Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Toward a Feminist Epistemology

This essay explores the concepts of objectivity and subjectivity from a feminist perspective. It criticizes contemporary feminist theory that identifies all objectivity with a "male" point of view and explores the possibility of dialectics as a methodology that "saves" objectivity without the traditional empiricist pitfalls. The first section addresses contemporary feminist efforts to collapse the border between subjectivity and objectivity, to dismiss "objectivity" altogether, or to create a universe with "soft" borders. It focuses on Catharine MacKinnon's recent work. The second section postulates "dialectics" as an alternative to empiricist objectivity and considers feminist theorists who do deal with dialectical method. The third section is a discussion of the structure of Hegelian dialectics and a brief comparison with Anglo-American empiricism. Section 4 is a discussion of the feminist potential of the structure, as distinct from the substance, of Marxian dialectics. Feminist theorists have struggled with the question of whether a feminine nature exists, distinguishable from the nature of man. The debate raged during the "first wave" of feminism in the nineteenth century and has returned to stir up undercurrents in the "second wave. " In the early 1970s feminist wariness of a world dichotomized into private and public presupposed fundamental similarities between male and female nature. "The personal is political" signaled a call to break down the barriers between private and public and to redefine politics to include female experience. Little thought was given to the possibility that women were "naturally" different from men in an immutable and politically significant way. More recently, feminists have begun to question the validity of that early "androgyny" theory which assumed certain similarities between men and women. Current theory runs a range from radical and separatist feminism to conservative or "social" feminism, drawn together by a common thread that postulates that women are after all different from men. Whether the source of that difference is biologically or socially determined remains largely unquestioned, subordinated to a general celebration of a feminist universe with soft borders, a universe characterized by cooperation rather than competition, nurturance rather than aggression. Depending upon academic discipline, feminist
RELIABILITY ESTIMATION FRAMEWORK -COMPLEXITY PERSPECTIVE-

A reliability estimation framework for OO design complexity perspective has been developed in this paper. The proposed framework correlates the object oriented design constructs with complexity and also correlates complexity with reliability. No such framework has been available in the literature that estimates software reliability of OO design by taking complexity into consideration. The framework bridges the gap between object oriented design constructs, complexity and reliability. Framework measures and minimizes the complexity of software design at the early stage of software development life cycle leading to a reliable end product. Reliability and complexity estimation models have been proposed by following the proposed framework. Complexity estimation model has been developed which takes OO design constructs into consideration and proposed reliability estimation models take complexity in consideration for estimating reliability of OO design.
Modeling the Potential Distribution of Bacillus anthracis under Multiple Climate Change Scenarios for Kazakhstan

Anthrax, caused by the bacterium Bacillus anthracis, is a zoonotic disease that persists throughout much of the world in livestock, wildlife, and secondarily infects humans. This is true across much of Central Asia, and particularly the Steppe region, including Kazakhstan. This study employed the Genetic Algorithm for Rule-set Prediction (GARP) to model the current and future geographic distribution of Bacillus anthracis in Kazakhstan based on the A2 and B2 IPCC SRES climate change scenarios using a 5-variable data set at 55 km2 and 8 km2 and a 6-variable BioClim data set at 8 km2. Future models suggest large areas predicted under current conditions may be reduced by 2050 with the A2 model predicting ∼14–16% loss across the three spatial resolutions. There was greater variability in the B2 models across scenarios predicting ∼15% loss at 55 km2, ∼34% loss at 8 km2, and ∼30% loss with the BioClim variables. Only very small areas of habitat expansion into new areas were predicted by either A2 or B2 in any models. Greater areas of habitat loss are predicted in the southern regions of Kazakhstan by A2 and B2 models, while moderate habitat loss is also predicted in the northern regions by either B2 model at 8 km2. Anthrax disease control relies mainly on livestock vaccination and proper carcass disposal, both of which require adequate surveillance. In many situations, including that of Kazakhstan, vaccine resources are limited, and understanding the geographic distribution of the organism, in tandem with current data on livestock population dynamics, can aid in properly allocating doses. While speculative, contemplating future changes in livestock distributions and B. anthracis spore promoting environments can be useful for establishing future surveillance priorities. This study may also have broader applications to global public health surveillance relating to other diseases in addition to B. anthracis.
Cumulative risk assessment of the intake of organophosphorus and carbamate pesticides in the Danish diet

