VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
The will and normative judgment [electronic resource]

This dissertation focuses on the nature of intention and the scope of the kinds of objects it can take as contents. Contrary to the established opinion, I argue that human beings have the capacity to intend ends that go well beyond what they believe they can do or control. If we think of the will as the faculty by which we come to adopt and be committed to ends in practical deliberation, then what I argue for is a broader conception of the will. I think this broader conception provides us with new and fertile theoretical resources to account for dimensions of human agency that remain inaccessible to a theory of intention that restricts its possible objects to states of aﬀairs the agent believes she can control. Here, I begin to explore the theoretical potential of this conception by showing how it can be employed by certain non-realist views in metanormativity to present attractive accounts of the nature of normative judgment. More specifically, I argue that Expressivist, Contextualist and Relativist metanormative views can appeal to the notion of an intention that takes as contents appropriately general principles of action—principles that concern what people in general are to do, or what everyone is to do in a given situation—to present a model of normative judgments that would help them deal, among other things, with one of the most pressing problems they currently face: that of accounting for interpersonal disagreement.

Keywords: Philosophy.
Advisor: Bratman Michael primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Dannenberg Jorah
Hussain Nadeem J. Z. advisor. Thesis advisor
The winner's paradox [electronic resource] : how successful students at a top university become "failures"

While previous researchers investigating the competitive environment at the highest levels of academic scholarship (e.g., Deresiewicz, 2014; Pope, 2001) have concluded that students buckle under an unbearable amount of stress as a result of over-achievement and narrow conceptions of success, they have left the construct of success itself unexamined. Building upon the work of George Herbert Mead (1934/2015) and Erving Goffman (1959; 1963; 1967; 1978/1981), this dissertation argues that the buckling of students at a top university may be best understood as a response within the culture of success, a set of generalized attitudes which together comprise the American cultural ideal of the extraordinarily successful individual. To understand what underlies the general malaise affecting these students, I first lay out the discourse surrounding the college admissions process at the most highly selective institutions of higher education and then demonstrate how understanding that discourse helps explain the everyday anxieties that students experience. Next, I report on the results of a two-year qualitative study a top-tier American institution, Wellborne University. These materials, gathered through participant observation, interviews, focus groups, written testimonials and information on web sites and university-published brochures, demonstrate that students suffer from their perceptions of the various ways they fail to embody the traits that they have internalized as necessary for success. The discourse examined frames success as the social act of winning, a process by which individuals are selected over their peers based on their ability to project certain desirable abilities or character traits. The individual admitted to a top school is often described in terms of being a total winner: the ideal self-made individual who excels without effort, confidently demonstrating genuine intellectual passion and desire to make a difference in the world, while effectively harnessing resources to realize increasingly greater achievements. This discourse creates the conditions for individuals admitted to Wellborne University to report seemingly countless contexts for failure, as they become aware of the ways their behavior—and projected identities—deviate from what is expected of a "total winner." This work seeks to unify students' descriptions of stress, insecurity, and self-criticism into one core issue: the fear of social exclusion due to perceptions of failure within the culture of success, where failure is unacceptable and, for many students, seemingly ever-present.

Keywords: Education.
Advisor: McDermott Ray (Raymond Patrick)
Antonio Anthony Lising
Polanyi Livia
A wireless MRI system using millimeter wave transmission [electronic resource]

Conventional MRI relies on a wired connection between a receiver coil array and an external processing circuitry to generate accurate images. To improve image quality, the number of receiver coil elements are increased and separate receiver coil arrays are used for different parts of the body. This while improving image quality also increases cabling complexity. Furthermore, baluns and radio frequency (RF) traps are required for each channel, and cables must be routed carefully to minimize coil interactions. This increases the operation and maintenance costs. Moreover, these receiver coil arrays are heavy and cumbersome and can be intimidating and ill-fitting for children. The coil setup time can occupy a significant fraction of the total exam time. Consequently, removing these cables from the receiver coils will lead to a more cost effective and time efficient system. In the past, a number of architectures have been proposed to enable wireless MRI for minimizing or eliminating the use of cables. All of these past efforts used microwave frequencies up to 3 GHz, and generic protocols such as 802.11b or MIMO that are intended for long-range communication over distances of 10 m to 100 m. Such generic long range communication protocols are sub-optimal solutions for wireless MRI in terms of power consumption and size. This is because typical MRI bore diameters vary from 60 cm to 70 cm. And, depending on a patient's physical attributes and the part of the body to be imaged, the distance between the coil array and the magnet bore/edge can vary from 10 cm to 50 cm. A millimeter (mm) wave radio for wireless MRI data transmission is presented in this work. High path loss and availability of wide bandwidth make millimeter (mm)-waves ideal for short range, high data rata communication required for wireless MRI. The proposed system uses a custom designed integrated chip (IC) mm-wave radio with 60 GHz as radio frequency carrier. We assess performance in a 1.5T MRI field, with the addition of optical links between the console room and magnet. The system uses ON-OFF keying (OOK) modulation for data transmission and supports data rates from 200 Mb/s to 2.5 Gb/s for distances up-to 65 cm. The presence of highly directional, linearly polarized, on-chip dipole antennas on the mm-wave radio along with time division multiplexing (TDM) circuitry allows multiple wireless links to be created simultaneously with minimal inter-channel interference. This leads to a highly scalable solution for wireless MRI.

