The Return of the Edwardians in Contemporary Fiction

My research stems from the hypothesis that a subgenre exists within the contemporary historical novel in English with a series of features that can be labelled as neoEdwardian and belong in a broader social and cultural phenomenon. Thus, trough the analysis of a series of recent novels set in the years prior to the First World War, this dissertation could contribute to the study of the relationship that we establish with the past, especially when History and fiction interact in novels. The main goals of this research are: 1. To delve into the state of the art of contemporary historical fiction in English. 2. To trace the state of the art of the neo-Edwardian novel, including a chronology of primary works and their evolution. 3. To analyse a series of primary works that could be considered neo-Edwardian and to obtain some common features. 4. To investigate critical concepts about our contemporary views on the past that can be related to this subgenre. 5. To contribute to the study of the neo-historical novel. In order to achieve this, a thorough examination of a selection of contemporary novels set in the Edwardian period is being carried out. The theoretical framework employed revolves around memory in contemporary fiction and the evolution of the historical novel in the 20th and the 21st centuries.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

On ultraviolet light and the origin of ribosomes

Function of UV light in evolution of contemporary ribosome

About the global magnetic fields of stars

We present a review of observations of the stellar longitudinal (effective) magnetic field ($B_e$) and its properties. This paper also discusses contemporary views on the origin, evolution and structure of $B_e$.Comment: Plenary report, The Gamov International Astronomical Conference, XIII ODESSA, 19-25 August, 2013, Odessa, Ukrain

An Aristotelian Account of Evolution and the Contemporary Philosophy of Biology

The anti-reductionist character of the recent philosophy of biology and the dynamic development of the science of emergent properties prove that the time is ripe to reintroduce the thought of Aristotle, the first advocate of a “top-down” approach in life-sciences, back into the science/philosophy debate. His philosophy of nature provides profound insights particularly in the context of the contemporary science of evolution, which is still struggling with the questions of form, teleology, and the role of chance in evolutionary processes. However, although Aristotle is referenced in the evolutionary debate, a thorough analysis of his theory of hylomorphism and the classical principle of causality which he proposes is still needed in this exchange. Such is the main concern of the first part of the present article which shows Aristotle’s metaphysics of substance as an open system, ready to incorporate new hypothesis of modern and contemporary science. The second part begins with the historical exploration of the trajectory from Darwin to Darwinism regarded as a metaphysical position. This exploration leads to an inquiry into the central topics of the present debate in the philosophy of evolutionary biology. It shows that Aristotle’s understanding of species, teleology, and chance – in the context of his fourfold notion of causality – has a considerable explanatory power which may enhance our understanding of the nature of evolutionary processes. This fact may inspire, in turn, a retrieval of the classical theology of divine action, based on Aristotelian metaphysics, in the science/theology dialogue. The aim of the present article is to prepare a philosophical ground for such project

Family evolution and contemporary social transformations

In the first place, this paper intends to analyze the kind of relationships existing inside the family. In order to do that, the author makes an effort to reconsider its historical forming process applying the classical anthropological texts. At this stage, the analysis proposes two different types of relationships between human beings, the primal, which arose from the most elementary feelings of love, protection, accompaniment, and the strictly social, risen from the needs of cooperation and collective work. The family is the expression of both kinds of relationships. In the second place, this work analyzes the nuclear family as a result of a historical process associated to the development of capital and the social conditions that make possible its consolidation. And in the third place, the author proposes the discussion on the crisis of the nuclear family under the perspective of the contemporary global transformation of the accumulation of capital. As a conclusion: some reflections on the perspectives that these transformations offer to the role of the family.Family; Family structure; Origin of family; Historic origin of family; family and society; social transformation and family

