Cultivating an ethos of openness through research integrity

Regardless of the rhetoric about more openness in academic research, institutions appear to be failing to address some of the deeper issues. In order to stave off the steady rise of regulation and monitoring and to present a coherent alternative to instrumental views about research, it falls to researchers themselves to define the ethos of openness. Andrew C. Rawnsley discusses the moral substance of claims about openness and how research integrity could ground these discussions

Prediction and Performance of Deep Excavations for Courthouse Station, Boston

Construction of the Silverline Courthouse Station in South Boston involved 18-m-deep excavations at a site underlain by more than 24 m of normally and lightly overconsolidated Boston blue clay (BBC). The excavations were supported by 27-m-deep floating diaphragm wall panels and five levels of preloaded cross-lot bracing. This paper compares the measured performance of the excavation support system with the Class A finite-element (FE) predictions prepared during the original design phase and with the results of Class C analyses using information obtained during construction. The numerical analyses used data from a special test program of laboratory and in situ tests at a nearby site. The analyses represent coupled consolidation within the soil mass and the anisotropic stress-strain-strength properties of BBC using the MIT-E3 soil model. The Class A analyses generally overestimate the lateral wall deflections and underestimate the measured strut loads, as preloading was not included in the original FE model. However, they provide remarkably consistent predictions of the measured soil deformations, including settlements, lateral spreading, and subgrade basal heave. The Class C analyses refine the stratigraphic section, in situ pore pressures, construction time frame, and strut preloads using the data available at the time of construction but make nominal changes in soil properties. With these limited changes, the Class C model is able to achieve excellent agreement with the measured data

The Soft Power of Anglia: British Cold War Cultural Diplomacy in the USSR

This article contributes to the growing literature on the cultural Cold War through an exploration of the British national projection magazine Anglia, produced by the Foreign Office for distribution in the USSR from 1962 to 1992. As well as drawing attention to the significance of national magazines in general, the article sheds light on Britain's distinctive approach to propaganda and cultural diplomacy during the Cold War. It considers why the magazine was set up and endured for so long, despite considerable reservations about its value. It examines how Britain was projected in a manner that accorded with British understandings about the need for ‘subtle’ propaganda. Finally, it addresses the question of the magazine's impact in the USSR

A Situated or a Metaphysical Body? Problematics of the Body as Mediation or as Site of Inscription

A common feature of much recent work done in a variety of disciplines is the foregrounding of embodiment. Thinking in terms of a situated body, however, brings up a complex problem which has often been overlooked: the re-importation of a kind of metaphysics of the body, or a covert idealism, which stubbornly persists in many such discussions. This is seen in treatments of the body as a mediation or as a site for inscription of socio-cultural codings. We will briefly show how even such an influential account of ritualization practices, that of Catherine Bell, shows traces of these problems. The corrective strategy to such conceptions is a properly situational ontology as suggested by Merleau-Ponty’s later philosophy and Tim Ingold’s critical work on environments.status: publishe

From roots to rites : practice logics and the 'heir' to metaphysics

One of the prevalent themes in recent theologies and philosophies of religion, especially those with a sensitivity to continental philosophy and theory more broadly, has been the problem of 'metaphysics'. This thesis seeks to explore the possibility of theology in a post-metaphysical mode. One of the main issues is whether theology requires some sort of framework for its articulation which can be characterized as having metaphysical-like features. This framework we call the 'heir' to metaphysics. The problem of metaphysics also appears within two, on the surface, quite different problems for theology: that of the relation of different 'domains' or 'spaces' (such as 'Church' and 'world', 'sacred' and 'profane', 'religious' and 'secular'); and this latter issue is also involved with the common view that human beings perceive and organize their world in terms of 'worldviews' or 'schema'. This thesis sets out to challenge both of these ideas. But unlike many previous attempts to work in a 'post-metaphysical' mode, the 'heir' to metaphysics is one which seeks to emphasize three distinct aspects, often previously overlooked: firstly, the embodied situated character of all human doing and thinking. This is explored through a re-exploration of the phenomenological tradition, not least because much of the impetus for 'post-metaphysical' theology has come from the so-called 'theological turn' of French phenomenology, such as Jean-Luc Marion and Jean-Yves Lacoste, both of whose work is examined in this thesis. We suggest that it is Maurice Merleau-Ponty whose philosophy offers the best place to re-think phenomenology, however, rather than these more recent approaches. Secondly, this situated character of human doing and thinking is organized by way of human practices: this praxeological turn is explored primarily through the work of Pierre Bourdieu and Theodore Schatzki. Thirdly, the implications of a recursive or dialectical structure to human situatedness which both Bourdieu and Schatzki emphasize, and which is articulated through practices, is extended into a topology, a redefinition of traditional ontology which is capable of taking account of the complexity and interwoven character of human life. It is this topology that is the principal organizing feature of the 'heir' to metaphysics. We then set out what this topology might be like through an exploration of the shape of what we call, following Barry Smith and Jan Patocka, the 'mesoscopic' world. By focussing on a conceptual distinction between 'situational practices' and 'practices of thematization' suggestions of new ways of thinking about the structure of human situations arise. Flow such an 'heir' might interact with theology and religious practices more broadly is the focus of the latter part of the thesis. This is done through examining 'ritualization' as a practice which is common within religious communities. How such ritualization practices are conceptualized in a particularly Christian way is explored through the sacramental theology of Louis-Marie Chauvet and through the tradition of liturgical theology typified by Alexander Schmemann, whose notion of leitourgia is used to broaden out how we might speak about situated mesoscopic experience in a theological way without opposing Church and world, sacred and profane, or the religious and the secular

The role of forage management in addressing challenges facing Australasian dairy farming

Forage management underpins the viability of pastoral dairy systems. This review investigated recent developments in forage research and their potential to enable pastoral dairy systems to meet the challenges that will be faced over the next 10 years. Grazing management, complementary forages, pasture diversity, fertiliser use, chemical restriction, irrigation management and pasture breeding are considered. None of these areas of research are looking to increase production directly through increased inputs, but, rather, they aim to lift maximum potential production, defend against production decline or improve the efficiency of the resource base and inputs. Technology approaches consistently focus on improving efficiency, while genetic improvement or the use of complementary forages and species diversity aim to lift production. These approaches do not require additional labour to implement, but many will require an increase in skill level. Only a few areas will help address animal welfare (e.g. the use of selected complementary forages and novel endophytes) and only complementary forages will help address increased competition from non-dairy alternatives, by positively influencing the properties of milk. Overall, the diversity of activity and potential effects will provide managers of pastoral dairy systems with the best tools to respond to the production and environmental challenges they face over the next 10 years