Weak gravitational lensing with CO galaxies

Optical weak lensing surveys have become a powerful tool for precision cosmology, but remain subject to systematic effects that can severely bias cosmological parameter estimates if not carefully removed. We discuss the possibility of performing complementary weak lensing surveys at radio/microwave frequencies, using detections of CO-emitting galaxies with resolved continuum images from ngVLA. This method has completely different systematic uncertainties to optical weak lensing shear measurements (e.g. in terms of blending, PSF, and redshift uncertainties), and can provide additional information to help disentangle intrinsic alignments from the cosmological shear signal. A combined analysis of optical and CO galaxy lensing surveys would therefore provide an extremely stringent validation of highly-sensitive future surveys with Euclid, LSST, and WFIRST, definitively rejecting biases due to residual systematic effects. A lensing survey on ngVLA would also provide valuable spectral (kinematic) and polarimetric information, which can be used to develop novel cosmological analyses that are not currently possible in the optical.Comment: Contribution to 2018, ASP Conference Series Monograph 7, "Science with a Next-Generation Very Large Array," Eric Murphy, ed., in preparatio

American Bubbles: Politics, Race, and Religion in Americans Core Friendship Networks

To better understand the composition of Americans' core friendship networks, PRRI designed a study to assess the scope and diversity of Americans' social relationships. The method of measuring Americans' core social networks was modeled after the General Social Survey and follows up on a study PRRI conducted in 2013. Respondents were asked to name people with whom they "discussed important matters" in the previous six months, regardless of the nature of the relationship or the frequency of interaction. This approach is designed to measure the ways in which individuals' choices and attitudes are influenced by their family and close friends

Competing Visions of America: An Evolving Identity or a Culture Under Attack?

This report highlights findings from the 2021 American Values Survey conducted by the Public Religion Research Institue (PRRI). The suvey asked participants of varying political leanings to describe their opionions on subjects ranging from Democracy to race and ethnicity to religion and many other aspects of American society in the 21st century

An Abundance of Riches: Cross-Task Comparisons of Semantic Richness Effects in Visual Word Recognition

There is considerable evidence (e.g., Pexman et al., 2008) that semantically rich words, which are associated with relatively more semantic information, are recognized faster across different lexical processing tasks. The present study extends this earlier work by providing the most comprehensive evaluation to date of semantic richness effects on visual word recognition performance. Specifically, using mixed effects analyses to control for the influence of correlated lexical variables, we considered the impact of number of features, number of senses, semantic neighborhood density, imageability, and body–object interaction across five visual word recognition tasks: standard lexical decision, go/no-go lexical decision, speeded pronunciation, progressive demasking, and semantic classification. Semantic richness effects could be reliably detected in all tasks of lexical processing, indicating that semantic representations, particularly their imaginal and featural aspects, play a fundamental role in visual word recognition. However, there was also evidence that the strength of certain richness effects could be flexibly and adaptively modulated by task demands, consistent with an intriguing interplay between task-specific mechanisms and differentiated semantic processing

Challenges in Moving Toward a More Inclusive Democracy: Findings from the 2022 American Values Survey

Approximately three-quarters of Americans agree that the country is heading in the wrong direction, but there is considerable division over whether the country needs to move backward — toward an idealized, homogeneous past — or forward, toward a more diverse future. Though most Americans favor moving forward, a sizable minority yearn for a country reminiscent of the 1950s, embrace the idea that God created America to be a new promised land for European Christians, view newcomers as a threat to American culture, and believe that society has become too soft and feminine. This minority is composed primarily of self-identified Republicans, white evangelical Protestants, and white Americans without a college degree. The majority of Americans, however, especially younger Americans, the religiously unaffiliated, and Democrats, are more likely to embrace a competing vision for the future of America that is more inclusive

Building future scenarios using cognitive mapping

A participatory approach for developing future scenarios through cognitive maps as a visual representation of mental models is presented. Applying long-term future visioning techniques in a workshop setting has traditionally been a significant challenge for construction industry practitioners with a predominantly short-term, project-based approach to day-to-day operational responsibilities. Six future scenario cognitive maps are presented to illustrate the process. The maps were digitised from A1-sized papers using Decision Explorer software. Several key characteristics of the resulting cognitive maps and lessons learnt for the organisation of industry-based workshops are discussed. The main benefits are derived from the interaction between participants during the mapping process whereby future issues and their interconnectivities are discussed. Limitations of the findings and further work are presented

GREAT3 results I: systematic errors in shear estimation and the impact of real galaxy morphology

