Occam\u27s Beard: Belief, Disbelief, and Contested Meanings in American Ufology

The purpose of this dissertation is to critically examine the emergence, maintenance, evolution, and dissemination of belief traditions in New Mexico and the United States that are most commonly associated with the UFO phenomenon. This critical analysis incorporates theoretical frameworks from a multitude of interrelated disciplines, including folklore, history, anthropology, popular culture studies, sociology, and psychology. The primary goal of this dissertation involves the attempt to formulate a typology of UFO accounts in American culture, and how said accounts are interpreted, communicated, and publicly evaluated. To achieve this end, a database of UFO-related experiences was compiled in New Mexico and accompanied with a sample of extensive firsthand interviews from New Mexico and other parts of the United States, collected from 2007 to 2009. These data were analyzed for both their correlation to socio-demographic variables, and for patterns and variations in narrative form and content. The findings of this dissertation suggest that personal experience narratives--or memorates--containing UFO-related content remain relatively common among a sample New Mexican population. Utilizing an interdisciplinary approach, the overarching explanation for this commonality involves the complex interplay of a variety of social factors, including: the continued presence of Cold War-related anxieties and cultural paranoia; the ubiquitous presence of UFO and alien imagery in American popular culture; broad-based public mistrust in the scientific establishment; the usefulness of the phenomenon in modern technospiritual reconciliations; the occasional presence of a seemingly core experience comprised of near universal characteristics, and the influence of UFO-centric cognitive models in the perceptions, interpretations, and reconsiderations of said experiences. These findings further suggest that many proponents of UFO-based belief traditions publicly position their opinions against a hostile skeptical community. To gain further insight into this competing perspective, a sampling of self-professed skeptics were interviewed in 2008. Their attitudes about the UFO phenomenon and other anomalous belief systems generally supported the idea of a broad competition in which proponents and skeptics grapple over cultural authority regarding public consensus on normative belief and experience in American life. The UFO phenomenon remains a key component in this public struggle, while continuing to symbolize deeper social anxieties involving issues of scientific ethics, governmental secrecy, racial disharmony, and spiritual hybridity

The Digital Divide: Current and Future Research Directions

The digital divide refers to the separation between those who have access to digital information and communications technology (ICT) and those who do not. Many believe that universal access to ICT would bring about a global community of interaction, commerce, and learning resulting in higher standards of living and improved social welfare. However, the digital divide threatens this outcome, leading many public policy makers to debate the best way to bridge the divide. Much of the research on the digital divide focuses on first order effects regarding who has access to the technology, but some work addresses the second order effects of inequality in the ability to use the technology among those who do have access. In this paper, we examine both first and second order effects of the digital divide at three levels of analysis ? the individual level, the organizational level, and the global level. At each level, we survey the existing research noting the theoretical perspective taken in the work, the research methodology employed, and the key results that were obtained. We then suggest a series of research questions at each level of analysis to guide researchers seeking to further examine the digital divide and how it impacts citizens, managers, and economies

An Economic Study of the Effect of Android Platform Fragmentation on Security Updates

Vendors in the Android ecosystem typically customize their devices by modifying Android Open Source Project (AOSP) code, adding in-house developed proprietary software, and pre-installing third-party applications. However, research has documented how various security problems are associated with this customization process. We develop a model of the Android ecosystem utilizing the concepts of game theory and product differentiation to capture the competition involving two vendors customizing the AOSP platform. We show how the vendors are incentivized to differentiate their products from AOSP and from each other, and how prices are shaped through this differentiation process. We also consider two types of consumers: security-conscious consumers who understand and care about security, and na\"ive consumers who lack the ability to correctly evaluate security properties of vendor-supplied Android products or simply ignore security. It is evident that vendors shirk on security investments in the latter case. Regulators such as the U.S. Federal Trade Commission have sanctioned Android vendors for underinvestment in security, but the exact effects of these sanctions are difficult to disentangle with empirical data. Here, we model the impact of a regulator-imposed fine that incentivizes vendors to match a minimum security standard. Interestingly, we show how product prices will decrease for the same cost of customization in the presence of a fine, or a higher level of regulator-imposed minimum security.Comment: 22nd International Conference on Financial Cryptography and Data Security (FC 2018