The aim of the study is to evaluate the potential cumulative effects of organophosphorus and carbamate pesticides that act through a common mechanism of toxicity, and to assess the long- and short-term risks for the Danish population. The intake estimates are based on dietary intake data collected in the Danish nation-wide food consumption survey in 1995. The pesticide data are based on the Danish pesticide residue-monitoring programme from 1996–2001. The amount of 35 organophosphorus pesticides and carbamates were included in the cumulative risk assessment. Processing factors, such as reduction of pesticide levels by rinsing and peeling, were applied in the exposure assessment. The “Toxicity Equivalence Factor” (TEF) approach was used to normalise the toxicity of the different organophosphorus and carbamate pesticides. Cumulative chronic exposure of organophosphorus and carbamates pesticides via fruit, vegetables and cereals is for adults 0.8–2% of the Acceptable Daily Intake (ADI) in chlorpyrifos equivalents, and 0.03–11% of the ADI in methamidophos equivalents; and for children 2–5% of the ADI in the chlorpyrifos equivalents, and 0.07–27% of the ADI in methamidophos equivalents. Neither Acute Reference Dose (ARfD) nor ADI was exceeded for any of the compounds studied. The results indicate that the Danish population is neither exposed to any cumulative chronic risk, nor at risk of acute exposure, from consumption of organophosphorus and carbamate pesticides from fruit, vegetables and cereals.
Synchronously Dividing Bacterial Cultures I. Synchrony Following Depletion and Resupplementation of a Required Amino Acid in Escherichia coli

Matney, Thomas S. (The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Hospital and Tumor Institute, Houston, Texas), and Joan C. Suit. Synchronously dividing bacterial cultures. I. Synchrony following depletion and resupplementation of a required amino acid in Escherichia coli. J. Bacteriol. 92:960–966. 1966. —A procedure was developed for phasing large-volume cultures of Escherichia coli K-12 with regard to cell division. The method consists of permitting the bacteria to exhaust a growth-limiting supply of a required amino acid, starving the culture, resupplementing with an excess of the amino acid, and following the ensuing growth by usual counting procedures.
Denoising and baseline correction of ECG signals using sparse representation

Removing noise and other artifacts in the electrocardiogram (ECG) is a critical preprocessing step for further heart disease analysis and diagnosis. In this paper, we propose a sparse representation based ECG signal denoising and baseline wandering (BW) correction algorithm. Unlike the traditional filtering-based methods, like Fourier or Wavelet transform, which use fixed basis, the proposed algorithm models the ECG signal as superposition of few inner structures plus additive random noise, while those structures can be learned from the input signal or a training set. Using those learned inner structures and their properties, we can accurately approximate the original ECG signal and remove noise and other artifacts like baseline wandering. To demonstrate the robustness and efficacy of the proposed algorithm, we compare it to several state-of-the-art algorithms through both simulated and real-life ECG recordings.
Improved bit-flipping decoding of low-density parity-check codes

In this correspondence, a new method for improving hard-decision bit-flipping decoding of low-density parity-check (LDPC) codes is presented. Bits with a number of unsatisfied check sums larger than a predetermined threshold are flipped with a probability p /spl les/ 1 which is independent of the code considered. The probability p is incremented during decoding according to some rule. With a proper choice of the initial p, the proposed improved bit-flipping (BF) algorithm achieves gain not only in performance, but also in average decoding time for signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) values of interest with respect to p = 1.
2016 Ieee International Conference on Big Data (big Data) Solving Cold-start Problem in Large-scale Recommendation Engines: a Deep Learning Approach

—Collaborative Filtering (CF) is widely used in large-scale recommendation engines because of its efficiency, accuracy and scalability. However, in practice, the fact that recommendation engines based on CF require interactions between users and items before making recommendations, make it inappropriate for new items which haven't been exposed to the end users to interact with. This is known as the cold-start problem. In this paper we introduce a novel approach which employs deep learning to tackle this problem in any CF based recommendation engine. One of the most important features of the proposed technique is the fact that it can be applied on top of any existing CF based recommendation engine without changing the CF core. We successfully applied this technique to overcome the item cold-start problem in Careerbuilder's CF based recommendation engine. Our experiments show that the proposed technique is very efficient to resolve the cold-start problem while maintaining high accuracy of the CF recommendations.
Efficient Solvers for Minimal Problems by Syzygy-Based Reduction

In this paper we study the problem of automatically generating polynomial solvers for minimal problems. The main contribution is a new method for finding small elimination templates by making use of the syzygies (i.e. the polynomial relations) that exist between the original equations. Using these syzygies we can essentially parameterize the set of possible elimination templates. We evaluate our method on a wide variety of problems from geometric computer vision and show improvement compared to both handcrafted and automatically generated solvers. Furthermore we apply our method on two previously unsolved relative orientation problems.
Police officer integrity: a partial replication and extension

