A Philosophical Inquiry into the Role of Universities in American Democratic Society

The infusion of market-logic has undermined American universities as democratic institutions. This issue was examined through an analysis of what role universities play in democratic governance. As a philosophical inquiry, the data were seminal texts from political science, education, and philosophy, such as those by Alexis de Tocqueville, John Dewey, and Henry Giroux. The most salient theme unveiled by this study was how central universities are to functional democracy, both as key fixtures and critics. However, universities have adopted market-logic ideologies, which inhibit universities’ abilities to function as democratic institutions. The study concludes by calling for a reinvigoration of the public, requiring universities to maintain a public nature. Such transparency lives in tension with neoliberal efforts to privatize public institutions, so universities must provide spaces for debates on that tension. In this way, universities will be able to embody the democratic dispositions necessary for supporting and defending democratic values

Reusing Data and Metadata to Create New Metadata Through Machine-Learning & Other Programmatic Methods

Recent improvements in natural language processing (NLP) enable metadata to be created programmatically from reused original metadata or even the dataset itself. Transfer-learning applied to NLP has greatly improved performance and reduced training data requirements. In this talk, well compare machine-generated metadata to human-generated metadata and discuss characteristics of metadata and data archives that affect suitability for machine-learning reuse of metadata. Where as human-generated metadata is often populated once, populated from the perspective of data supplier, populated by many individuals with different words for the same thing, and limited in length, machine-generated metadata can be updated any number of times, generated from the perspective of any user, constrained to a standardized set of terms that can be evolved over time, and be any length required. Machine-learning generated metadata offers benefits but also additional needs in terms of version control, process transparency, human-computer interaction, and IT requirements. As a successful example, well discuss how a dataset of abstracts and associated human-tagged keywords from a standardized list of several thousand keywords were used to create a machine-learning model that predicted keyword metadata for open-source code projects on code.nasa.gov. Well also discuss a less successful example from data.nasa.gov to show how data archive architecture and characteristics of initial metadata can be strong controls on how easy it is to leverage programmatic methods to reuse metadata to create additional metadata

Objective benefits, participant perceptions and retention rates of a New Zealand community-based, older-adult exercise programme

INTRODUCTION: Most exercise studies for older adults have been university- or hospital-based. Little is known about the benefits and factors influencing long-term participation in community-based exercise programmes, especially in New Zealand. AIM: To quantify the objective benefits, participant perceptions and retention rates of a New Zealand community-based exercise programme for adults (60 years or older). METHODS: Study 1 involved assessing the benefits of 12 weeks’ training on a convenience sample of 62 older adults commencing the never2old Active Ageing programme. Study 2 assessed the perceptions of 150 current participants on a variety of programme components that could act as barriers or facilitators to continued engagement. Study 3 assessed the retention rates of 264 participants in the programme over a two-year period. RESULTS: Significant improvements in many physical functional scores were observed in Study 1 (5–30 percentile points; p less than 0.05). Questionnaire responses from participants in Study 2 indicated many xsi:type=""benefits (positive responses from 67–95% on various questions) and that core components of the programme were rated very highly (64–99% on various components). Retention rates were high, with Study 3 finding 57% of participants still engaging in the programme at the end of the two-year period. DISCUSSION: A community-based exercise programme for older adults can improve many objective and subjective measures of physical fitness and functional performance and have good retention rates. General practitioners and other allied health professionals in New Zealand should consider promoting programmes, such as the never2old Active Ageing programme, to their older patients

INVESTIGATING THE USE OF SAMPLE ENTROPY TO DETECT FATIGUE

Sample entropy can sensitively identify changes in biological signal regularity. The aim of this study was to investigate whether sample entropy could detect such change in human movement which may be attributable to fatigue or other factors. The regularity of kettlebell trajectories from simulated kettlebell sport competition performed by five experienced lifters was assessed using a novel moving window technique. Resultant entropy estimate trajectories indicate sensitivity to changes in regularity. Decrements in grip strength indicate this may be attributable to fatigue though other possibilities exist. The ability to easily model the resultant entropy trajectories is also demonstrated. The technique holds potential for use by practitioners though more work is required before implementation

The Drosophila genome nexus: a population genomic resource of 623 Drosophila melanogaster genomes, including 197 from a single ancestral range population.

