Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Voters in the 2000 US Presidential Election

Lesbians, gay men, and bisexuals (LGBs) in the United States are strikingly more likely to vote for Democratic presidential candidates than are heterosexuals. LGBs are one of the Democratic Party’s most loyal voting blocs, despite the absence of one of the most important mechanisms for creating party identification: inter-generational transmission. We use the 2000 Presidential election to examine whether LGB voters overwhelmingly chose Al Gore because they viewed him as superior to George W. Bush on LGB-related policy issues or because of their greater overall liberalism and Democratic Party identification. We also examine the impact of socialization within the LGB community for generating political liberalism, Democratic Party identification, and interest in LGB policies. Using logit analysis on a 2000 Harris Interactive poll of 13,000 Americans, including 1,000 LGBs, we find that concern for LGB rights, policy liberalism, and party identification all played a role in the LGB vote. Analysis of the LGB sub-sample supports a model of political socialization within the LGB community leading to stronger interest in LGB rights, liberalism, Democratic party identification, and support for Gore

The Effects of Building Representation and Clustering in Large-Eddy Simulations of Flows in Urban Canopies

We perform large-eddy simulations of neutral atmospheric boundary-layer flow over a cluster of buildings surrounded by relatively flat terrain. The first investigated question is the effect of the level of building detail that can be included in the numerical model, a topic not yet addressed by any previous study. The simplest representation is found to give similar results to more refined representations for the mean flow, but not for turbulence. The wind direction on the other hand is found to be important for both mean and turbulent parameters. As many suburban areas are characterised by the clustering of buildings and homes into small areas separated by surfaces of lower roughness, we look at the adjustment of the atmospheric surface layer as it flows from the smoother terrain to the built-up area. This transition has unexpected impacts on the flow; mainly, a zone of global backscatter (energy transfer from the turbulent eddies to the mean flow) is found at the upstream edge of the built-up are

The Seven Words of the Virgin: Identifying Change in the Discourse Context of the Concept of Virginity in Early Modern English

No abstract available

Special Issue on Designing With and For Users on the Autism Spectrum

Autism is a lifelong neurodevelopmental condition that affects how a person communicates with and relates to other people, and to the world around them. It is estimated that around 1 in 68 people are autistic (Christensen et al., 2016 Christensen, D. L., Baio, J., Van Naarden Braun, K., Bilder, D., Charles, J., Constantino, J. N., … Yeargin-Allsopp, M. (2016). Prevalence and characteristics of autism spectrum disorder among children aged 8 years

Asynchronous accretion can mimic diverse white dwarf pollutants II: water content

Volatiles, notably water, are key to the habitability of rocky planets. The presence of water in planetary material can be inferred from the atmospheric oxygen abundances of polluted white dwarfs, but this interpretation is often complex. We study the accretion process, and find that ices may sublimate and accrete before more refractory minerals reach the star. As a result, a white dwarf's relative photospheric abundances may vary with time during a single accretion event, and do not necessarily reflect the bulk composition of a pollutant. We offer two testable predictions for this hypothesis: 1. cooler stars will more often be inferred to have accreted wet pollutants, and 2. there will be rare occurrences of accretion events with inferred volatile levels far exceeding those of pristine comets. To observationally test these predictions, we statistically constrain the water content of white dwarf pollutants. We find that in the current sample, only three stars show statistically significant evidence of water at the 2$\sigma$ level, due to large typical uncertainties in atmospheric abundances and accretion states. In the future, an expanded sample of polluted white dwarfs with hydrogen-dominated atmospheres will allow for the corroboration of our theoretical predictions. Our work also shows the importance of interpreting pollutant compositions statistically, and emphasizes the requirement to reduce uncertainties on measured abundances to allow for statistically significant constraints on their water content.Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRAS. Part two of a series of two papers. Comments and questions welcom