Keywords: Electrical Engineering.
Advisor: Poon Ada Shuk Yan
Pauly John (John M.) advisor. Thesis advisor
Wong S.
Wish I Were Here

The collection is comprised of three short stories, "The Woods", "En Cachette", and "You are Here", with a thematic focus on memory and its revision.

Keywords:  Program in Feminist
School of Humanities &amp; Sciences
Feminist Gender Sexuality Studies
FGSS
Feminist Fiction
Creative Writing
Short Story
Thesis
Advisor: Miner Valerie
Hanlon-Baker Patti
Atura Annie
Women's history, attitudes, and life experiences with computing [electronic resource]

It is widely acknowledged that women are underrepresented in computing. A number of solutions have been developed to try to solve this problem, particularly the introduction of camps and clubs designed to appeal to middle and high school girls in the hopes of increasing their interest in computing and computing careers. However, there is little evidence of the efficacy of these interventions and even less research into the long-term effects of short-term programs. Recently the "CSForAll" initiative and new Advanced Placement Computer Science course have provided opportunities for increased school-based computer science, but these initiatives are too new for longitudinal results. This dissertation provides some insight into the factors associated with women's long-term interest in computing careers by investigating two populations: girls who had attended a middle school where computer science courses were mandatory, and women who had achieved computing careers. The first paper reports on an initial survey of girls at the end of eighth grade. Approximately one-third of the participants were open to a computing career. While all participants described computer scientists similarly, the "CS Career" group saw themselves as more similar to this description, and also indicated higher interest and confidence in computing. The second paper is a longitudinal follow up with the same participants at the end of high school. Participants who had been open to computing careers in middle school demonstrated increased interest and positive attitudes towards computing as compared to their middle school responses. They were more likely to have programming as a hobby than their "No CS Career" peers, but otherwise did not engage in substantially more computing activities while in high school, suggesting a disconnect between attitudes and activities. The third paper is an interview study of working female computer scientists, investigating their paths to their careers and what they think the typical path to a computing career looks like. These women had commonly engaged in early computing activities such as classes, clubs, or independent learning. Frequently they had not engaged in computing in high school, but had returned to it in college, often choosing computer science as a major. They identified two typical paths: majoring in computer science and having a "single track mind" in which one is born with talent and interest in computing. The single track mind was seen as a masculine path and none of the participants identified similarities between her own experience and that path. Together these studies suggest the importance of early computing experience on career interest. While not all girls who engage in computing will become interested, for those who have early experience, once they are captured, the interest seems resilient despite a lack of high school computing experiences.

Keywords: Education.
Advisor: Barron Brigid primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Osborne Jonathan advisor. Thesis advisor
Roberts Eric advisor. Thesis advisor
The workings of democracy [electronic resource] : voter attention, long-term policies, and party collusion

How are good, long-term policies produced in competitive democracies when voters reward politicians for the more easily observable benefits of short-term policies? In Chapter 1, I develop a theoretical model to address this question and show how, and under what conditions, the government and the opposition cooperate with each other to implement good, long-term policies, even though these policies are unpopular and the parties have divergent policy interests on other issues. A problem of this cooperation is that it can also be used by the government and the opposition to implement policies that benefit only the political elite and are not in the public interest. In Chapter 2, I investigate when voters prefer to---and how voters are able to---prevent this cooperation; respectively, party collusion against the voters. In Chapter 3, I explore the consequences of how voters allocate their limited attention to different policy issues, showing how voter attention can result in some good reforms to be avoided by purely office-seeking politicians, even though a majority of voters prefer the reforms. This is because these reforms take attention away from other---electorally more beneficial---reforms and because the losers of the reforms would pay the most attention to them.