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to partially replicate and extend the work of Klockars et al. and others on police integrity by examining how individual, organizational, and ecological factors affect police supervisors’ perceptions of police misconduct and willingness to report fellow officers’ misconduct. Design/methodology/approach – Surveys containing 17 scenarios developed by Klockars et al. (2000, 2004, 2006) were administered to 553 ranking officers attending training at the Bill Blackwood Law Enforcement Management Institute of Texas from June 1, 2009 to March 1, 2010 and employed by municipal police departments, county sheriff’s departments, and constable agencies. Findings – Results suggest that individual and organizational factors affect supervisor willingness to blow the whistle on underling misconduct, although their effects varied by seriousness of the behavior. Originality/value – The current project partially replicates and extends prior studies of factors affecting police integrity.
Using Video Models to Teach Students With Disabilities to Play the Wii

This study investigated effects of video modeling (VM) when teaching recreation and leisure skills to three high school students with moderate intellectual disabilities and autism spectrum disorder. Results, evaluated via a multiple probe across participants design, indicated that VM was effective for teaching all students to play the Wii. Students were able to maintain high levels of accuracy in follow-up probes. Study limitations and implications for future research are discussed.
Can psychoanalytic research integrate and improve knowledge for clinical practice?

This paper argues that scientific research in psychoanalytically-based disciplines has beneficial effects for psychoanalysis and its practitioners. First, systematic collection of relevant data yields comprehensive information about several key aspects of clinical practice that would otherwise evade awareness. Second, well-conducted studies may increase our knowledge concerning the effectiveness of psychoanalytic therapy, which is more than ever in urgent need of validation. Third, data generated from clinical case studies, upon which psychoanalysis relies to build its rationale and further clinical development, is not considered an acceptable method of scientific scrutiny; alternative, extra-clinical ways of studying psychoanalytic claims are needed to integrate clinical findings. Fourth, in the current unfavourable climate for psychoanalytically-based treatment, it is vital that bridges with other disciplines are built through the development of a set of empirically derived knowledge. This would strengthen our claims and create fertile ground for cross-fertilisation and dialogue with allied fields such as general psychiatry and clinical psychology. Fifth, there is still grave uncertainty and disagreement as to which components of the psychoanalytic encounter are responsible for structural change. Reliance on clinical case studies has not advanced our ability to generalise findings and find consensus. In order to exemplify some of these points, the main findings of a prospective study of the psychoanalytically-informed treatment ofpersonality disorder are presented and discussed.
Experiences Implementing and Using Personal Projected Displays

We have created a personal projected display called the Escritoire. Two projectors overlap to create a horizontal desk display, and two pens allow two-handed input. We describe the issues we encountered implementing this system and the results of experiments with single users working on their own and with pairs of users collaborating using separate desks. Cheap portable projectors form a display that fills the desk and also has a high-resolution region in front of the user. The display works under normal office lighting and front projection has not been a problem. Commodity 3D video cards can easily perform the necessary image warping, using planar homographies, to compensate for rough projector positioning. We describe various implementation issues with DirectX and OpenGL. Individual users were quickly able to use the system, and the colour and intensity mismatch between projectors was not a problem. For remote collaboration participants found an audio channel and shared desk surface to be much more useful than a video channel.
Calvo Contracts - Optimal Indexation in General Equilibrium

Calvo contracts, which are the basis of the current generation of New Keynesian models, widely include indexation to general inflation. We argue that the indexing formula should be expected inflation rather than lagged inflation. This optimises the welfare of the representative agent in a general equilibrium model of the New Keynesian type. This is shown analytically for a simplified model and by numerical simulation for a full model with price and wage contracts as well as capital. The consequence of such indexation is that monetary policy no longer has any effect on welfare.
Advances in Omics and Bioinformatics Tools for Systems Analyses of Plant Functions

Omics and bioinformatics are essential to understanding the molecular systems that underlie various plant functions. Recent game-changing sequencing technologies have revitalized sequencing approaches in genomics and have produced opportunities for various emerging analytical applications. Driven by technological advances, several new omics layers such as the interactome, epigenome and hormonome have emerged. Furthermore, in several plant species, the development of omics resources has progressed to address particular biological properties of individual species. Integration of knowledge from omics-based research is an emerging issue as researchers seek to identify significance, gain biological insights and promote translational research. From these perspectives, we provide this review of the emerging aspects of plant systems research based on omics and bioinformatics analyses together with their associated resources and technological advances.
Moralising class: A discourse analysis of the mainstream political response to Occupy and the August 2011 British riots

