Natural Philosophy and Theology in Seventeenth-Century England

This thesis explores the disciplinary relationship between natural philosophy (the study of nature or body) and theology (the study of the divine) in seventeenth-century England. Early modern disciplines had two essential functions. First, they set the rules and boundaries of argument – knowledge was therefore legitimised and made intelligible within disciplinary contexts. And second, disciplines structured pedagogy, parcelling knowledge so it could be studied and taught. This dual role meant disciplines were epistemic and social structures. They were composed of various elements, and consequently, they related to one another in a variety of complex ways. As such, the contestability of early modern knowledge was reflected in contestability of disciplines – their content and boundaries. Francis Bacon, Thomas White, Henry More and John Locke are the focus of the four chapters respectively, with Joseph Glanvill, Thomas Hobbes, other Cambridge divines, and a variety of medieval scholastic authors providing context, comparison and reinforcement. These case studies offer a cross-section of seventeenth-century thought and belief; they embody different professional and institutional interests, and represent an array of philosophical, theological and religious positions. Nevertheless, each of them, in different ways, and to different effect, put the relationship between natural philosophy and theology at the heart of their intellectual endeavours. Together, they demonstrate that, in seventeenth-century England, natural philosophy and theology were in flux, and that their disciplinary relationship was complex, entailing degrees of overlap and alienation. Primarily, natural philosophy and theology investigated the nature and constitution of the world, and, together, determined the relationship between its constituent parts – natural and divine. However, they also reflected the scope of man’s cognitive faculties, establishing which bits of the world were knowable, and outlining the grounds for, and appropriate degrees of, certainty and belief. Thus, both disciplines, and their relationship with one another, contributed to broad discussions about, truth, certainty and opinion. This, in turn, established normative guidelines. To some extent, the rightness or wrongness of belief and behaviour was determined by particular definitions of, and relationship between, natural philosophy and theology. Consequently, man’s place in the world – his relationship with nature, God and his fellow man – was triangulated through these disciplines.CHES

The Irish Rover: Phil Lynott and the Search for Identity

Phil Lynott, the lead singer of the rock band Thin Lizzy, was a complex character. An illegitimate black child who grew up in a working-class, Catholic district of Dublin, Ireland in the 1950s, Lynott spent his life searching for a sense of belonging, something which he explored through rock and roll. This study uses Lynott’s song lyrics to investigate his quest for identity. In particular, it identifies the many recurring themes and archetypes in his music that offered multifaceted self-portraits of his internal conflict between being black, Irish, illegitimate, a rockstar, a Lothario, a son, a father, and a husband, all at the same time

A new polygenic score for refractive error improves detection of children at risk of high myopia but not the prediction of those at risk of myopic macular degeneration

Background High myopia (HM), defined as a spherical equivalent refractive error (SER) ≤ −6.00 diopters (D), is a leading cause of sight impairment, through myopic macular degeneration (MMD). We aimed to derive an improved polygenic score (PGS) for predicting children at risk of HM and to test if a PGS is predictive of MMD after accounting for SER. Methods The PGS was derived from genome-wide association studies in participants of UK Biobank, CREAM Consortium, and Genetic Epidemiology Research on Adult Health and Aging. MMD severity was quantified by a deep learning algorithm. Prediction of HM was quantified as the area under the receiver operating curve (AUROC). Prediction of severe MMD was assessed by logistic regression. Findings In independent samples of European, African, South Asian and East Asian ancestry, the PGS explained 19% (95% confidence interval 17–21%), 2% (1–3%), 8% (7–10%) and 6% (3–9%) of the variation in SER, respectively. The AUROC for HM in these samples was 0.78 (0.75–0.81), 0.58 (0.53–0.64), 0.71 (0.69–0.74) and 0.67 (0.62–0.72), respectively. The PGS was not associated with the risk of MMD after accounting for SER: OR = 1.07 (0.92–1.24). Interpretation Performance of the PGS approached the level required for clinical utility in Europeans but not in other ancestries. A PGS for refractive error was not predictive of MMD risk once SER was accounted fo

Genome-wide association meta-analysis of corneal curvature identifies novel loci and shared genetic influences across axial length and refractive error

Abstract: Corneal curvature, a highly heritable trait, is a key clinical endophenotype for myopia - a major cause of visual impairment and blindness in the world. Here we present a trans-ethnic meta-analysis of corneal curvature GWAS in 44,042 individuals of Caucasian and Asian with replication in 88,218 UK Biobank data. We identified 47 loci (of which 26 are novel), with population-specific signals as well as shared signals across ethnicities. Some identified variants showed precise scaling in corneal curvature and eye elongation (i.e. axial length) to maintain eyes in emmetropia (i.e. HDAC11/FBLN2 rs2630445, RBP3 rs11204213); others exhibited association with myopia with little pleiotropic effects on eye elongation. Implicated genes are involved in extracellular matrix organization, developmental process for body and eye, connective tissue cartilage and glycosylation protein activities. Our study provides insights into population-specific novel genes for corneal curvature, and their pleiotropic effect in regulating eye size or conferring susceptibility to myopia