Extending a result of Ryan on weakly compact operators

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The Ecology of Cultural Space: Towards an Understanding of the Contemporary Artist-led Collective

The importance of friendship has been under-researched in relation to artistic discourse. This lack of research becomes particularly acute when considering ambiguous formations of collective artistic activity. My thesis draws upon friendship as a socio-cultural phenomenon in order to situate the artist-led collective both historically and within the contemporary art continuum. Tracing an historiography of the personal relationships which blurred the boundaries between art and politics, from the re-imagining of the medieval artisanal guild in the nineteenth century to the development of Futurism in the early twentieth century, I argue that the contemporary artist-led collective is haunted by these ‘collectivisms past’ and the spectre of autonomy. Further, the contradictions located within the ideological notions of individualism, which pervade the neo-liberal capitalist hegemony, both deny collective agency and yet accept collective praxis in the guise of enterprise culture. It is this contradictory character that frames my thesis and provides the context for understanding the complex role which friendship plays in the genesis of the contemporary artist-led collective. In order to understand the implications of friendship as a vital component of the artist-led collective, I utilise Relational Dialectics Theory (RDT) developed by Leslie Baxter and Barbara Montgomery, as a conceptual framework. I employ in-depth case studies of the artist-led collective duo The Cool Couple and architecture collective Assemble, in order to explore how friendship informs artist-led collectives throughout their life cycles. I question how and why these social bonds, which constitute relationships and thus shape the collectives, interrelate with a multiplicity of forces in their specific cultural ecology. These interrelations are further explored through a mapping study of artist-led collective activity in Leeds, UK. This study problematises the dualistic perspective of resistance and co-option between artist-led collectives and institutions. I argue that the evolution of the artist-led collective is implicitly interrelated with the institution and thus the binary opposition of resistance and co-option becomes a dialectical knot of ever-changing relationships. Finally, I situate myself in the research through an auto-ethnographic study of the artist-led collective The Retro Bar at the End of the Universe, of which I am a founding member. This case study enables an internal view of the social bonds which formed The Retro Bar at the End of the Universe and provides an insight that would otherwise be impossible from an external perspective

Folk moral relativism

It has often been suggested that people’s ordinary folk understanding of morality involves a rejection of moral relativism and a belief in objective moral truths. The results of six studies call this claim into question. Participants did offer apparently objectivist intuitions when confronted with questions about individuals from their own culture, but they offered increasingly relativist intuitions as they were confronted with questions about individuals from increasingly different cultures or ways of life. In light of these data, the authors hypothesize that people do not have a fixed commitment to moral objectivism but instead tend to adopt different views depending on the degree to which they consider radically different perspectives on moral questions. [NOTE: This is a reprint of Sarkissian et al 2011

Folk Moral Relativism

It has often been suggested that people's ordinary understanding of morality involves a belief in objective moral truths and a rejection of moral relativism. The results of six studies call this claim into question. Participants did offer apparently objectivist moral intuitions when considering individuals from their own culture, but they offered increasingly relativist intuitions considering individuals from increasingly different cultures or ways of life. The authors hypothesize that people do not have a fixed commitment to moral objectivism but instead tend to adopt different views depending on the degree to which they consider radically different perspectives on moral questions

A tool to aid redesign of flexible transport services to increase efficiency in rural transport service provision

This research was supported by the Research Councils UK Digital Economy programme award (reference: EP/G066051/1) to the dot.rural Digital Economy Hub, at the University of Aberdeen.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Adherence to UK national guidance for discharge information: an audit in primary care

Aims: Poor communication of clinical information between healthcare settings is associated with patient harm. In 2008, the UK National Prescribing Centre (NPC) issued guidance regarding the minimum information to be communicated upon hospital discharge. This study evaluates the extent of adherence to this guidance and identifies predictors of adherence. Methods: This was an audit of discharge summaries received by medical practices in one UK primary care trust of patients hospitalized for 24 h or longer. Each discharge summary was scored against the applicable NPC criteria which were organized into: ‘patient, admission and discharge’, ‘medicine’ and ‘therapy change’ information. Results: Of 3444 discharge summaries audited, 2421 (70.3%) were from two teaching hospitals and 906 (26.3%) from three district hospitals. Unplanned admissions accounted for 2168 (63.0%) of the audit sample and 74.6% (2570) of discharge summaries were electronic. Mean (95% CI) adherence to the total NPC minimum dataset was 71.7% [70.2, 73.2]. Adherence to patient, admission and discharge information was 77.3% (95% CI 77.0, 77.7), 67.2% (95% CI 66.3, 68.2) for medicine information and 48.9% (95% CI 47.5, 50.3) for therapy change information. Allergy status, co-morbidities, medication history and rationale for therapy change were the most frequent omissions. Predictors of adherence included quality of the discharge template, electronic discharge summaries and smaller numbers of prescribed medicines. Conclusions: Despite clear guidance regarding the content of discharge information, omissions are frequent. Adherence to the NPC minimum dataset might be improved by using comprehensive electronic discharge templates and implementation of effective medicines reconciliation at both sides of the health interface

