Quaker responses to Darwin

[FIRST PARAGRAPH] In his seminal work Darwin and the General Reader (1958), Alvar Ellegird surveyed the British periodical press over the period 1859 to 1872 in order to discover how Darwin's theory had been received in a hundred publications reflecting a wide range of social, religious, and political opinion. He paid attention both to the amount of space devoted to Darwinian topics and also to each periodical's stance with respect to such issues as the theory of natural selection and the naturalistic account of the formation of humankind. In each case he summarized his findings using a numerical scale. Among the journals he examined were two Quaker periodicals- the Friend and the Friends' Quarterly Examiner-from which he concluded that Quakers paid little attention to Darwin's theory and that the few references that appeared were generally antagonistic to the new theory. The quotations Ellegird selected confirmed this judgment: for example, in characterizing the Friend as anti-Darwinian he cited an 1861 entry in which a reviewer regretted the large number of converts to Darwinism, exclaiming, "Alas, their name is legion." Despite the somewhat higher scores achieved by the Friends' Quarterly Examiner, Ellegird did not adequately distinguish between these two periodicals, which reflected significantly different sections within the British Quaker community. Rather surprisingly, he also lumped Quakers with Congregationalists, Baptists, and certain other dissenting groups that appear to have responded similarly to Darwin's theory but shared little of religious significance with Quakers. In contrast to these denominations, Unitarians scored higher but Methodists were lower still on Elleglrd's scale

Creating the Royal Society's Sylvester Medal

Following the death of James Joseph Sylvester in 1897, contributions were collected in order to mark his life and work by a suitable memorial. This initiative resulted in the Sylvester Medal, which is awarded triennially by the Royal Society for the encouragement of research into pure mathematics. Ironically the main advocate for initiating this medal was not a fellow mathematician but the chemist and naturalist Raphael Meldola. Religion, not mathematics, provided the link between Meldola and Sylvester; they were among the very few Jewish Fellows of the Royal Society. This paper focuses primarily on the politics of the Anglo-Jewish community and why it, together with a number of scientists and mathematicians, supported Meldola in creating the Sylvester Medal

The Race Horse That Wouldn\u27t Die: On Herrera v. Wyoming

In Herrera v. Wyoming, the Supreme Court is considering how to reconcile the Crow Tribe’s hunting right with Wyoming’s sovereignty. This endeavor requires examining nineteenth-century treaties and precedents to decipher the intents of the Crow Tribe and the United States government. If the Court’s decision includes a clear articulation of whether Native American treaty rights may be truncated by mere implication, tribes nationwide may be at risk of losing treaty rights they have enjoyed for centuries. In making its decision, the Supreme Court will also have to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of overturning precedent and of undermining its underlying rationale. In this Commentary, I argue that the lower courts erred in applying issue preclusion and in relying on the outdated Race Horse doctrine

Charles Singer and the founding of the British Society for the History of Science

[FIRST PARAGRAPHS] Presidential addresses offer an opportunity to reflect on the history of our subject and where the history of science stands in our own day. Such reflections are particularly appropriate with the fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the British Society for the History of Science (BSHS) which is marked in 1997. Some may consider that looking back over our past is either an unacceptable luxury or an occasion for the kind of celebration that can all too easily degenerate into hagiography and an excuse to rake over the past in a thoroughly uncritical manner." This address - and I trust the events of 1997 - will try to avoid such excesses and instead contribute to the historiography of our subject. This paper contains an all-too-sketchy account of the role of the first president, Charles Singer (1876±1960), in the founding of the BSHS. My main theme is Singer's commitment to a form of internationalism that appeared so necessary and so appealing after Europe had been shattered by Fascism and a devastating war. I shall be exploring the ways in which his background and the political events of the 1930s and 1940s shaped his vision for the history of science in the post-war era and especially his concern to found a specifically British society that would, through encouraging study of the history of science, contribute to international peace and stability. I should make clear at the outset that by focusing on Singer I will doubtless undervalue the roles of the many other people who were active in the early years of this Society. There are, without doubt, other contending narratives and ones that I hope will soon be heard. I also approach this subject with some trepidation in the realization that some of my readers will have known Singer and may themselves have been actors in the events I am discussing

Amplifier clamping circuit for horizon scanner Patent

Clamped amplifier circuit for horizon scanner enabling amplification and accurate measurement of specified parameter

The Law and Poor People’s Access to Health Care

Many companies today, in different fields of operations and sizes, have access to a vast amount of data which was not available only a couple of years ago. This situation gives rise to questions regarding how to organize and use the data in the best way possible. In this thesis a large database of pricing data for products within various market segments is analysed. The pricing data is from both external and internal sources and is therefore confidential. Because of the confidentiality, the labels from the database are in this thesis substituted with generic ones and the company is not referred to by name, but the analysis is carried out on the real data set. The data is from the beginning unstructured and difficult to overlook. Therefore, it is first classified. This is performed by feeding some manual training data into an algorithm which builds a decision tree. The decision tree is used to divide the rest of the products in the database into classes. Then, for each class, a multivariate time series model is built and each product’s future price within the class can be predicted. In order to interact with the classification and price prediction, a front end is also developed. The results show that the classification algorithm both is fast enough to operate in real time and performs well. The time series analysis shows that it is possible to use the information within each class to do predictions, and a simple vector autoregressive model used to perform it shows good predictive results

Sensing array for coherence analysis of modulated aquatic chemical plumes

An electrochemical sensor array can provide information about the spatial and temporal distribution of chemicals in liquid turbulent plumes. Planar laser induced fluorescence (PLIF) and amperometric sensor arrays were used to record signals from modulated chemical plumes released into a recirculating aquatic flume. Coherence analysis was applied to extract the frequency components contained in the sensor response. Effects due to release distance, modulation frequency, and array orientation were investigated. This study has demonstrated that frequency encoded information can be extracted from a turbulent chemical plume using an array of amperometric sensors with optimized three-dimensional geometry and tuning.M.S.Committee Chair: Janata, Jiri; Committee Member: Lyon, Andrew; Committee Member: Weissburg, Mar

The securities industry and the New York - New Jersey region

The author finds that the securities industry in the New York-New Jersey region, while vulnerable to stock and bond market fluctuations, is enjoying strong growth in employment and salaries. Benefits from future growth, however, will likely flow predominantly to highly skilled workers as rapid technological change continues to widen existing income differentials.Securities ; Federal Reserve District, 2nd

Effects of leverage on corporate investment and hiring decisions

Corporations - Finance ; Financial leverage ; Ratio analysis