Algorithmic accountability and digital justice: A critical assessment of technical and sociotechnical approaches.

The concept of digital justice is intended to open up discourse about strategies for bringing relief to those who believe they have been discriminated against or harmed by algorithmic decision making. Digital justice has depended on algorithmic accountability, a means by which entities can be held accountable for the consequences of algorithmic decision making. This paper critically examines the concept of algorithmic accountability to assess its utility as a ground for digital justice and argues that it is fraught with difficulties. After discussing digital justice and algorithmic discrimination, algorithmic accountability is decomposed into two types, technical and sociotechnical. These approaches are critically assessed and a cautionary note is struck about the difficulty of enacting algorithmic accountability. If this argument is persuasive, it implies that the concept of digital justice also has difficulties. The paper concludes with suggestions for moving forward that do not use either version of algorithmic accountability

Chinese collective trolling

The vast majority of research on online trolling focused on Western cultures. Given the role context plays in shaping online interactions, it is important to take into account its socio‐cultural context and investigate the role of national culture, by conducting research into trolling in Eastern cultures. In this paper, we attempt to begin addressing this gap by focusing on Chinese collective trolling, looking at Sina Weibo's PG One case. Specifically, we aim to identify who are the major players, what are the metaphors they use, and what are the major trolling tactics employed in Chinese collective trolling event. Using a mixed‐method approach, we analyzed 2,004 posts and 9,967 comments on Sina Weibo's PG One case, of which 480 were sampled for thematic content analysis. Major contributions of this study include an account of collective trolling in Chinese cultural context that is characterized by role switching between trolls, bystanders, and victims during the various stages of the event. We conclude with suggestion for future research directions

Graphicons and Tactics in Satirical Trolling on Tumblr.com

Internet trolling is inherently multimodal, relying on both textual and graphical means of communication (or “graphicons”). We examined how satire and ideological trolls who use graphicons on the microblogging site Tumblr.com, use knowledge of local culture as part of their trolling tactics. Based on a qualitative thematic analysis of 172 trolling posts (that include 284 graphicons), we identified 7 Tumblr satire troll tactics: the lying tactic, the derailment tactic, the parodic exaggeration tactic, the misappropriation of jargon tactic, the straight man (or “comical seriousness”) tactic, the troll reveal tactic, and the politeness tactic. We also found that ideologically extremizing language was the most commonly used outrage tactic and that trolls used graphicons frequently as flame baiting prompts and for tone modification

Scientific Paradigms and Urban Development: Alternative Models

Urban sprawl's negative impacts have been amply demonstrated, starting as long as 30 years ago, and most North American urban plans have, somewhere, reference to sprawl as bad policy (or, perhaps, absence of policy). Yet North Americans continue to tolerate the construction of more and more suburban subdivisions. This paper suggests an answer to this paradox. We argue that sprawl's attractiveness – if one can call it that – is buried deep in North American cultural predispositions, which we trace to quite specific interpretations of the mechanistic worldview that emerged from 17th and 18th century revolutions in natural philosophy. North American culture is a scientific culture as well as a suburban one. If mechanistic science and its peculiar view of nature is so pervasive and if suburban sprawl is both pervasive and dysfunctional, then this particular form of science and its cultural roots need to be carefully examined. We do this from the perspective of the 21st century, when quantum physics and new discoveries in the ecological and biological sciences are suggesting that many commonly accepted assumptions about physical reality inherited from 17th and 18th century science are flawed

Plasma arginine vasopressin concentrations in epileptics under monotherapy

Plasma arginine vasopressin concentrations were determined by radio-immunoassay in 112 adult epileptics who were taking carbamazepine, phenytoin, primidone, or sodium valproate in long-term monotherapy, and in 19 controls. No significant difference was found between the groups, but some epileptics taking carbamazepine and primidone showed low values. Serum concentrations of carbamazepine did not correlate with the concentrations of plasma arginine vasopressin. In conclusion, there was no evidence of a stimulating effect of chronic carbamazepine medication or a special inhibiting effect of phenytoin on the release of vasopressin arginine from the posterior pituitary

Alfred Russel Wallace and the Antivaccination Movement in Victorian England

Historical analysis can play a major role in public health policy

Using Rheo-Small-Angle Neutron Scattering to Understand How Functionalised Dipeptides Form Gels

We explore the use of rheo-small-angle neutron scattering as a method to collect structural information from neutron scattering simultaneously with rheology to understand how low-molecular-weight hydrogels form and behave under shear. We examine three different gelling hydrogel systems to assess what structures are formed and how these influence the rheology. Furthermore, we probe what is happening to the network during syneresis and why the gels do not recover after an applied strain. All this information is vital when considering gels for applications such as 3D-printing and injection

Work-Unit Absenteeism: Effects of Satisfaction, Commitment, Labor Market Conditions, and Time

Prior research is limited in explaining absenteeism at the unit level and over time. We developed and tested a model of unit-level absenteeism using five waves of data collected over six years from 115 work units in a large state agency. Unit-level job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and local unemployment were modeled as time-varying predictors of absenteeism. Shared satisfaction and commitment interacted in predicting absenteeism but were not related to the rate of change in absenteeism over time. Unit-level satisfaction and commitment were more strongly related to absenteeism when units were located in areas with plentiful job alternatives

On opportunistic software reuse

The availability of open source assets for almost all imaginable domains has led the software industry toopportunistic design-an approach in which people develop new software systems in an ad hoc fashion by reusing and combining components that were not designed to be used together. In this paper we investigate this emerging approach. We demonstrate the approach with an industrial example in whichNode.jsmodules and various subsystems are used in an opportunistic way. Furthermore, to study opportunistic reuse as a phenomenon, we present the results of three contextual interviews and a survey with reuse practitioners to understand to what extent opportunistic reuse offers improvements over traditional systematic reuse approaches.Peer reviewe