Mapping posthuman discourse and the evolution of living information

The discourse that surrounds and constitutes the post-human emerged as a response to earlier claims of an essential or universal human or human nature. These discussions claim that the human is a discursive construct that emerges from various configurations of nature, embodiment, technology, and culture, configurations that have also been variously shaped by the forces of social history. And in the absence of an essential human figure, post-human discourses suggest that there are no restrictions or limitations on how the human can be reconfigured. This axiom has been extended in light of a plethora of technological reconfigurations and augmentations now potentially available to the human, and claims emerge from within this literature that these new technologies constitute a range of possibilities for future human biological evolution. This thesis questions the assumption contained within these discourses that technological incursions or reconfigurations of the biological human necessarily constitute human biological or human social evolution by discussing the role the evolution theories plays in our understanding of the human, the social, and technology. In this thesis I show that, in a reciprocal process, evolution theory draws metaphors from social institutions and ideologies, while social institutions and ideologies simultaneously draw on metaphors from evolution theory. Through this discussion, I propose a form of evolution literacy; a tool, I argue, is warranted in developing a sophisticated response to changes in both human shape and form. I argue that, as a whole, our understanding of evolution constitutes a metanarrative, a metaphor through which we understand the place of the human within the world; it follows that historical shifts in social paradigms will result in new definitions of evolution. I show that contemporary evolution theory reflects parts of the world as codified informatic systems of associated computational network logic through which the behaviour of participants is predefined according to an evolved or programmed structure. Working from within the discourse of contemporary evolution theory I develop a space through which a version of the post-human figure emerges. I promote this version of the post-human as an Artificial Intelligence computational programme or autonomous agent that, rather than seeking to replace, reduce or deny the human subject, is configured as an exosomatic supplement to and an extension of the biological human

Hierarchy Theory of Evolution and the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis: Some Epistemic Bridges, Some Conceptual Rifts

Contemporary evolutionary biology comprises a plural landscape of multiple co-existent conceptual frameworks and strenuous voices that disagree on the nature and scope of evolutionary theory. Since the mid-eighties, some of these conceptual frameworks have denounced the ontologies of the Modern Synthesis and of the updated Standard Theory of Evolution as unfinished or even flawed. In this paper, we analyze and compare two of those conceptual frameworks, namely Niles Eldredge’s Hierarchy Theory of Evolution (with its extended ontology of evolutionary entities) and the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis (with its proposal of an extended ontology of evolutionary processes), in an attempt to map some epistemic bridges (e.g. compatible views of causation; niche construction) and some conceptual rifts (e.g. extra-genetic inheritance; different perspectives on macroevolution; contrasting standpoints held in the “externalism–internalism” debate) that exist between them. This paper seeks to encourage theoretical, philosophical and historiographical discussions about pluralism or the possible unification of contemporary evolutionary biology

They Bleed But They Don’t Die: Towards a Theoretical Canon On Ga-Adangbe Gender Studies

Contemporary African women are often cast as existing below the glass ceiling. African women who are perceived as having overcome this glass threshold are therefore seen and celebrated as exceptional. Against this background, this essay offers conceptual tools with which to examine the lives of historical and contemporary women in Ga traditional society of Ghana, living beyond the glass ceiling. Drawing a distinction between the role of women in the modern nation-state and traditional societies, this study asserts that unlike the situation in modern governance, structures and practices of Ga traditional societies have enabled Ga women to live beyond the glass ceiling. Acknowledging the non-static and dynamic evolution of Ga traditional society, this paper explores how Ga women exercise public and private power in Ga society

Rapid Prototype for Foundry Tool Making: Curriculum and Industrial Projects

This paper presents the evolution of an experimental .courseat Cal Poly which applies rapid prototyping techniques, enabling a concurrent engineering approach to product development. This is applied within our manufacturillgenvironmentof foundry and machining processes. It focuses upon the.mainprobletnof rapid tooling for these processes. A contemporary problenlprovided by industry is used as the vehicle for illustrating rapidprototyping techniques within a concurrent engineering context.Mechanical Engineerin

Effects of Rotation on the Minimum Mass of Primordial Progenitors of Pair Instability Supernovae

The issue of which stars may reach the conditions of electron/positron pair formation instability is of importance to understand the final evolution both of the first stars and of contemporary stars. The criterion to enter the pair instability regime in density and temperature is basically controlled by the mass of the oxygen core. The main sequence masses that produce a given oxygen core mass are, in turn, dependent on metallicity, mass loss, and convective and rotationally-induced mixing. We examine the evolution of massive stars to determine the minimum main sequence mass that can encounter pair-instability effects, either a pulsational pair instability (PPISN) or a full-fledged pair-instability supernova (PISN). We concentrate on zero-metallicity stars with no mass loss subject to the Schwarzschild criterion for convective instability, but also explore solar metallicity and mass loss and the Ledoux criterion. As expected, for sufficiently strong rotationally-induced mixing, the minimum main sequence mass is encountered for conditions that induce effectively homogeneous evolution such that the original mass is converted almost entirely to helium and then to oxygen. For this case, we find that the minimum main sequence mass is ~40 Msun to encounter PPISN and ~65 Msun to encounter a PISN. When mass-loss is taken into account those mass limits become ~50 Msun for PPISN and ~80 Msun for PISN progenitors. The implications of these results for the first stars and for contemporary supernovae is discussed.Comment: 23 pages, 8 figure