The computational turn: thinking about the digital humanities

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Post-digital humanities: computation and cultural critique in the arts and humanities

Today we live in computational abundance whereby our everyday lives and the environment that surrounds us are suffused with digital technologies. This is a world of anticipatory technology and contextual computing that uses smart diffused computational processing to create a fine web of computational resources that are embedded into the material world. Thus, the historical distinction between the digital and the non-digital becomes increasingly blurred, to the extent that to talk about the digital presupposes an experiential disjuncture that makes less and less sense. Indeed, just as the ideas of “online” or “being online” have become anachronistic as a result of our always-on smartphones and tablets and widespread wireless networking technologies, so too the term “digital” perhaps assumes a world of the past

CRFM Consultancy Report on Review of Existing Policy, Legal and Institutional Arrangements for Governance and Management of Flyingfish Fisheries in the Caribbean Large Marine Ecosystem

Many of the marine resources in the Caribbean are considered to be fully or overexploited. A Transboundary Diagnostic Analysis identified three priority transboundary problems that affect the CLME: unsustainable exploitation of fish and other living resources, the degradation and modification of natural habitats, pollution and contamination. The fourwing flyingfish fishery is the single most important small pelagic fishery in the southern Lesser Antilles. It is a shared resource, which has been traditionally exploited by seven different States, i.e. Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Martinique, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Trinidad and Tobago. With expanding fleet capacity and limited cooperation among the States exploiting the flyingfish, there is concern that the resource may become overfished. While the flyingfish fishery is a directed fishery, it is at the same time part of a multi-species, multi-gear fishery, which also targets regional large pelagic species.This case study identifies and analyses the priority transboundary problems and issues. The policy, legal and institutional reforms needed to address such transboundary issues and achieve long-term conservation and sustainable use of the resources are also identified. A major and necessary component of the case study is an evaluation of the existing policy cycles and linkages among the countries and institutions involved with the flyingfish fishery

Libre culture: meditations on free culture

Libre Culture is the essential expression of the free culture/copyleft movement. This anthology, brought together here for the first time, represents the early groundwork of Libre Society thought. Referring to the development of creativity and ideas, capital works to hoard and privatize the knowledge and meaning of what is created. Expression becomes monopolized, secured within an artificial market-scarcity enclave and finally presented as a novelty on the culture industry in order to benefit cloistered profit motives. In the way that physical resources such as forests or public services are free, Libre Culture argues for the freeing up of human ideas and expression from copyright bulwarks in all forms

An Automated Method for Tracking Clouds in Planetary Atmospheres

We present an automated method for cloud tracking which can be applied to planetary images. The method is based on a digital correlator which compares two or more consecutive images and identifies patterns by maximizing correlations between image blocks. This approach bypasses the problem of feature detection. Four variations of the algorithm are tested on real cloud images of Jupiter’s white ovals from the Galileo mission, previously analyzed in Vasavada et al. [Vasavada, A.R., Ingersoll, A.P., Banfield, D., Bell, M., Gierasch, P.J., Belton, M.J.S., Orton, G.S., Klaasen, K.P., Dejong, E., Breneman, H.H., Jones, T.J., Kaufman, J.M., Magee, K.P., Senske, D.A. 1998. Galileo imaging of Jupiter’s atmosphere: the great red spot, equatorial region, and white ovals. Icarus, 135, 265, doi:10.1006/icar.1998.5984]. Direct correlation, using the sum of squared differences between image radiances as a distance estimator (baseline case), yields displacement vectors very similar to this previous analysis. Combining this distance estimator with the method of order ranks results in a technique which is more robust in the presence of outliers and noise and of better quality. Finally, we introduce a distance metric which, combined with order ranks, provides results of similar quality to the baseline case and is faster. The new approach can be applied to data from a number of space-based imaging instruments with a non-negligible gain in computing time

A Developmental Model of Infantile Nystagmus

The possibility that infantile nystagmus (IN) may reflect a failure in early sensorimotor integration has been proposed for more than a century, but is only recently being borne out in animal studies. The underlying neural and genetic substrate for this plasticity is complex. We propose that, in most cases, IN develops as a developmental response to reduced contrast sensitivity to high-spatial frequencies in an early "critical period," however caused, whether by structural malformations (e.g. foveal hypoplasia) or poor optics (e.g. cataract). As shown by psychophysics, contrast sensitivity to low spatial frequencies is enhanced by motion of the image across the retina. Based on our previous theoretical study (Harris & Berry, Nonlinear Dynamics, 2006), we argue that the best compromise between moving the image and maintaining the image near the fovea (or its remnant) is to oscillate the eyes with jerk nystagmus with increasing velocity waveforms, as seen empirically. The generation of jerk waveforms relies heavily on the saccadic system, which is immature in infancy. Pendular waveforms may therefore provide an alternative to jerk waveforms, and may explain why they are seen more often in young infants. We discuss the implications of this developmental model for the need to synchronize sensory and motor developments in normal development. Failure of this synchronization may also explain some idiopathic cases

