Why Does It Have To Be So Loud? A Social History Of The Electric Guitar

In this thesis , I will examine the history of the electric guitar from it\u27s earliest incarnations in the twentieth century up to the present day. I will argue that more than any other instrument, the electric guitar has achieved a special place in American society, and indeed has become an iconic symbol of American culture. I will further argue that the greatest electric guitarists playing in the genre of rock \u27n\u27 roll also achieved special place in American society that their peers playing in other genres did not attain. These rock guitarists were not just considered great musicians; they took on a mythic quality akin to fictional superheroes. Indeed, they came to be called not just great players, but guitar heroes or gods. I will explore why this was so

Revised masses of dust and gas of SLUGS FIR bright galaxies based on a recent CO survey

Recent CO measurements of an essentially complete sub-sample of galaxies from the SCUBA Local Universe Survey (SLUGS) are used to examine their implications for dust and gas masses in this sample. Estimates of dust masses are affected by a contribution to the SCUBA brightness measurements by CO(3-2) emission, and molecular gas masses by the use of a modified value of the CO-to-H_2 conversion factor X. The average dust mass is reduced by 25-38 per cent, which has no bearing on earlier conclusions concering the shapes of the dust mass luminosity function derived from the SLUGS. The value of X found from the CO survey, when applied together with the reduction in dust masses, leads to lower estimates for the mean gas-to-dust mass ratios, where the gas includes both H_2 and HI. For the CO sample, the mean global ratio is reduced from approximately 430 to about 320-360, but is further reduced to values near 50 when applied to the nuclear regions relevant to the CO observations. We discuss these results and suggest that the differences between the nuclear and outer regions may simply reflect differences in metallicity or the existence of considerable amounts of unobserved cold dust in the outer regions of these galaxiies.Comment: 18 pages, 2 tables, 4 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA

The case of the vanishing medical student

Medical students are often hard to find on the wards after 3.00pm. In this reflective piece, using our own experiences of clinical teaching we describe the case of an archetypal, and stereotypical medical student who rarely attends a full day of timetabled clinical teaching. Using this case as an example we outline our insights of the reasons underpinning the fact many medical students leave clinical teaching placements well before 5.00pm and in doing so miss out of learning opportunities. We also make two simple recommendations to medical students and teachers that could be employed to incentivise students to linger longer on their clinical placements

Chiral Extrapolation: An Analogy with Effective Field Theory

We draw an analogy between the chiral extrapolation of lattice QCD calculations from large to small quark masses and the interpolation between the large mass (weak field) and small mass (strong field) limits of the Euler--Heisenberg QED effective action. In the latter case, where the exact answer is known, a simple extrapolation of a form analogous to those proposed for the QCD applications is shown to be surprisingly accurate over the entire parameter range.Comment: 6 pp, revtex, 3 figs; minor changes -- version to appear in PL

The role of sediment supply in the adjustment of channel sinuosity across the Amazon Basin

© 2019 Geological Society of America. Sediment supplies are a fundamental component of alluvial river systems, but the importance of sustained supplies of externally derived sediments for the evolution of meandering planforms remains unclear. Here we demonstrate the importance of sediment supply in enhancing the growth of point bars that influence the rate of sinuosity increase through flow deflections in meander bends. We use an archive of Landsat images of 16 meandering reaches from across the Amazon Basin to show that rivers transporting larger sediment loads increase their sinuosity more rapidly than those carrying smaller loads. Sediment-rich rivers are dominated by downstream-rotating meanders that increase their sinuosity more rapidly than both extensional and upstream-rotating meanders. Downstream-rotating meanders appear to establish larger point bars that expand throughout the meander, in contrast to extensional meanders, which have smaller bars, and upstream rotating meanders, which are characterized by deposition over the bar head. These observations demonstrate that the size and position of point bars within meander bends influences flow routing and thus controls the dominant direction of meander growth. Rivers with low sediment supplies build smaller point bars, which reduces their capacity to increase meander curvature and the resulting sinuosity

Adaptive Finite Element Approximation of Fluid-Structure Interaction Based on Eulerian and Arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian Variational Formulations

Aim of this work is the examination of numerical methods for fluid-structure interaction (FSI) problems. We use two approaches for the modelling of FSI problems. The well-known ‘arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian’ (ALE) approach as well as an unusual fully Eulerian approach. For both frameworks we derive a general variational framework for the adaptive finite element approximation of FSI problems. The focal points of this thesis are the comparison of the ALE and the novel Eulerian approaches and the application of the ‘dual weighted residual’ (DWR) method to FSI problems. The DWR method is the basis of two techniques, a posteriori error estimation and goal-oriented mesh adaptivity. Based on the developed models of FSI we apply the DWR method for a posteriori error estimation and goal-oriented mesh adaptation to FSI problems. Necessary aspects of DWR method and implementation for the ALE and Eulerian approach are discussed. Several stationary as well as nonstationary examples are presented using both the ALE as well as the Eulerian framework. Results from both frameworks are in good agreement with each other. Also for both frameworks the DWR method is successfully applied. Finally using benchmark results from the DFG joint research group FOR 493 (of which the author is a participating member) the discussed methods are verified for both frameworks

Fast and Slow Processes Underlying Theories of Information Technology Use

Although theories of information technology (IT) use have been widely researched, organizations continue to struggle with insufficiently utilizing their IT assets. Those interested in understanding and managing IT use need both novel theoretical development and new directions for future research. In this paper, we address both of these needs. Regarding the first need, we develop novel theory by explaining two types of cognitive processes—one fast and one slow—that underlie theories of IT use. The impetus for our explanation of underlying processes (EUP) comes from studies of IT use that have found moderating effects of previous interaction with IT. With these results, researchers have concluded that cognitions are less important in determining IT use as the use of that IT increases. Consistent with that conclusion, our EUP posits that, as learning from prior use occurs, the influence of fast, automatic, unconscious (type 1) cognitive processes increases while the influence decreases for slow, controlled, conscious (type 2) cognitive processes. Type 1 processes automatically generate a default type 1 response; type 2 processes have the potential to generate an intervening type 2 response. The intervention potential is highest for initial use of the target IT and lowest when learning is high such that use of the IT has become automatic. From our EUP, we develop three insights: 1) that the cognitions that lead to a default response are not necessarily the cognitions found in extant theories of IT use, 2) that both type 1 and type 2 processes are subject to bounded rationality, and 3) that the relationship between learning and the intervention potential for a type 2 response, although negative, may not be linear. To address the second need that we note above, we suggest new directions for future research, which includes investigating the cognitive control problem (i.e., when type 2 processes intervene) and exploring the effects of heuristics, nudges, and bounded rationality on decisions to use IT. Beyond the hope that the suggested directions for research will yield solutions for addressing the underutilization of IT assets, the fundamental advances in theoretical understanding that we present here suggest notable implications for practice, including developing brief, simple, cognitively unconscious messages directed at nudging decision makers toward a default response to use the target IT