James Connolly\u27s Years in America, 1902-1910

James Connolly, born in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1868, was an Irish socialist who would go on to be a leading member of the 1916 Easter Rebellion in Ireland. From an early age he became involved in the socialist movement through groups such as the Scottish Socialist Federation and the Independent Labor Party. A self-educated man well read in the socialist and political literature of his day, Connolly eventually made his way back to Ireland, forming his own socialist group, the Irish Socialist Republican Party. In 1902 he embarked on a speaking tour in the United States at the invite of Daniel De Leon’s Socialist Labor Party. Upon return to Ireland, troubles arose within his party, resulting in his expulsion and subsequent return to America, where he would live from 1903 to 1910. Connolly’s years in America had a profound impact on his political and socialist ideology, providing him with real world experience navigating leadership politics, and refining his grassroots labor organization and strike methods. He wrote and traveled extensively with the SLP, IWW, and SP, thus gaining valuable experience he would bring back to Ireland and employ for the causes of the Irish worker, and of Irish national independence. He had arrived in America as a socialist speaker and writer from a minor party, but then returned to Ireland as a veteran strike leader and labor organizer, with revolutionary aims for Ireland and a far more defined understanding of his own socialist ideology

Finding Common Interests in the Times of Rising Conflict: Shibusawa Eiichi and the 1909 Japanese Commercial Commission to the United States

The 1909 Japanese Commercial Commission to the United States, its purpose, and its perception within the United States public and government, is analyzed using U.S. newspapers’ coverage of the Commission over the duration of its approximately three-month tour of the United States. The 1909 Japanese Commercial Commission was an unofficial diplomatic mission, headed by Eiichi Shibusawa and a group of the leading figures of Japan, including businessmen, financiers, heads of chambers of commerce, educators, and newspapermen. They came at the invitation of the Seattle Chamber of Commerce and the Associated Chambers of Commerce of the Pacific Coast and hoped to improve relations between the United States and Japan, which had been strained by immigration and Japan’s victory in the Russo-Japanese War in 1905, through friendly commercial ties. Members on both sides expressed their earnest desire for increased trade and friendly relations, while downplaying the immigration issue and rumors of war that had appeared in U.S. newspapers. The Commission’s favorable reception is evidence that the benefits of increased trade through friendly commercial relations outweighed the conflicting, shifting, and often negative view of Japan held by many Americans at this time, especially in California where controversy over the immigration of Japanese laborers was severe. The welcome the commissioners received from key government figures such as Secretary of State Knox and President Taft is evidence of a shift in perception by the United States government, with the realization that Japan must be taken seriously as a growing world power

The development of an 85-kW (thermal) air Brayton receiver

The results of the program from its inception through December 1980 are presented. The design requirements, concept, and significant analysis upon which the receiver is based are described. The fabrication processes that have been utilized in the construction of the prototype receivers at the test station are summarized. The test and evaluation phase at the Parabolic Dish Test Site are described

The Net Neutrality Debate: Twenty Five Years after United States v. AT&T and 120 Years after the Act to Regulate Commerce

Apparent ignorance of more than a century of economic history now threatens the competitive constitution of the Internet under the guise of "net neutrality." Net neutrality is a slogan that stands for the proposition that the Internet and physical means of access to it should be available to all on uniform, non-discriminatory terms. Proponents of net neutrality fear, first, that access to bottlenecks, such as the "last mile" to the home, will be monopolized and second, that the successful monopolist will seek to favor its own vertical services by excluding or disfavoring others. Net neutrality is their answer to these threats. But the architects of the concept of net neutrality have simply resurrected the traditional na

The dust and gas content of the Crab Nebula

We have constructed MOCASSIN photoionization plus dust radiative transfer models for the Crab Nebula core-collapse supernova (CCSN) remnant, using either smooth or clumped mass distributions, in order to determine the chemical composition and masses of the nebular gas and dust. We computed models for several different geometries suggested for the nebular matter distribution but found that the observed gas and dust spectra are relatively insensitive to these geometries, being determined mainly by the spectrum of the pulsar wind nebula which ionizes and heats the nebula. Smooth distribution models are ruled out since they require 16-49 Msun of gas to fit the integrated optical nebular line fluxes, whereas our clumped models re quire 7.0 Msun of gas. A global gas-phase C/O ratio of 1.65 by number is derived, along with a He/H number ratio of 1.85, neither of which can be matched by current CCSN yield predictions. A carbonaceous dust composition is favoured by the observed gas-phase C/O ratio: amorphous carbon clumped model fits to the Crab's Herschel and Spitzer infrared spectral energy distribution imply the presence of 0.18-0.27 Msun of dust, corresponding to a gas to dust mass ratio of 26-39. Mixed dust chemistry models can also be accommodated, comprising 0.11-0.13 Msun of amorphous carbon and 0.39-0.47 Msun of silicates. Power-law grain size distributions with mass distributions that are weighted towards the largest grain radii are derived, favouring their longer-term survival when they eventually interact with the interstellar medium. The total mass of gas plus dust in the Crab Nebula is 7.2 +/- 0.5 Msun, consistent with a progenitor star mass of 9 Msun.Comment: Accepted in Ap

Voldemort Tyrannos: Plato’s Tyrant in the Republic and the Wizarding World

In the Harry Potter novel series, by J. K. Rowling, the character of Lord Voldemort is the dictatorial ruler of the Death Eaters and aspiring despot of the entire wizarding community. As such, he serves as an apt subject for the application of Plato’s portrait of the tyrant in Republic IX. The process of applying Plato to Voldemort, however, leads to an apparent anomaly, the resolution of which requires that we move beyond the Republic to the account of beauty presented by Plato in the Symposium. In doing so, we shall find that while Plato can help us to understand Voldemort, Voldemort can also help us to attain a deeper understanding of Plato

Pragmatism and Meaning: Assessing the Message of Star Trek: The Original Series

The original Star Trek television series purported to depict a future in which such evils as sexism and racism do not exist, and intelligent beings from numerous planets live in a condition of peace and mutual benefit. As many scholars have observed, from a standpoint of contemporary theoretical analysis, Star Trek: The Original Series contains many elements that are inimical to the utopia it claims to depict and thus undermine its supposed message. A different perspective may be gained by drawing on the American pragmatist movement, in which the value of an idea is judged by its effectiveness, how it ‘cashes out’ in terms of its impact in real life. Thus, the meaning and value of Star Trek: TOS can be assessed by observing its effects on its audience. This perspective coordinates well with Taylor’s discussion of the necessary conditions for the realization of a protreptic moral order in the social imaginary, as well as a pragmatist understanding of audience engagement and education