A Distal Model of Congenital Nystagmus as Nonlinear Adaptive Oscillations

Congenital nystagmus (CN) is an incurable pathological spontaneous oscillation of the eyes with an onset in the first few months of life. The pathophysiology of CN is mysterious. There is no consistent neurological abnormality, but the majority of patients have a wide range of unrelated congenital visual abnormalities affecting either the cornea, lens, retina or optic nerve. In this theoretical study, we show that these eye oscillations could develop as an adaptive response to maximize visual contrast with poor foveal function in the infant visuomotor system, at a time of peak neural plasticity. We argue that in a visual system with abnormally poor high spatial frequency sensitivity, image contrast is not only maintained by keeping the image on the fovea (or its remnant) but also by some degree of image motion. Using the calculus of variations, we show that the optimal trade-off between these conflicting goals is to generate oscillatory eye movements with increasing velocity waveforms, as seen in real CN. When we include a stochastic component to the start of each epoch (quick-phase inaccuracy) various observed waveforms (including pseudo-cycloid) emerge as optimal strategies. Using the delay embedding technique, we find a low fractional dimension as reported in real data. We further show that, if a velocity command-based pre-motor circuitry (neural integrator) is harnessed to generate these waveforms, the emergence of a null region is inevitable. We conclude that CN could emerge paradoxically as an ‘optimal’ adaptive response in the infant visual system during an early critical period. This can explain why CN does not emerge later in life and why CN is so refractory to treatment. It also implies that any therapeutic intervention would need to be very early in life

A Developmental Model of Congenital Nystagmus

Purpose: Congenital nystagmus (CN) is a spontaneous oscillation of the eyes with an onset in the first few months of life. In 90% of affected children there is an associated underlying sensory defect (foveal hypoplasia, cone dysfunction, cataracts, etc.). In 10% no underlying visual defect can be found, and the nystagmus is labelled as ‘idiopathic’. CN appears to be a developmental anomaly of sensorimotor integration, as it is not have an onset later in infancy or beyond, but why such a wide variety of early onset visual defects should lead to life-long oscillation of the eyes is a mystery. Previous models have focussed on a systems level approach to explain how CN might be generated by known oculomotor circuits. We ask, instead, why CN might occur. Model: Our basic tenet is that infant visuomotor development is highly plastic during some early ‘critical’ period. A defect of foveal vision occurring during (and only during) this period leads to an anomalous connectivity in the oculomotor circuitry, which becomes permanent thereafter. We propose that circuitry normally used for precise foveal registration of a visual object (gaze holding, fixation, and smooth pursuit) develops to maintain some degree of image motion, as this would maximise contrast for a low spatial frequency system. However, this motion is in conflict with maintaining the image on the fovea (or its remnant). We explore the best oculomotor strategy to cope with this conflict. Results: The optimal strategy (in the least squares sense) is to oscillate the eyes in one meridian with alternating slow and quick (saccade) phases. Remarkably, the optimal waveform profile has an increasing-velocity profile. Many of the unique waveforms seen empirically in CN are also optimal strategies given realistic uncertainty in the initial position of a slow phase. Using non-linear dynamical systems analysis, we show that these ‘optimal’ oscillations have similar fractional correlation dimensions to observed data. We also show that a ‘null region’, as commonly observed in CN, would be an inevitable consequence of a velocity driven oculomotor system. Conclusions: We have developed a new approach to understanding oculomotor development, in which we examine the best strategy to maximise visual contrast. In a normal foveate visual system with fine oculomotor control, the best strategy is to develop good foveal registration, which we call ‘fixation’, and ‘smooth pursuit’. If, however, the fovea is absent or not being stimulated (eg. cataracts), the best strategy would be to develop oscillations of the type seen in CN. It implies that the chaotic oscillations are the result of a physiological developmental adaptive process. This is in contrast to the prevailing view that CN is a disease that can be ‘cured’. It is not surprising that CN has proven remarkably refractory to therapeutic intervention with only minimal (if any) long-term successes using drugs, surgery, or even biofeedback. We argue that CN is as adaptive and permanent as normal eye movements are in a normally sighted individual

Evidence for Auto-Correlation and Symmetry Detection in Primary Visual Cortex

The detectability of patterns in random dot arrays was measured as a function of dot density and compared with the statistical limit set by different methods of detecting the pattern. For filtering, cross-correlation, convolution, or template matching, the limit is expected to be inversely proportional to the square root of dot density. But for auto-correlation, which can detect symmetries of various types, the limit is unaffected by dot density under many conditions. Confirming previous results, we found that the coherence-threshold is often constant for Glass patterns, but the range of constancy depends on details of the display procedure. Coherence-thresholds were found to increase when the average number of dots expected at each location rose towards or exceeded a value of one; we therefore think it results from the non-linear effects of occlusion that occur when a later-programmed dot falls in the same location as an earlier one. To test this, these non-linear effects were prevented by arranging the luminance of each location to be directly proportional to the number of times that location was covered by a dot. Millions of dots can be used for these images, and they retain the streakiness of Glass patterns, while discrete dots disappear. The constant coherence threshold for detecting this streakiness is maintained over a huge range of dot densities, extending right down to the range where discrete dots become visible and up to patterns that are essentially full-tone images with no discrete dots. At threshold, all these patterns have similar auto-correlation functions, as we can see from the way both low dot-number Glass-patterns and these mega-dot, multi-tone, Glass-like images are formed. This startling fact raises the question whether primary visual cortex computes auto-correlations as well as, or even instead of, the local, Fourier-type, wavelet analysis of the currently popular paradigm