The Invisible Worlds of Religion and Economy

Twelve years ago I accepted my Chair at ISS with an inaugural lecture entitled Rats, Cockroaches and People Like Us, in which I discussed the relation between people’s views of humanity and actual human rights. In it I made a plea for an intelligent use of the wide range of religious and spiritual resources available to people all over the world for the sake of human rights. In subsequent years I have expanded this argument by advocating the inclusion of religious resources for development in the broadest sense. Twelve years later it seems that, at least in the Netherlands, this remains a controversial proposal, especially in view of the great changes in the political climate at home and abroad since the dramatic events in 2001

Rats, cockroaches and people like us : views of humanity and human right

Many people appear to believe that there are a growing number of religious conflicts in the world, particularly since the end of the Cold War. On closer examination, however, it seems that the number of conflicts of the type which are today often labelled 'ethnic' or' 'religious' has in fact been growing since the 1950s'. Many such conflicts were already detectable in the period of the Cold War, but at that time, they were usually interpreted within a framework of East-West relations

Religion and Development. What’s in Two Names: Symposium on the 10th Anniversary of the Chair of Religion and Development, 11 June 2009

This compilation brings together in one booklet some of Professor Ter Haar’s most important essays and papers on the theme of religion and development - a ‘taster’ of the work she has produced over the past 10 years

Equipment, measurement and dose—a survey for therapeutic ultrasound

Background Dosimetry for Ultrasound Therapy (DUTy) is a large international project which addresses the development of a metrological infrastructure for the determination of ultrasound exposure and dose to tissue. Methods In order to seek the views of the wider therapy ultrasound community and to review dose and in situ exposure quantities that have been suggested or used previously, a web-based questionnaire containing a range of questions covering the type of ultrasound equipment that is used and the range of applications for which it has been developed was created at www.​surveymonkey.​com. This questionnaire was intended to cover any contemporary therapeutic ultrasound application (including physiotherapy, lithotripsy and drug delivery) and asked specific questions about quantification of in situ exposure and dose, especially as relevant to treatment planning, standardisation and/or regulation. Results This paper summarises the 123 responses submitted between February and September 2014 to the questions on clinical applications, equipment, quality assurance (QA) and measurement and standards, as well as to those relating to an understanding of “dose” in the context of ultrasound. The full set of anonymous responses is available in an additional Excel file. Conclusions The results clearly demonstrate the need not only for further improvements in measuring devices and for measurement guidelines but also for a wider dissemination and higher awareness of existing standards. Whilst it is unlikely that a single definition of dose can be sufficient for all ultrasound treatment modalities, the answers clearly indicate that many aspects would benefit from clear definitions of relevant dose quantities and shed light on the preferred form of such definitions

A model of acoustic absorption in fluids based on a continuous distribution of relaxation times

This work extends the quasi-equilibrium relaxation theory of sound absorption in liquids to the case of continuous distribution of relaxation times. Such extension is needed when absorption mechanisms are not confined to the action of viscosity and heat conduction, but are mainly due to the excitation of a large number of internal molecular degrees of freedom. In this case the conventional Navier–Stokes equations are not sufficient to describe the fluid motion, and additional equations are required to model normal relaxation stresses. When relaxation frequencies form a sufficiently dense distribution, as is the case for many biological fluids, it makes sense to consider the limit of continuously distributed relaxation frequencies, in order to obtain the required equation for normal relaxation stresses. In contrast to its discrete counterparts, the proposed method avoids the use of a potentially infinite number of relaxation equations for a given set of distinct relaxation frequencies. Instead, these are replaced by a single evolution equation of Boltzmann type whose right-hand side is a linear combination of the time derivatives of density and entropy. The rheological functions appearing before these derivatives are expressed in terms of the absorption coefficient. Since the dependence of absorption coefficient on sound frequency is measurable experimentally, these rheological coefficients can be recovered from experimental data. The key feature of the present study is that a closed system of equations of motion can be formulated directly from absorption measurement data on the basis of the theory proposed for the very wide range of absorption laws that can occur in practice. As an illustration of the generality of the present method, a number of absorption laws documented in the experimental literature are considered in detail, in order to derive the coefficients of the related systems of equations of motion for these liquids. For example, the methodology based on modelling of acoustic absorption in biologically soft tissue by the employment of fractional derivatives, which has been recently developed in the literature, is shown to be a special case of the proposed theory

Relationship between brachycephalic airway syndrome and gastrointestinal signs in three breeds of dog

Objectives: To assess the breed-specific prevalence of, and effects of corrective airway surgery on, gastrointestinal signs in French bulldogs, English bulldogs and pugs presenting with brachycephalic airway syndrome to a referral teaching hospital. Materials and Methods: In this retrospective study, ptyalism, regurgitation and vomiting were graded at presentation using a previously established scoring system. Staphylectomy and nares resection were performed on all dogs. Gastrointestinal signs were re-assessed via telephone follow-up at least 6 weeks after surgery. Results: Ninety-eight dogs were included: French bulldogs (n=43), English bulldogs (n=12) and pugs (n=43). Overall population prevalence of all gastrointestinal signs was 56%. Breed-specific prevalence for French bulldogs was 93%, English bulldogs 58% and pugs 16%. There was post-surgical clinical improvement in gastrointestinal signs for the whole study population, especially in French bulldogs. Clinical Significance: The prevalence of gastrointestinal signs in dogs presenting with brachycephalic airway syndrome and improvement in these clinical signs following corrective surgery may vary between breeds