Hundreds of wild-derived Drosophila melanogaster genomes have been published, but rigorous comparisons across data sets are precluded by differences in alignment methodology. The most common approach to reference-based genome assembly is a single round of alignment followed by quality filtering and variant detection. We evaluated variations and extensions of this approach and settled on an assembly strategy that utilizes two alignment programs and incorporates both substitutions and short indels to construct an updated reference for a second round of mapping prior to final variant detection. Utilizing this approach, we reassembled published D. melanogaster population genomic data sets and added unpublished genomes from several sub-Saharan populations. Most notably, we present aligned data from phase 3 of the Drosophila Population Genomics Project (DPGP3), which provides 197 genomes from a single ancestral range population of D. melanogaster (from Zambia). The large sample size, high genetic diversity, and potentially simpler demographic history of the DPGP3 sample will make this a highly valuable resource for fundamental population genetic research. The complete set of assemblies described here, termed the Drosophila Genome Nexus, presently comprises 623 consistently aligned genomes and is publicly available in multiple formats with supporting documentation and bioinformatic tools. This resource will greatly facilitate population genomic analysis in this model species by reducing the methodological differences between data sets

The Life and Work of the anti-apartheid movement within the Church of Scotland from 1975 to 1985

This article analyses the impact of the Church of Scotland (CoS) magazine Life and Work on the Dutch Reformed Church and other individuals and bodies during the period 1975–1985. It does this through investigating the editor’s approach to South African affairs and the nature of contributions that he published. Significantly different views were expressed by those who had lengthy exposure to the South African context as missionaries of the CoS and ‘tourists’ (holiday makers, relatives of residents in South Africa and church visitors). As the period progressed, changing attitudes are discerned that came more and more into line with the anti-apartheid stance of the General Assembly expressed through its boards and committees

Positional Differences in Running Distance and Speed Among Collegiate Rugby 7s Players

Rugby sevens (7s) is an anaerobic contact sport consisting of seven players per team, with two 7-minute halves per match played in tournament style with several matches over up to a three-day event. However, due to the nature of the collegiate game, less funding, and their academic schedule, the tournaments are commonly consolidated into one day (minimum 3, as many as 6 matches). While there are six positions in 7s, this study divided them into three groups: Forwards (FW), Backs (BK), and Scrum halves (SH). Purpose: The purpose of this investigation was to identify the physiological and physical demands between positions of Indiana University 7s club players. Methods: Data was retrospectively analyzed from male (n = 15) collegiate rugby 7s players. Data was collected at Indiana University using GameTraka (Sports Performance Tracking, Victoria, Australia) and data represented here are from one tournament consisting of 5 matches on the same day. Participants wore Global Positioning System (GPS) units from which information on distances run per minute by each position group (FW, BK, and SH) was measured within six different speed zones. A one-way ANOVA was used to determine between group differences by each half of play with Tukey post-hoc analyses to reveal differences between positions. A two-way repeated measures ANOVA was used to determine if differences existed across matches by player position. A p-value of \u3c0.05 was set to determine the level of statistical significance. Results: During the first half no significant differences were seen. In the second half of match #1, significant differences were found in Zone 1 running (p = 0.004) indicating that BK ran more than both FW (p = 0.003) and SH (p = 0.05). No significant differences were found in the second half of matches 2-4. Match #5 second half results indicated significant difference in distance per minute (p = 0.022) with both FW (p = 0.036) and SH (p = 0.041) covering more distance than BK. A main effect for zone 1 (p = 0.015) and zone 4 (p = 0.003) were observed with both FW (p = 0.029) and SH (p = 0.003) higher than BK. No significant differences were found across the five matches between position groups. GPS data indicate that the primary differences between position groups are observed in the second halves of rugby 7s matches. Data suggests that FW and SH have a higher distance covered per minute and spend more time in the different running zones as the number of matches increases. This could be a byproduct of a change in the quality of play as peripheral fatigue sets in as the match progresses. Conclusion: Data presented here can affect the training approaches for the various position groups as the data suggests a greater amount of physiological exertion is present in the later matches of tournament play. Data also may be useful to coaches in the strategic utilization of substituting players as substitutions per match are capped in rugby 7s

The Local Nanohertz Gravitational-Wave Landscape From Supermassive Black Hole Binaries

Supermassive black hole binaries (SMBHBs) in the 10 million to 10 billion $M_\odot$ range form in galaxy mergers, and live in galactic nuclei with large and poorly constrained concentrations of gas and stars. There are currently no observations of merging SMBHBs--- it is in fact possible that they stall at their final parsec of separation and never merge. While LIGO has detected high frequency GWs, SMBHBs emit GWs in the nanohertz to millihertz band. This is inaccessible to ground-based interferometers, but possible with Pulsar Timing Arrays (PTAs). Using data from local galaxies in the 2 Micron All-Sky Survey, together with galaxy merger rates from Illustris, we find that there are on average $91\pm7$ sources emitting GWs in the PTA band, and $7\pm2$ binaries which will never merge. Local unresolved SMBHBs can contribute to GW background anisotropy at a level of $\sim20\%$, and if the GW background can be successfully isolated, GWs from at least one local SMBHB can be detected in 10 years.Comment: submitted to Nature Astronomy (reformatted for arXiv

University of North Florida Environmental Center Annual Report 2019

2019 Annual Report of the Environmental Center at the University of North Floridahttps://digitalcommons.unf.edu/ecenter_annual/1007/thumbnail.jp