-Supersymmetric Seiberg Duality, Orientifold QCD and Non-Critical Strings

We propose an electric-magnetic duality and conjecture an exact conformal window for a class of non-supersymmetric U(N_c) gauge theories with fermions in the (anti)symmetric representation of the gauge group and N_f additional scalar and fermion flavors. The duality exchanges N_c with N_f -N_c \mp 4 leaving N_f invariant, and has common features with Seiberg duality in N=1 SQCD with SU or SO/Sp gauge group. At large N the duality holds due to planar equivalence with N=1 SQCD. At finite N we embed these gauge theories in a setup with D-branes and orientifolds in a non-supersymmetric, but tachyon-free, non-critical type 0B string theory and argue in favor of the duality in terms of boundary and crosscap state monodromies as in analogous supersymmetric situations. One can verify explicitly that the resulting duals have matching global anomalies. Finally, we comment on the moduli space of these gauge theories and discuss other potential non-supersymmetric examples that could exhibit similar dualities.Comment: 45 pages, 1 figur

Curvature Corrections to Dynamics of Domain Walls

The most usual procedure for deriving curvature corrections to effective actions for topological defects is subjected to a critical reappraisal. A logically unjustified step (leading to overdetermination) is identified and rectified, taking the standard domain wall case as an illustrative example. Using the appropriately corrected procedure, we obtain a new exact (analytic) expression for the corresponding effective action contribution of quadratic order in the wall width, in terms of the intrinsic Ricci scalar $R$ and the extrinsic curvature scalar $K$. The result is proportional to $cK^2-R$ with the coefficient given by $c\simeq 2$. The resulting form of the ensuing dynamical equations is obtained in terms of the second fundamental form and the Dalembertian of its trace, K. It is argued that this does not invalidate the physical conclusions obtained from the "zero rigidity" ansatz $c=0$ used in previous work.Comment: 19 pages plain TeX, 2 figures include

The Influence of Formulation, Buffering, pH and Divalent Cations on the Activity of Endothall on Hydrilla.

Endothall has been used as an aquatic herbicide for more than 40 years and provides very effective weed control of many weeds. Early research regarding the mechanism-of-action of endothall contradicts the symptomology normally associated with the product. Recent studies suggest endothall is a respiratory toxin but the mechanism-of-action remains unknown. To further elucidate the activity of endothall, several endothall formulations were evaluated for their effects on ion leakage, oxygen consumption and photosynthetic oxygen evolution from hydrilla shoot tips. The influence of pH, buffering and divalent cations was also evaluated. (PDF contains 6 pages.

Higher-dimensional resolution of dilatonic black hole singularities

We show that the four-dimensional extreme dilaton black hole with dilaton coupling constant $a= \sqrt{p/(p+2)}$ can be interpreted as a {\it completely non-singular}, non-dilatonic, black $p$-brane in $(4+p)$ dimensions provided that $p$ is {\it odd}. Similar results are obtained for multi-black holes and dilatonic extended objects in higher spacetime dimensions. The non-singular black $p$-brane solutions include the self-dual three brane of ten-dimensional N=2B supergravity and a multi-fivebrane solution of eleven-dimensional supergravity. In the case of a supersymmetric non-dilatonic $p$-brane solution of a supergravity theory, we show that it saturates a bound on the energy per unit $p$-volume.Comment: 27 pages, R/94/28, UCSBTH-94-35 (Comments added to the discussion section

Torsion matrices over commutative integral group rings

Let ZA be the integral group ring of a finite abelian group A, and n a positive integer greater than 5. We provide conditions on n and A under which every torsion matrix U, with identity augmentation, in GLn(ZA) is conjugate in GLn(QA) to a diagonal matrix with group elements on the diagonal. When A is infinite, we show that under similar conditions, U has a group trace and is stably conjugate to such a diagonal matrix

Full-Field, Carrier-Less, Polarization-Diversity, Direct Detection Receiver based on Phase Retrieval

We realize dual-polarization full-field recovery using intensity only measurements and phase retrieval techniques based on dispersive elements. 30-Gbaud QPSK waveforms are transmitted over 520-km standard single-mode fiber and equalized from the receiver outputs using 2X2 MIMO