In this article, I present an analysis of the discursive response of two British politicians – the Prime Minister David Cameron and the leader of the opposition, Ed Miliband – to the riots that took place in British cities in August 2011 and the Occupy protests of later in the same year. Considering this response as, following Van Leeuwen, recontextualisation of the events with which the two politicians are concerned, I suggest that in both cases a particular neoliberal discourse is employed that serves to moralise what is in actual fact material, class-based opposition. Cameron suggests that the riots are indicative of a ‘moral collapse’ in contemporary Britain, and Miliband, superficially aligning himself with the movement, suggests that the Occupy protests indicate a ‘value gap’. In both cases, I argue, the discursive response serves as an attempt to assert as hegemonic a substantively identical moralised neoliberal understanding of the inequalities of contemporary capitalism. This is an understanding – a discourse – that I suggest is both a contributor to these inequalities and a false representation of their true nature.
N-TAP: A Platform of Large-Scale Distributed Measurement for Overlay Network Applications

To sustain a large-scale overlay network, knowledge about network characteristics is indispensable. However, the collection of such information is often a burden on the developers: why should they struggle to obtain the information even though it is not their intended purpose? As one solution to this problem, this paper presents N-TAP, a distributed measurement infrastructure. N-TAP is an independent service for overlay network applications that provides network characteristics. N-TAP itself forms the measurement overlay network on which measurement nodes can cooperate in measurement activity. Consequently, overlay network applications can take full advantage of novel measurement methodologies. Through a discussion on the problems of distributed measurement, in this paper we explore the capabilities and the future direction of N-TAP
Koszul Duality of Translation—and Zuckerman Functors

We review Koszul duality in representation theory of categoryO, especially we give a new presentation of the Koszul duality functor. Combining this with work of Backelin, we show that the translation and Zuckerman functors are Koszul dual to each other, thus verifying a conjecture of Bernstein, Frenkel and Khovanov. Finally we use Koszul duality to give a short proof of the Enright- Shelton equivalence.
Subliminal Perception

Does " subliminal perception " (perception without awareness) occur, and how can it be measured? Subliminal Perception 2 Introduction The first documented findings suggesting an effect that has come to be called " subliminal perception " (or perception without awareness) came from Pierce and Jastrow's (1884) work testing the human response to very similar, barely distinguishable stimuli. Pierce and Jastrow devised an experiment in which they each had to evaluate which of two pressures on skin was greater, along with a reported confidence level. The significant, and surprising, finding was that even when the subject indicated that they were guessing (zero confidence, implied 50% chance), they were actually correct about which pressure was greater more than 60% of the time. The subjects were consistently more accurate than chance, but were not aware of any difference between the two stimuli. These findings were later confirmed by other researchers, stirring interest about stimuli that were beneath the threshold of conscious awareness. Popular interest in this field was spurred by the claims of a marketing researcher, James Vicary (Merikle, 2000). In 1957, Vicary claimed that patrons at a movie theatre were exposed to advertising messages Eat Popcorn and Drink Coca-Cola flashed for 3 millisecond durations and repeated throughout a movie. According to Vicary, patrons were not consciously aware of these hidden messages but responded favourably by significantly increasing their purchases of popcorn and drinks. There has not been any independent evidence to support the claims, and Vicary himself stated that the research was a fabrication (Merikle, 2000). Nevertheless, extraordinary claims have attracted attention over the years. The notion that peoples' behaviours can be influenced by stimuli they were not even aware of perceiving has generated much interest among the public, and among psychologists. Research into what was coined " subliminal perception " has been marked by debate about what exactly researchers should Subliminal Perception 3 measure, and how they can justify evaluating whether subliminal perception occurs at all. Overall, findings seem to support the discovery that even when an individual does not report awareness of a stimulus, the stimulus can still have an effect upon memory or behaviour. This paper aims to describe the important experiments within the field, while addressing the controversy over subliminal perception, measurement, and experimental methodology. What is subliminal perception? The meaning of the term subliminal perception has changed over the years, and some prefer to use perception without …
Design of MSRR-loaded dual-band dipole PCB antennas

This paper is dedicated to the study of rectangular dipole antennas that are loaded by metamaterials inclusions to create multi-band behavior devoted for telecommunication applications. After introducing a theoretical point of view about RLC trap-loaded antennas, simulations are performed to validate the approach of dual bands centered at 1.5 and 2.4 GHz. The next step is to add metamaterial inclusions to obtain the same frequency performance. Four split ring resonators (SRRs) are first added on the two arms of the dipole antenna. Finally, the SRRs are replaced by four multi split ring resonators (MSRRs). The excellent performance obtained in SRR-loaded antenna is maintained with the MSRR since the omni-directional patterns are conserved.