Keywords: Business.
Advisor: Bendor Jonathan B. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Shotts Kenneth W. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Malhotra Neil Ankur advisor. Thesis advisor
A world society perspective of corporate social responsibility [electronic resource] : the utility of normative over strategic accounts

This dissertation consists of three, standalone empirical papers on the global corporate social responsibility (CSR) movement, papers that are inspired by, but do not necessarily address individually, the world society perspective. The CSR movement advances the idea that business should seek, not only profits, but also positive social impacts. The movement has expanded globally in dramatic fashion in the last three decades. It now includes dozens of international voluntary initiatives with participation from thousands of companies in scores of nations, including initiatives that promulgate broad CSR principles (e.g., the United Nations Global Compact), that promote the reporting of CSR practices (the Global Reporting Initiatives), that certify labor practices (the SA800), and that govern the ethical sourcing of commodities (the Fair Trade Association). This rapid, multi-level, pan-industry expansion of the CSR movement remains poorly understood in extant CSR research. In seeking explanation, the first paper of this dissertation is a meta-study that gathers and analyzes 200 individual surveys of business leaders on their motivations for CSR engagement. Contrary to prevailing strategic and political accounts of CSR engagement within academic research, the paper finds that business leaders claim to engage in CSR activities mostly for normative reasons (in the sense, that they consider CSR to morally and socially needful and appropriate). Further, the normative reasons are remarkably consistent worldwide, suggesting the rise of a transnational prosocial managerial value-system. The second paper tests whether CSR activities improve company brand equities. To do so, the paper conducts a panel study of the CSR activities and brand equities of the world's largest 700 companies over the years 2001-2014. It finds that CSR activities, contrary to prevailing strategic accounts within the academic research, have no relationship with brand equity. The third paper tests whether CSR activities are followed by advertising campaigns to raise consumer awareness and thereby to increase consumer purchases. This paper also uses panel study methodology for the world's largest 700 companies. Contrary to prevailing strategic accounts in the academic research, the paper finds that CSR activities do not generate advertising campaigns. In the introductory section to the dissertation that follows this abstract, the dissertation interprets the totality of the above findings in light of an emergent world society in which CSR behaviors are cultural expectations, rather than strategic or political endeavors. This emergent world society explains the convergence of managerial CSR perceptions across national borders and the apparent missing link between CSR and narrowly conceived strategic benefits such as increases in brand equity.

Keywords: Sociology.
Advisor: Granovetter Mark S. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Meyer John
Zhou Xueguang
Writing on the wind [electronic resource] : composing nature and the supernatural

Writing on the Wind: Composing Nature and the Supernatural encompasses two works, The Four Winds and Chant Etudes. The Four Winds, a vocal quartet for three sopranos and mezzo-soprano, is a collection of five pieces inspired by scientific and mythological incarnations of the wind. Chant Etudes, a collection of solo pieces for voice and makeshift wind instruments, was developed over the course of a year through ritual improvisation.

Keywords: Music.
Advisor: Applebaum Mark
Kapuscinski Jaroslaw
Pentcheva Bissera V. advisor. Thesis advisor
Ulman Erik
3D reconstruction in the wild [electronic resource]

Are existing RGB-D reconstruction pipelines ready for broad deployment? To answer this question and assist future research, I present a dataset of thorough RGB-D videos of more than 10,000 objects, produced in the wild by paid operators for the purpose of reconstruction. An evaluation of existing RGB-D reconstruction approaches reveals that they often fail on the collected data, in part due to insufficiently robust loop closure detection and global optimization. I thus present a new approach to object and indoor scene reconstruction from RGB-D video. The key idea is to combine geometric registration of fragments with robust global optimization based on line processes. Geometric registration is error-prone due to sensor noise, which leads to aliasing of geometric detail and inability to disambiguate different surfaces in the scene. The presented optimization approach disables erroneous geometric alignments even when they significantly outnumber correct ones. The objective has a least-squares form and is optimized by a high-performance pose graph solver. Experimental results demonstrate that the presented approach substantially increases the accuracy of reconstructed models on challenging real-world sequences.

