Children hold owners responsible when property causes harm

Since ancient times, legal systems have held owners responsible for harm caused by their property. Across 4 experiments, we show that children aged 3–7 also hold owners responsible for such harm. Older children judge that owners should repair harm caused by property, and younger children may do this as well. Younger and older children judge that owners should apologize for harm, even when children do not believe the owners allowed the harm to occur. Children are also as likely to hold owners responsible for harm caused by property as for harm caused by the owners themselves. The present findings contribute to psychological accounts of ownership by showing that ownership not only confers rights to control property, but also responsibility for harm caused by property. The findings also contribute to our understanding of the attribution of responsibility, and challenge accounts claiming that directly causing harm, or allowing it to happen, is a prerequisite for responsibility. The findings provide support for an account claiming that property is an extension of its owner, and likewise reveal that responsibility for harm caused by property is an early developing aspect of the psychology of ownership. 2018 APA, all rights reserved

On the edge of mystery towards a spiritual hermeneutic of the urban margins

The questions explored in this thesis are: whether it is possible to have a shared spirituality between those who work on the urban margins and the people with whom they work; and what factors might assist such a reciprocal sense of depth exchange?The focus for the empirical work was on a situation where a group of religious and lay women are living and working on a peripheral urban housing estate. Although it was necessary to employ sociological research methods, this is not a sociological case study, but rather the exploration of lived spirituality within the Christian tradition.The emerging importance of conversation and dialogue leads to interaction with Gadamer and Tracy. The work of Rahner, particularly his emphasis on the dynamic drive towards divine mystery inherent within humanity, proves important, as it becomes evident that by virtue of their own discovery of the transcendent, the people of the estate are celebrating grace, but have come to it in and through the sacrament of their own lives.It is suggested that this operative fact of grace at work amongst the marginalised merits further consideration by the church. Here the vital function of a critical listening faculty is imperative. Indeed, it is suggested that such a developed faculty has more universal applicability throughout all forms of ministry. The facilitative tool for such an attuned listening is seen to be the openness to engagement with the contemplative dimension. Thus there is a re-engagement with the classical spiritual tradition, which is seen to authenticate the integrated nature of contemplation and action. Finally, detailed consideration is given to the process of the interior journey and the qualities engendered along the way vital for a contemporary spiritual hermeneutic. Here interaction with the work of Merton proves invaluable.Thus the course of the thesis is an unfolding of a spiritual hermeneutic which, it is suggested, has ramifications not exclusively on the urban margins, but as a potential dynamic force within the church at the close of the twentieth century

Outputs: Potassium Losses from Agricultural Systems

Potassium (K) outputs comprise removals in harvested crops and losses via a number of pathways. No specific environmental issues arise from K losses to the wider environment, and so they have received little attention. Nevertheless, K is very soluble and so can be leached to depth or to surface waters. Also, because K is bound to clays and organic materials, and adsorbed K is mostly associated with fine soil particles, it can be eroded with particulate material in runoff water and by strong winds. It can also be lost when crop residues are burned in the open. Losses represent a potential economic cost to farmers and reduce soil nutritional status for plant growth. The pathways of loss and their relative importance can be related to: (a) the general characteristics of the agricultural ecosystem (tropical or temperate regions, cropping or grazing, tillage management, interactions with other nutrients such as nitrogen); (b) the specific characteristics of the agricultural ecosystem such as soil mineralogy, texture, initial soil K status, sources of K applied (organic, inorganic), and rates and timing of fertilizer applications. This chapter provides an overview of the main factors affecting K removals in crops and losses through runoff, leaching, erosion, and open burning

Is it possible to increase the sustainability of arable and ruminant agriculture by reducing inputs?

