1,575 research outputs found
Resilience: Accounting for the Noncomputable
Plans to solve complex environmental problems should always consider the role of surprise. Nevertheless, there is a tendency to emphasize known computable aspects of a problem while neglecting aspects that are unknown and failing to ask questions about them. The tendency to ignore the noncomputable can be countered by considering a wide range of perspectives, encouraging transparency with regard to conflicting viewpoints, stimulating a diversity of models, and managing for the emergence of new syntheses that reorganize fragmentary knowledg
The ethics of socio-ecohydrological catchment management: towards hydrosolidarity
International audienceThis paper attempts to clarify key biophysical issues and the problems involved in the ethics of socio-ecohydrological catchment management. The issue in managing complex systems is to live with unavoidable change while securing the capacity of the ecohydrological system of the catchment to sustain vital ecological goods and services, aquatic as well as terrestrial, on which humanity depends ultimately. Catchment management oriented to sustainability has to be based on ethical principles: human rights, international conventions, sustaining crucial ecological goods and services, and protecting ecosystem resilience, all of which have water linkages. Many weaknesses have to be identified, assessed and mitigated to improve the tools by which the ethical issues can be addressed and solved: a heritage of constraining tunnel vision in both science and management; inadequate shortcuts made in modern scientific system analyses (e.g. science addressing sustainability issues); simplistic technical-fix approaches to water and ecosystems in land/water/ecosystem management; conventional tools for evaluation of scientific quality with its focus on ?doing the thing right? rather than ?doing the right thing?. The new ethics have to incorporate principles that, on a catchment basis, allow for proper attention to the hungry and poor, upstream and downstream, to descendants, and to sites and habitats that need to be protected. Keywords: catchment, hydrosolidarity, ecosystem, water determinants, resilience, green water, blue water, sustainability scienc
Is resilience a normative concept?
In this paper, we engage with the question of the normative content of the resilience concept. The issues are approached in two consecutive steps. First, we proceed from a narrow construal of the resilience concept – as the ability of a system to absorb a disturbance – and show that under an analysis of normative concepts as evaluative concepts resilience comes out as descriptive. In the second part of the paper, we argue that (1) for systems of interest (primarily social systems or system with a social component) we seem to have options with respect to how they are described and (2) that this matters for what is to be taken as a sign of resilience as opposed to a sign of the lack of resilience for such systems. We discuss the implications of this for how the concept should be applied in practice and suggest that users of the resilience concept face a choice between versions of the concept that are either ontologically or normatively charged
On Resilient Behaviors in Computational Systems and Environments
The present article introduces a reference framework for discussing
resilience of computational systems. Rather than a property that may or may not
be exhibited by a system, resilience is interpreted here as the emerging result
of a dynamic process. Said process represents the dynamic interplay between the
behaviors exercised by a system and those of the environment it is set to
operate in. As a result of this interpretation, coherent definitions of several
aspects of resilience can be derived and proposed, including elasticity, change
tolerance, and antifragility. Definitions are also provided for measures of the
risk of unresilience as well as for the optimal match of a given resilient
design with respect to the current environmental conditions. Finally, a
resilience strategy based on our model is exemplified through a simple
scenario.Comment: The final publication is available at Springer via
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s40860-015-0002-6 The paper considerably extends
the results of two conference papers that are available at http://ow.ly/KWfkj
and http://ow.ly/KWfgO. Text and formalism in those papers has been used or
adapted in the herewith submitted pape
Transforming innovation for sustainability
The urgency of charting pathways to sustainability that keep human societies within a "safe operating space" has now been clarified. Crises in climate, food, biodiversity, and energy are already playing out across local and global scales and are set to increase as we approach critical thresholds. Drawing together recent work from the Stockholm Resilience Centre, the Tellus Institute, and the STEPS Centre, this commentary article argues that ambitious Sustainable Development Goals are now required along with major transformation, not only in policies and technologies, but in modes of innovation themselves, to meet them. As examples of dryland agriculture in East Africa and rural energy in Latin America illustrate, such "transformative innovation" needs to give far greater recognition and power to grassroots innovation actors and processes, involving them within an inclusive, multi-scale innovation politics. The three dimensions of direction, diversity, and distribution along with new forms of "sustainability brokering" can help guide the kinds of analysis and decision making now needed to safeguard our planet for current and future generations
Chapter 04: Ecological resilience, climate change and the Great Barrier Reef
The vulnerability assessments in this volume frequently refer to the resilience of various ecosystem
elements in the face of climate change. This chapter provides an introduction to the concept of
ecological resilience, and its application as part of a management response to climate change threats.
As defined in the glossary, resilience refers to the capacity of a system to absorb shocks, resist dramatic
changes in condition, and maintain or recover key functions and processes, without undergoing “phase
shifts” to a qualitatively different state. For example, people who are physically and
mentally fit and strong will have good prospect of recovery from disease, injury or trauma: they
are resilient.This is Chapter 4 of Climate change and the Great Barrier Reef: a vulnerability assessment. The entire book can be found at http://hdl.handle.net/11017/13
Process Development for Batch Production of Micro-Milling Tools Made of Silicon Carbide by Means of the Dry Etching Process
Downsized and complex micro-machining structures have to meet quality requirements concerning geometry and convince through increasing functionality. The development and use of cutting tools in the sub-millimeter range can meet these demands and contribute to the production of intelligent components in biomedical technology, optics or electronics. This article addresses the development of double-edged micro-cutters, which consist of a two-part system of cutter head and shaft. The cutting diameters are between 50 and 200 μm. The silicon carbide cutting heads are manufactured from the solid material using microsystem technology. The substrate used can be structured uniformly via photolithography, which means that 5200 homogeneous micro-milling heads can be produced simultaneously. This novel batch approach represents a contrast to conventionally manufactured micro-milling cutters. The imprint is taken by means of reactive ion etching using a mask made of electroplated nickel. Within this dry etching process, characteristic values such as the etch rate and flank angle of the structures are critical and will be compared in a parameter analysis. At optimal parameters, an anisotropy factor of 0.8 and an etching rate of 0.34 µm/min of the silicon carbide are generated. Finally, the milling heads are diced and joined. In the final machining tests, the functionality is investigated and any signs of wear are evaluated. A tool life of 1500 mm in various materials could be achieved. This and the milling quality achieved are in the range of conventional micro-milling cutters, which gives a positive outlook for further development
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