Beating the random assignment on constraint satisfaction problems of bounded degree

We show that for any odd $k$ and any instance of the Max-kXOR constraint satisfaction problem, there is an efficient algorithm that finds an assignment satisfying at least a $\frac{1}{2} + \Omega(1/\sqrt{D})$ fraction of constraints, where $D$ is a bound on the number of constraints that each variable occurs in. This improves both qualitatively and quantitatively on the recent work of Farhi, Goldstone, and Gutmann (2014), which gave a \emph{quantum} algorithm to find an assignment satisfying a $\frac{1}{2} + \Omega(D^{-3/4})$ fraction of the equations. For arbitrary constraint satisfaction problems, we give a similar result for "triangle-free" instances; i.e., an efficient algorithm that finds an assignment satisfying at least a $\mu + \Omega(1/\sqrt{D})$ fraction of constraints, where $\mu$ is the fraction that would be satisfied by a uniformly random assignment.Comment: 14 pages, 1 figur

Engaging Street Youth in an Evaluation of a Community-Based Arts Program

Data from the Edmonton Arts & Youth Feasibility Study (EAYFS) was used to ascertain the feasibility of engaging street youth in a structured community-based arts program and an outcome-based evaluation. The study engaged 23 street youth in a ten-week multi-media arts program focused on developing prosocial communication, team-building, and problem-solving skills. Results have shown that street youth are highly interested in artistic endeavors; will participate to the best of their circumstances; and will provide reliable data. The youth and staff reported improved art skills, problem-solving capacity, and prosocial communication as well as a decrease in drug use, depression, loneliness, and a greater sense of enjoyment about life. Strengths of the program included the arts media, the non-judgmental environment, and the support from staff. The study suggests that community-based arts programs for street youth could be subjected to a rigorous outcome-based evaluation

Resistor-Network Formulation of Multi-Temperature Free Convection Problems

Copyright © 2016 by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc. All rights reserved. Copies of this paper may be made for personal and internal use, on condition that the copier pay the per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center (CCC). All requests for copying and permission to reprint should be submitted to CCC at www.copyright.com; employ the ISSN 0887-8722 (print) or 1533-6808 (online) to initiate your request. Foroushani, S., Wright, J. L., & Naylor, D. (2017). Resistor-Network Formulation of Multitemperature Free-Convection Problems. Journal of Thermophysics and Heat Transfer, 1–6. https://doi.org/10.2514/1.T5024In recent work, the resistor-network formulation of forced-convection problems and a technique (dQdT) for evaluating the paired convective resistances that characterize the network were presented. This technique entails solutions of the energy equation with perturbed boundary conditions. In the present paper, the dQdT technique is extended to free convection. The analytical solution to the classical two-temperature problem of free convection at an isothermal vertical flat plate is used to verify the technique. Then, dQdT is applied to the three-temperature problem of free convection in an asymmetrically heated vertical channel based on numerical solutions of the energy equation. Sample results are presented and known limits are discussed to demonstrate the validity of the results. This paper is part of a series on the resistor-network formulation of convection problems.Smart Net-Zero Energy Buildings Strategic Research Network || Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada || University of Waterlo

Resistor-Network Formulation of Multitemperature Forced-Convection Problems

Please note that this file contains the final draft version of this technical paper. Minor differences will be found between this version and the final version printed by the publisher. The reader should contact the publisher if the final version, as printed, is preferred. Copyright © 2016 by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc. All rights reserved. Copies of this paper may be made for personal and internal use, on condition that the copier pay the per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center (CCC). All requests for copying and permission to reprint should be submitted to CCC at www.copyright.com; employ the ISSN 0887-8722 (print) or 1533-6808 (online) to initiate your request. Foroushani, S., Naylor, D., & Wright, J. L. (2016). Resistor-Network Formulation of Multitemperature Forced-Convection Problems. Journal of Thermophysics and Heat Transfer, 1–8. https://doi.org/10.2514/1.T4993Many convection heat transfer problems involve more than two isothermal heat sources/sinks. A network of multiple convective resistors connecting temperature nodes representing the isothermal sources (walls, inlet flows, etc.) can be used to represent this class of problem. However, the convective resistances that characterize this network cannot generally be evaluated using energy balances resulting from a single solution to the energy equation. A technique based on solutions of the energy equation with perturbed boundary conditions is developed to overcome this difficulty. The resulting technique is verified by comparison with energy-balance results previously obtained for a special symmetric case. The technique is also applied to a superposition solution for hydrodynamically developed laminar flow in an annulus and to numerical solutions of simultaneously developing flow in an asymmetrically heated annulus under both laminar and turbulent flow conditions. This work is part of an ongoing research project on the resistor-network modeling and characterization of multitemperature convection problems.Smart Net-Zero Energy Buildings Strategic Research Network (SNEBRN) || Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) || University of Waterlo