We present first results from the third GRavitational lEnsing Accuracy Testing (GREAT3) challenge, the third in a sequence of challenges for testing methods of inferring weak gravitational lensing shear distortions from simulated galaxy images. GREAT3 was divided into experiments to test three specific questions, and included simulated space- and ground-based data with constant or cosmologically-varying shear fields. The simplest (control) experiment included parametric galaxies with a realistic distribution of signal-to-noise, size, and ellipticity, and a complex point spread function (PSF). The other experiments tested the additional impact of realistic galaxy morphology, multiple exposure imaging, and the uncertainty about a spatially-varying PSF; the last two questions will be explored in Paper II. The 24 participating teams competed to estimate lensing shears to within systematic error tolerances for upcoming Stage-IV dark energy surveys, making 1525 submissions overall. GREAT3 saw considerable variety and innovation in the types of methods applied. Several teams now meet or exceed the targets in many of the tests conducted (to within the statistical errors). We conclude that the presence of realistic galaxy morphology in simulations changes shear calibration biases by $\sim 1$ per cent for a wide range of methods. Other effects such as truncation biases due to finite galaxy postage stamps, and the impact of galaxy type as measured by the S\'{e}rsic index, are quantified for the first time. Our results generalize previous studies regarding sensitivities to galaxy size and signal-to-noise, and to PSF properties such as seeing and defocus. Almost all methods' results support the simple model in which additive shear biases depend linearly on PSF ellipticity.Comment: 32 pages + 15 pages of technical appendices; 28 figures; submitted to MNRAS; latest version has minor updates in presentation of 4 figures, no changes in content or conclusion

When a Repository Is Not Enough: Redesigning a Digital Ecosystem to Serve Scholarly Communication

INTRODUCTION Our library’s digital asset management system (DAMS) was no longer meeting digital asset management requirements or expanding scholarly communication needs. We formed a multiunit task force (TF) to (1) survey and identify existing and emerging institutional needs; (2) research available DAMS (open source and proprietary) and assess their potential fit; and (3) deploy software locally for in-depth testing and evaluation. DESCRIPTION OF PROGRAM We winnowed a field of 25 potential DAMS down to 5 for deployment and evaluation. The process included selection and identification of test collections and the creation of a multipart task based rubric based on library and campus needs assessments. Time constraints and DAMS deployment limitations prompted a move toward a new evaluation iteration: a shorter criteria-based rubric. LESSONS LEARNED We discovered that no single DAMS was “just right,” nor was any single DAMS a static product. Changing and expanding scholarly communication and digital needs could only be met by the more flexible approach offered by a multicomponent digital asset management ecosystem (DAME), described in this study. We encountered obstacles related to testing complex, rapidly evolving software available in a range of configurations and flavors (including tiers of vendor-hosted functionality) and time and capacity constraints curtailed in-depth testing. While we anticipate long-term benefits from “going further together” by including university-wide representation in the task force, there were trade-offs in distributing responsibilities and diffusing priorities. NEXT STEPS Shifts in scholarly communication at multiple levels—institutional, regional, consortial, national, and international—have already necessitated continual review and adjustment of our digital systems

GREAT3 results - I. Systematic errors in shear estimation and the impact of real galaxy morphology

We present first results from the third GRavitational lEnsing Accuracy Testing (GREAT3) challenge, the third in a sequence of challenges for testing methods of inferring weak gravitational lensing shear distortions from simulated galaxy images. GREAT3 was divided into experiments to test three specific questions, and included simulated space- and ground-based data with constant or cosmologically varying shear fields. The simplest (control) experiment included parametric galaxies with a realistic distribution of signal-to-noise, size, and ellipticity, and a complex point spread function (PSF). The other experiments tested the additional impact of realistic galaxy morphology, multiple exposure imaging, and the uncertainty about a spatially varying PSF; the last two questions will be explored in Paper II. The 24 participating teams competed to estimate lensing shears to within systematic error tolerances for upcoming Stage-IV dark energy surveys, making 1525 submissions overall. GREAT3 saw considerable variety and innovation in the types of methods applied. Several teams now meet or exceed the targets in many of the tests conducted (to within the statistical errors). We conclude that the presence of realistic galaxy morphology in simulations changes shear calibration biases by ∼1percent for a wide range of methods. Other effects such as truncation biases due to finite galaxy postage stamps, and the impact of galaxy type as measured by the Sérsic index, are quantified for the first time. Our results generalize previous studies regarding sensitivities to galaxy size and signal-to-noise, and to PSF properties such as seeing and defocus. Almost all methods' results support the simple model in which additive shear biases depend linearly on PSF ellipticit