Review of \u3ci\u3eRARE: Portraits of America\u27s Endangered Species.\u3c/i\u3e By Joel Sartore.

Short of being in the presence of a creature, a really good photograph of one can also make a lasting impression. That is something RARE does compellingly, with exquisite portrait photos of 68 North American species that are dwindling dangerously in numbers or have recently recovered from the brink of extinction. Included are such Great Plains natives as the lesser prairie chicken, the interior least tern, and the black-footed ferret. All creatures were photographed with either a pure white or black background, but unconventional poses surprise the reader with each turn of the page, while creative framing and layout engage the eye. It\u27s as if we were having a friendly visit with these plants and animals in their living rooms, not watching them pose stiffly for mug shots. A mouse washes its face, a toad leaps off the page, an eagle looks the other way, a salamander raises its forefoot as if to give us a high five, a butterfly emerges from its chrysalis. Each portrait has only a brief paragraph of text accompanying it, but introductory essays by Joel Sartore and noted author Verlyn Klinkenborg frame the narrative well and emphasize the importance of what Aldo Leopold famously established as the first rule of intelligent tinkering: save all the pieces

FPGA Implementation of Spectral Subtraction for In-Car Speech Enhancement and Recognition

The use of speech recognition in noisy environments requires the use of speech enhancement algorithms in order to improve recognition performance. Deploying these enhancement techniques requires significant engineering to ensure algorithms are realisable in electronic hardware. This paper describes the design decisions and process to port the popular spectral subtraction algorithm to a Virtex-4 field-programmable gate array (FPGA) device. Resource analysis shows the final design uses only 13% of the total available FPGA resources. Waveforms and spectrograms presented support the validity of the proposed FPGA design

BIM fork: Are smart contracts in construction more likely to prosper with or without BIM?

Forum papers are thought-provoking opinion pieces or essays founded in fact, sometimes containing speculation, on a civil engineering topic of general interest and relevance to the readership of the journal. The views expressed in this Forum article do not necessarily reflect the views of ASCE or the Editorial Board of the journal

A Reply to \u27\u27Animal Welfare, Rights and \u27Liberation \u27 by M.W. Fox

A distinction that is more than mere semantics needs to be made between specific philosophical and political trends in the humane movement. The movement\u27s historical basis is founded upon the morality of promoting kindness toward all creatures: reverence for all life. This approach has been strengthened by integrating ecological or eco-ethical principles and the emerging interdisciplinary animal welfare science. Furthermore, the movement has been enriched by the scholarship of moral philosophy, including the limited but valuable concept of animal \u27rights.\u2

Intelligent contracts and the construction industry

Advances in technology have resulted in a fast changing landscape for construction contracts. Lawyers struggle to keep up with the pace of innovation and the need to provide legal solutions and accommodate new approaches. Building Information Modelling (BIM) has become part of the common parlance in construction notwithstanding limited evidence of its impact on the ground... Intelligent contracts appear as a logical extension to BIM whereby the contractual performance itself becomes automated. However, intelligent contracts work best where they are short term or are of instantaneous effect. This is at odds with the complicated and long-running nature of construction projects. Further, storage constraints, compatibility and reliability issues together with confidentiality and the long term nature of distributed ledgers pose additional problems. The aim of this paper is to present the debate about what could be achieved in the construction industry by the adoption of intelligent contracts. An on-line forum provided the secondary data on which the discussion is based. The objectives are to introduce aspects of technological advancement within commerce generally and to discuss their application in construction. The hypothesis advanced is that certain aspects of the construction contract cannot be fully intelligent and the best that can be achieved in the short to medium term is a semi-automated position. Further, intelligent contracts should be viewed as part of the BIM-led revolution in construction and not separate from it. The recommendation is that incremental advances such as the coding of project management and contract administration data be targeted to provide improved operational efficiency and value savings

Get smart

‘Smart’ contracts could be the next big thing in construction technology but will developers learn the lessons of BIM implementation? Sometimes it’s better to keep things simpl

Things That Growl In The Night

You cannot say this about a lot of the Great Plains, but the Flint Hills of today bear a strong resemblance to what they looked like before European colonization, and that is one of their many charms

Getting at the Numbers

Henry Spira, leader of the Campaign Against the LD50 test, talks about how he builds coalitions to focus action

The Politics of Animal Rights: Making the Human Connection

Animal Rights is in the air, so much so that the term borders on becoming a buzzword and the cause itself the latest form of radical chic. Although Lewis Gompertz, Henry S. Salt, and others put forth radically different views on attitudes and relations toward other animals more than a century ago, the publication in 1972 of essays by Brigid Brophy, Richard Ryder, and others in the book, Animals, Men and Morals (London: Gollancz, 1971; New York: Taplinger, 1972) and the more popular book, Animal Liberation, by Peter Singer (New York Review, 1975) have sparked another wave of these views and have inspired a spate of college courses, articles in both academic and popular periodicals and radio and television programs on the subject of animal rights. We are reaching the public now with better analyses and better ways of explaining why humans should stop abusing and using other species

The Politics of Animal Rights: Making the Human Connection

Animal Rights is in the air, so much so that the term borders on becoming a buzzword and the cause itself the latest form of radical chic. Although Lewis Gompertz, Henry S. Salt, and others put forth radically different views on attitudes and relations toward other animals more than a century ago, the publication in 1972 of essays by Brigid Brophy, Richard Ryder, and others in the book, Animals, Men and Morals (London: Gollancz, 1971; New York: Taplinger, 1972) and the more famous book, Animal Liberation, by Peter Singer (New York Review, 1975) have sparked another wave of these views and have inspired a spate of college courses, articles in both academic and popular periodicals and radio and television programs on the subject of animal rights. We are reaching the public now with better analyses and better ways of explaining why humans should stop abusing and using other species