Until recently, agricultural production was optimised almost exclusively for profit but now farming is under pressure to meet environmental targets. A method is presented and applied for optimising the sustainability of agricultural production systems in terms of both economics and the environment. Components of the agricultural production chain are analysed using environmental life-cycle assessment (LCA) and a financial value attributed to the resources consumed and burden imposed on the environment by agriculture, as well as to the products. The sum of the outputs is weighed against the inputs and the system considered sustainable if the value of the outputs exceeds those of the inputs. If this ratio is plotted against the sum of inputs for all levels of input, a diminishing returns curve should result and the optimum level of sustainability is located at the maximum of the curve. Data were taken from standard economic almanacs and from published LCA reports on the extent of consumption and environmental burdens resulting from farming in the UK. Land-use is valued using the concept of ecosystem services. Our analysis suggests that agricultural systems are sustainable at rates of production close to current levels practiced in the UK. Extensification of farming, which is thought to favour non-food ecosystem services, requires more land to produce the same amount of food. The loss of ecosystem services hitherto provided by natural land brought into production is greater than that which can be provided by land now under extensive farming. This loss of ecosystem service is large in comparison to the benefit of a reduction in emission of nutrients and pesticides. However, food production is essential, so the coupling of subsidies that represent a relatively large component of the economic output in EU farming, with measures to reduce pollution are well-aimed. Measures to ensure that as little extra land is brought into production as possible or that marginal land is allowed to revert to nature would seem to be equally well-aimed, even if this required more intensive use of productive areas. We conclude that current arable farming in the EU is sustainable with either realistic prices for products or some degree of subsidy and that productivity per unit area of land and greenhouse gas emission (subsuming primary energy consumption) are the most important pressures on the sustainability of farming

Highlights of the special issue Carbon neutrality and a low carbon economy for agriculture

Editoria

Direct detection and quantification of microRNAs

The recent discovery of the potent regulatory nature of microRNAs (miRNAs), a relatively new class of approximately 22 nucleotide RNAs, has made them a primary focus in today’s biochemical and medical research. The relationship between miRNA expression patterns and the onset of cancer, as well as other diseases, has glimpsed the potential of miRNAs as disease biomarkers or drug targets, making them a primary research focus. Their promising future in medicine is hinged upon improving our scientific understanding of their intricate regulatory mechanisms. In the realm of analytical chemistry, the main challenge associated with miRNA is its detection. Their extremely small size and low cellular concentration poses many challenges for achieving reliable results. Current reviews in this area have focused on adaptations to microarray, PCR, and Northern blotting procedures to make them suitable for miRNA detection. While these are extremely powerful methods and accepted as the current standards, they are typically very laborious, semi-quantitative, and often require expensive imaging equipment and/or radioactive/toxic labels. This review aims to highlight emerging techniques in miRNA detection and quantification that exhibit superior flexibility and adaptability as well as matched or increased sensitivity in comparison to the current standards. Specifically, this review will cover colorimetric, fluorescence, bioluminescence, enzyme, and electrochemical based methods, which drastically reduce procedural complexity and overall expense of operation thereby increasing the accessibility of this field of research. The methods are presented and discussed as to their improvements over current standard methods as well as their potential complications preventing acceptance as standard procedures. These new methods have addressed the many of the problems associated with miRNA detection through the employment of enzyme-based signal amplification, enhanced hybridization conditions using PNA capture probes, highly sensitive and flexible forms of spectroscopy, and extremely responsive electrocatalytic nanosystems, among other approaches

Thermodynamics applied to potassium exchange in aluminosilicate minerals and soils.

The enthalpies of Ca-»K exchange in 2:1 layer silicate minerals and in soils identify six types of cation exchange site, with up to four in any one soil or clay, which control ion exchange and the extent to which clays swell on adsorption of glycol. It is suggested that these sites are on the planar surfaces of mica, illite, vermiculite and montmorillonite, with a particular type of strongly K selective site at steps, cracks and expansion boundaries (wedge zones) of micaceous clays. Such thermodynamic measurements permit the quantitative determination of very small amounts of 2:1 layer silicate minerals and their K contents in clays and soils with mainly 1:1 or amorphous minerals, and thus a more precise determination of K exchange behaviour, especially selectivity and fixation