Keywords: Electrical Engineering.
Advisor: Dill David L. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Koltun Vladlen
Wetzstein Gordon advisor. Thesis advisor
A correctional algorithm for intracranial electrode localization through the simulation of post-operative brain surface deformation

Electrocorticography can be used to measure and understand electrical potentials on the brain surface which underlie cognitive function of the cerebral cortex. In order to derive understanding between cortical function and structure, the precise locations of the electrodes must be known. However, due to deformation of the brain surface that occurs during craniotomy, the positions of electrodes cannot be determined from alignment of CT with MRI scans, and additional corrective measures become necessary. While current leading methods rely on computing linear projections from the deformed post-operative brain onto the non-deformed preoperative brain, these methods experience limitations in areas of the brain with more variable curvature. In order to account for variable curvature, the post-operative brain was biomechanically simulated using finite element methods in order to map and invert brain surface deformation.
This approach was tested on 4 patients who were candidates for epilepsy surgery at Stanford Hospital. The algorithm localized electrodes with average error of 3.70 +/- 0.15 mm, (median +/- s.e.) measured as radial arc length in the plane of the cortical surface. While this error is slightly higher than that of competing methods, the standard error is lower, suggesting improved robustness. Additionally, this error it is measured in the plane of the brain as opposed to the plane of intraoperative photography, removing spatial distortion induced from 3D projection and providing a more realistic margin of error. Gold-standard electrode positions were determined by manually coregistering intraoperative photography with pre-operative MRI and back-projecting electrodes onto a three-dimensional mesh. This algorithm is entirely automatic, and provides a fast (< 1 minute) processing pipeline for electrode localization and display. These results suggest possible future viability of the algorithm for use in clinical and research settings, where it may improve spatial precision of electrocorticography in epilepsy surgery and cognitive research.

Keywords: electrode localization
finite element analysis
surgical planning
electrocorticography
brain shift
Thesis
Advisor: Parvizi Josef
Block Steven
A Functionality-Driven Process for Rapidly Building Semantic Parsers

Imagine being able to build and train a parser over any domain of knowledge, starting from zero training data, over the course of a few hours. In this thesis, my research goal is to develop a new functionality-driven methodology in an attempt to achieve this. My attempt uses a domain-general grammar and a domain-specific seed lexicon to generate logical forms paired with canonical utter- ances that capture the meaning of the logical forms. By construction, the domain-general grammar ensures complete coverage of the desired set of compositional operators. I then use crowdsourcing to paraphrase these canonical utterances into natural utterances. The resulting data is used to train the semantic parser. I further study the role of compositionality in the resulting paraphrases. Finally, I test our methodology on eight domains and show that I can build an adequate semantic parser in just a few hours.

Keywords: semantic parsing
natural language processing
computer science
Thesis
A Molecular Switch: The Role of β-catenin Tyrosine Phosphorylation in Regulating Adherens Junctional Stability

β-catenin functions in the contexts of (1) cell development as a transcription factor for Wnt target genes and (2) cell-cell adhesion as an adaptor in cadherin-based adherens junctions. Mutations in β-catenin or in molecules regulating its localization and stability are associated with inappropriately triggered cell growth, weakened cell adhesion, and oncogenesis. Such correlation underscores the need to understand the molecular mechanisms by which β-catenin’s localization, and thereby its function, is regulated. An increasing body of evidence has suggested that the extent to which β-catenin partakes in either function may be influenced by phosphorylation. In particular, tyrosine phosphorylation of β-catenin has been qualitatively shown to modulate the affinities of two key binding partners at adherens junctions: cadherin and α-catenin. This study seeks to quantitatively assess the impact of tyrosine phosphorylation at specific sites on β-catenin’s affinity for cadherin and α-catenin. Through in vitro thermodynamic measurements by isothermal titration calorimetry (ITC) with β-catenin Y to E phosphomimics we show that tyrosine phosphorylation at Y142 and Y654 weakens β-catenin’s affinity for α-catenin and cadherin respectively. These results help construct a model of β-catenin regulation and may offer future therapeutic approaches for cancer.

Keywords:  Department of Biology
Biology
Adherens Junction
β-catenin
tyrosine phosphorylation
ITC
cancer
Y142
Y654
structural biology
biophysics
Thesis
Advisor: Weis William
Nelson William James