IDENTIFIKASI KERUSAKAN PINTU AIR DI DAERAH IRIGASI ALALE KABUPATEN BONE BOLANGO

ABSTRAK   Pintu air merupakan bangunan penunjang pada suatu bendungan irigasi dan bendungan pengendali banjir Daerah Irigasi Alale terbagi antara dua daerah layanan yakni Kabupaten Bone Bolango areal persawahan potensial yang dilayani sebesar 565 Ha dan Kota Gorontalo luas areal persawahan potensial yang dilayani sebesar 51,15 Ha. Rusaknya pintu air menyebabkan kurang optimalnya pelayanan pengairan di daerah Irigasi Alale khususnya yang ada di Kabupaten Bone Bolango dengan tidak optimal, untuk itu perlu dilakukan identifikasi kerusakan pintu air di daerah irigasi alale.   Penelitian ini dilakukan survei pada jaringan Irigasi Alale dari Bangunan Alale 1 sampai Bangunan Alale 6 hal ini bertujuan untuk mengetahui jenis jenis kerusakan yang terjadi pada pintu pintu air den seberapa besar tingkat kerusakan yang terjadi. Dari hasil survey tersebut akan dapat diketahui perencanaan anggaran biaya yang dikeluarkan untuk memperbaiki pintu air yang ada dijaringan Irigasi Alale. Metode yang dilakukan dalam penelitian ini adalah metode survey. Hasil dari penelitian diketahui penyebab kerusakan yang terjadi pada pintu air di jaringan Irigasi Alale terdiri dari beberapa hal, yaitu faktor alam dan juga faktor kesalahan dari manusia dalam pengoperasian yang terjadi. Tingkat kerusakan yang terjadi di jaringan irigas i Alale terdiri dari berbagai macam tingkat kerusakan ringan seperti korosi ringan, tingkat kerusakan sedang patahnya baut penyangga serta kerusakan berat rusaknya daun pintu, miringnya tiang ulir dan keausan pada brons. hasil identifikasi kerusakan pintu air maka anggaran biaya yang diperlukan dalam perbaikan pintu air adalah sebesar Rp.8.281.850   Kata Kunci : Irigasi, Kerusakan, Pintu Ai

Gravity wave activity in the lower atmosphere: Seasonal and latitudinal variations

A climatology of gravity wave activity in the lower atmosphere based on high-resolution radiosonde measurements provided by the Australian Bureau of Meteorology is presented. These data are ideal for investigating gravity wave activity and its variation with position and time. Observations from 18 meteorological stations within Australia and Antarctica, covering a latitude range of 12°S – 68°S and a longitude range of 78°E – 159°E, are discussed. Vertical wavenumber power spectra of normalized temperature fluctuations are calculated within both the troposphere and the lower stratosphere and are compared with the predictions of current gravity wave saturation theories. Estimates of important model parameters such as the total gravity wave energy per unit mass are also presented. The vertical wavenumber power spectra are found to remain approximately invariant with time and geographic location with only one significant exception. Spectral amplitudes observed within the lower stratosphere are found to be consistent with theoretical expectations but the amplitudes observed within the troposphere are consistently larger than expected, often by as much as a factor of about 3. Seasonal variations of stratospheric wave energy per unit mass are identified with maxima occurring during the low-latitude wet season and during the midlatitude winter. These variations do not exceed a factor of about 2. Similar variations are not found in the troposphere where temperature fluctuations are likely to be contaminated by convection and inversions. The largest values of wave energy density are typically found near the tropopause.Simon J. Allen and Robert A. Vincen

Psychotic symptoms in post traumatic stress disorder: a case illustration and literature review

Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a condition being increasingly recognized. The diagnosis is based on the re-experiencing of a traumatic event. There have been reports of the presence of psychotic symptoms in some cases of PTSD. This may represent increased severity or a different diagnostic clinical entity. It has also been suggested that psychotic symptoms may be over-represented in the Hispanic population. In this manuscript, we describe a case to illustrate this relationship and we review the current literature on the relationship of psychotic symptoms among PTSD patients. The implications regarding diagnosis, treatment, and prognosis are discussed. Keywords: Psychosis; PTSD; Trauma; Hallucinations; Delusions; Posttraumatic stress disorderSA Psych Rev 2003;6: 21-2

Relativistic contraction and related effects in noninertial frames

Although there is no relative motion among different points on a rotating disc, each point belongs to a different noninertial frame. This fact, not recognized in previous approaches to the Ehrenfest paradox and related problems, is exploited to give a correct treatment of a rotating ring and a rotating disc. Tensile stresses are recovered, but, contrary to the prediction of the standard approach, it is found that an observer on the rim of the disc will see equal lengths of other differently moving objects as an inertial observer whose instantaneous position and velocity are equal to that of the observer on the rim. The rate of clocks at various positions, as seen by various observers, is also discussed. Some results are generalized for observers arbitrarily moving in a flat or a curved spacetime. The generally accepted formula for the space line element in a non-time-orthogonal frame is found inappropriate in some cases. Use of Fermi coordinates leads to the result that for any observer the velocity of light is isotropic and is equal to $c$, providing that it is measured by propagating a light beam in a small neighborhood of the observer.Comment: 15 pages, significantly revised version, title changed, to appear in Phys. Rev.