Putting the emotion back: exploring the role of emotion in disengagement

This chapter explores the nature of disengagement and the role played by emotions and in doing so will disentangle the overlapping theories and definitions of both engagement and disengagement. The research that forms the basis for the chapter comes from two related studies exploring engagement and disengagement in 10 large UK public and private sector organisations. Both studies used an interpretive approach involving 75 managers and employees. The chapter suggests the that emotions play a mediating role in the process of disengagement and the emotional reaction involved provides a distinction to being ‘not engaged’. It highlights the confusion that different approaches bring to distinguishing engagement and disengagement from other job attitudes

Centric diatom morphogenesis: a model based on a DLA algorithm investigating the potential role of microtubules

AbstractDiatoms are single-celled algae which possess characteristic rigid cell walls (frustules) composed of amorphous silica. Frustule formation occurs within a specialised organelle termed the silica deposition vesicle (SDV). During diatom morphogenesis, silica particles are transported to the SDV by silica transport vesicles. Once released within the SDV, the particles are then thought to diffuse until they encounter part of the growing aggregate upon which they adhere. The particles may then undergo a further period of surface relocalisation (sintering) which leads to a smoothing of the surface. A number of computer simulations based on a modified diffusion-limited aggregation (DLA) algorithm, have been undertaken to investigate the potential role of microtubules (which are known to be associated with the periphery of the SDV) in localising deposition of new siliceous material. Based on our findings, we present a new model of diatom morphogenesis which is able to account for many morphological features of diatoms including the influence of environmental effects such as changes in pH and salinity, and the formation of a regular branched pattern

Nudging the adaptive thermal comfort model

The recent release of the largest database of thermal comfort field studies (ASHRAE Global Thermal Comfort Database II) presents an opportunity to perform a quality assurance exercise on the first generation adaptive comfort standards (ASHRAE 55 and EN15251). The analytical procedure used to develop the ASHRAE 55 adaptive standard was replicated on 60,321 comfort questionnaire records with accompanying measurement data. Results validated the standard's current adaptive comfort model for naturally ventilated buildings, while suggesting several potential nudges relating to the adaptive comfort standards, adaptive comfort theory, and building operational strategies. Adaptive comfort effects were observed in all regions represented in the new global database, but the neutral (comfort) temperatures in the Asian subset trended 1–2°C higher than in Western countries. Moreover, sufficient data allowed the development of an adaptive model for mixed-mode buildings that closely aligned to the naturally ventilated counterpart. We present evidence that adaptive comfort processes are relevant to the occupants of all buildings, including those that are air conditioned, as the thermal environmental exposures driving adaptation occur indoors where we spend most of our time. This suggests significant opportunity to transition air conditioning practice into the adaptive framework by programming synoptic- and seasonal-scale set-point nudging into building automation systems

Running primordial perturbations: Inflationary Dynamics and Observational Constraints

Inflationary cosmology proposes that the early Universe undergoes accelerated expansion, driven, in simple scenarios, by a single scalar field, or inflaton. The form of the inflaton potential determines the initial spectra of density perturbations and gravitational waves. We show that constraints on the duration of inflation together with the BICEP3/Keck bounds on the gravitational wave background imply that higher derivatives of the potential are nontrivial with a confidence of 99%. Such terms contribute to the scale-dependence, or running, of the density perturbation spectrum. We clarify the ``universality classes'' of inflation in this limit showing that a very small gravitational wave background can be correlated with a larger running. If pending experiments do not observe a gravitational wave background the running will be at the threshold of detectability if inflation is well-described at third-order in the slow roll expansion.Comment: 5 pages; 5 figures; as published in PRD -- change of title, minor clarification

The legitimation of deliberative democracy

This thesis explores issues of legitimacy in the theory and practice of deliberative democracy. The starting point is two problems which arise in classical accounts of deliberation. First, if legitimacy depends on the give and take of reasons between free and equal citizens, how can the results of a deliberative moment be legitimate for those who did not take part, when in complex societies there will always be many more outsiders than insiders? Second, there are problems to do with motivations which mean that people may choose not to deliberate even if they can. The thesis begins by criticising the standard deliberative conception of legitimacy as being too narrow, then expands on it to include two different means of establishing links between participants and non-participants: representation and the publicity principle. The former helps by allowing a legitimate basis for including relatively few participants; the latter helps by greatly expanding the institutional possibilities of deliberative democracy, moving away from a reliance on small, self-contained forums and towards a "deliberative system". Having established a set of ideals, I then examine how three key features of the theoretical solution play out in real deliberations, using four deliberative experiments in the UK's National Health Service. One of the reasons why legitimacy is problematic in that context is a conflict between bureaucratic and deliberative imperatives, and so it should not be surprising that legitimacy problems plague some attempts to use deliberation in a liberal state. In chapter four I show how competing representation claims are used as strategic weapons in real policy conflicts, but argue that different claims have strengths and weaknesses depending on context. This has implications for the kind of process used at different points of a policy debate, particularly with regards to participant selection. In chapter five I argue that publicity lessens our reliance on problematic representative solutions, but presents difficulties of its own, largely because there are fundamental, structural barriers to the free exchange of communication such that the media can only transmit quite a narrow range of arguments. In chapter six, I show how disagreements over who and what counts as reasonable adds further complications, highlighting both the positive and negative contributions made by rhetoric and publicity and the varying ability of different deliberative models to handle the tensions. I conclude that while we may have to give up on the idea of a perfectly legitimate deliberative institution, it may be possible to connect several different types of institution, operating at different stages of a decision making process, to create legitimate agreements. I sketch what such a deliberative system might look like, before closing with recommendations for further research