15,783 research outputs found
Exploring Political Disappointment
Disappointment is often identified as a pathology of modern politics; citizens expect much of politicians, yet governments are ill-equipped to deliver outcomes commensurate with those expectations. The net result is said to be a widespread disappointment; a negative balance between what citizens expect of government and what they perceive governments to deliver. Yet little attention has hitherto been paid to which kinds of citizens are particularly disappointed with politics, and why. This article offers one of the first empirical analyses of political disappointment. Drawing on a survey conducted in Britain, it provides a quantitative measure of political disappointment and explores its prevalence among citizens. It then considers which social groups might be more prone to disappointment than others. In particular, it explores whether certain groups are more disappointed by virtue of holding very high expectations of government or very low perceptions of government performance. The article concludes by considering what strategies might be open to policy makers to alleviate political disappointment
Kepler Mission Stellar and Instrument Noise Properties Revisited
An earlier study of the Kepler Mission noise properties on time scales of
primary relevance to detection of exoplanet transits found that higher than
expected noise followed to a large extent from the stars, rather than
instrument or data analysis performance. The earlier study over the first six
quarters of Kepler data is extended to the full four years ultimately
comprising the mission. Efforts to improve the pipeline data analysis have been
successful in reducing noise levels modestly as evidenced by smaller values
derived from the current data products. The new analyses of noise properties on
transit time scales show significant changes in the component attributed to
instrument and data analysis, with essentially no change in the inferred
stellar noise. We also extend the analyses to time scales of several days,
instead of several hours to better sample stellar noise that follows from
magnetic activity. On the longer time scale there is a shift in stellar noise
for solar-type stars to smaller values in comparison to solar values.Comment: 10 pages, 8 figures, accepted by A
Deep GALEX Observations of the Coma Cluster: Source Catalog and Galaxy Counts
We present a source catalog from deep 26 ks GALEX observations of the Coma
cluster in the far-UV (FUV; 1530 A) and near-UV (NUV; 2310 A) wavebands. The
observed field is centered 0.9 deg (1.6 Mpc) south-west of the Coma core, and
has full optical photometric coverage with SDSS. The catalog consists of 9700
galaxies with GALEX and SDSS photometry, including 242
spectroscopically-confirmed Coma member galaxies that range from giant spirals
and elliptical galaxies to dwarf irregular and early-type galaxies. The full
multi-wavelength catalog (cluster plus background galaxies) is ~80% complete to
NUV=23 and FUV=23.5, and has a limiting depth at NUV=24.5 and FUV=25.0 which
corresponds to a star formation rate of ~0.001 Msun/yr at the distance of Coma.
Our deep GALEX observations required a two-fold approach to generating a source
catalog: we used a Bayesian deblending algorithm to measure faint and compact
sources (using SDSS coordinates as a position prior), and relied on the GALEX
pipeline catalog for bright/extended objects. We performed simulations to
assess the influence that systematic effects (e.g. object blends, source
confusion, Eddington Bias) have on source detection and photometry when using
both methods. The Bayesian deblending method roughly doubles the number of
source detections and provides reliable photometry to a few magnitudes deeper
than the GALEX pipeline catalog. This method is also free from source confusion
over the UV magnitude range studied here; conversely, we estimate that the
GALEX pipeline catalogs are confusion limited at magnitudes fainter than NUV~23
and FUV~24. We have measured the total UV galaxy counts using our catalog and
report a ~50% excess of counts across FUV=22-23.5 and NUV=21.5-23 relative to
previous GALEX measurements, which is not attributed to cluster member
galaxies. Our galaxy counts are a better match to deeper UV counts measured
with HST.Comment: 27 pages, 13 figures, 4 tables, accepted for publication in ApJ
What's the matter with realism?
International relations, as an academic discipline, is not known for its strength in the area of theory. It has no immediate equivalent to the rich contrasts of perspective generated in sociology by the legacy of Max Weber, Marx and Durkheimâa lack so felt that Martin Wight once wrote a paper called âWhy is there no International Theory?â His own answer was, in part, that there is nothing further to theorize after the discovery of the repetitive mechanisms of the balance of power. This was a sad conclusion for such an acute and creative mind to reach. But it does illustrate a central feature of IR theory. For the balance of power, it can be argued, is the limit of any Realist theory of international relations. And Wight's conclusion was perhaps more an index of the dominance of a Realist orthodoxy than a relection of the inherent properties of âthe internationalâ
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