bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
CHEXANET: A novel approach to fast-tracking disequilibrium chemistry calculations for exoplanets using neural networks
Authors: Vojtekova Antonia , Waldmann Ingo , Yip Kai Hou , Merín Bruno , Al-Refaie Ahmed Faris , Venot Olivia
Published: February 2025

In the rapidly evolving field of exoplanetary science with missions like JWST and Ariel, there is a pressing need for fast and accurate simulations of disequilibrium chemistry in exoplanet atmospheres. Methods which assume chemical equilibrium simplify calculations but fail to capture the more complex chemical dynamics observed in actual exoplanets. Accurate estimations require complex kinetic codes that are time-intensive due to the need to solve ordinary differential equations. Given an extensive parameter space that needs to be explored to calculate forward models, kinetic codes will become a significant bottleneck, especially when used to match observations or in retrieval processes. We introduce CHEXANET, a novel U-Net-based neural network architecture designed to efficiently simulate disequilibrium chemistry in exoplanetary atmospheres. By utilising the thermochemical equilibrium state of a hot-Jupiter’s atmosphere as an initial condition, which computes in seconds, alongside a set of initial parameters such as the C/O ratio, the network effectively learns to predict the atmosphere in disequilibrium. It significantly enhances computational efficiency, reducing the prediction time for atmospheric disequilibrium states to just one second per atmosphere on a standard personal computer—over a hundred times faster than traditional kinetic models like FRECKLL.
Representation learning for fast radio burst dynamic spectra
Authors: Kuiper Dirk , Contardo Gabriella , Huppenkothen Daniela , Hessels Jason W T
Published: February 2025

Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are millisecond-duration radio transients of extragalactic origin, with diverse time-frequency patterns and emission properties that require explanation. With one possible exception, FRBs are detected only in the radio, analyzing their dynamic spectra is therefore crucial to disentangling the physical processes governing their generation and propagation. Furthermore, comparing FRB morphologies provides insights into possible differences among their progenitors and environments. This study applies unsupervised learning and deep learning techniques to investigate FRB dynamic spectra, focusing on two approaches: Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and a Convolutional Autoencoder (CAE) enhanced by an Information-Ordered Bottleneck (IOB) layer. PCA served as a computationally efficient baseline, capturing broad trends, identifying outliers, and providing valuable insights into large datasets. However, its linear nature limited its ability to reconstruct complex FRB structures. In contrast, the IOB-augmented CAE excelled at capturing intricate features, with high reconstruction accuracy and effective denoising at modest signal-to-noise ratios. The IOB layerâ€™s ability to prioritize relevant features enabled efficient data compression, preserving key morphological characteristics with minimal latent variables. When applied to real FRBs from CHIME, the IOB-CAE generalized effectively, revealing a latent space that highlighted the continuum of FRB morphologies and the potential for distinguishing intrinsic differences between burst types. This framework demonstrates that while FRBs may not naturally cluster into discrete groups, advanced representation learning techniques can uncover meaningful structures, offering new insights into the diversity and origins of these bursts.
Virus-derived siRNA: Coronavirus and influenza virus trigger antiviral RNAi immunity in birds
Authors: Wu Yaotang , Liu Peng , Zhou Jie , Fu Mei , Wang Chenlu , Xiong Ningna , Ji Wenxin , Wang Zhisheng , Lin Jian , Yang Qian
Published: February 2025

RNA interference (RNAi) is a key antiviral immune mechanism in eukaryotes. However, antiviral RNAi in vertebrates has only been observed in cells with poor interferon systems or in viral suppressors of RNAi (VSR) deficiency virus infections. Our research discovered that infecting macrophages with wild-type coronavirus (Infectious bronchitis virus, IBV) and influenza viruses (Avian influenza virus, AIV) can trigger RNAi antiviral immunity and produce a certain amount of virus-derived siRNA (vsiRNA). These vsiRNAs have an inhibitory effect on the virus and carry out targeted silencing along the Dicer-Ago2-vsiRNA axis. Notably, these vsiRNAs are distributed throughout the virus's entire genome, with a predilection for A/U at the 5′ and 3′ termini of vsiRNA. In addition, Dicer cleavage produces vsiRNA based on the RWM motif, where R represents A/G, W represents A/C, and M represents A/U. We also discovered that avian LGP2 and MDA5 proteins positively impact the expression of the Dicer protein and the Dicer subtype “DicerM.” Most importantly, the PS-vsiRNA plasmid combined with nanomaterial polyetherimide (PEI) showed excellent anti-virus activity in specific-pathogen-free (SPF) chickens. These findings show that RNA viruses trigger the production of the vsiRNA in avian somatic cells, which is of great significance for the application of therapeutic vaccines.
Autologous Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation for Non-AL Amyloidosis Monoclonal Gammopathy of Renal Significance
Authors: Liu Mengnan , Zhao Liang , Guo Jinzhou , Chen Wencui , Wu Xiaomei , Xu Weiwei , Huang Xianghua
Published: February 2025

Background

The treatment strategy for non-AL amyloidosis monoclonal gammopathy of renal significance (MGRS) remains unstandardized. Autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (ASCT) has shown favorable results in a limited number of studies.

Methods

This single-center, retrospective case-control study included non-AL amyloidosis MGRS patients diagnosed between February 2012 and July 2024; these patients were divided into the ASCT group and non-ASCT group. Baseline characteristics, ASCT characteristics and complications, treatment responses, survival outcomes, and risk factors for progression-free survival (PFS) were analyzed.

Results

A total of 53 patients with non-AL amyloidosis MGRS were enrolled in this study, comprising 23 patients who received ASCT and 30 patients who did not receive ASCT. The baseline characteristics were comparable between the ASCT and non-ASCT groups, with exceptions of serum albumin and C3 levels. The median OS and renal survival were not reached in either group. The median PFS was significantly longer in the ASCT group compared to the non-ASCT group (58.4 vs 16.4 months, P=0.004). The ORR and deep response rates of the ASCT group were higher than those of the non-ASCT group, both in hematological and renal responses. In the ASCT group, 18 patients (78.3%) achieved a hematological VGPR or better, and 21 patients (91.3%) achieved a renal PR or better after transplantation. Moreover, the ASCT group exhibited higher long-term cumulative incidences of OS and renal survival. The toxicity of ASCT was manageable, and no transplantation-related deaths occurred. There was no statistically significant difference in the median PFS between MIDD and LCPT (P=0.539). High serum albumin level at diagnosis, and hematological response ≥VGPR after ASCT were protective factors of PFS.

Conclusions

This study confirmed that ASCT was an effective and safe treatment for patients with non-AL amyloidosis MGRS, thereby offering long-term hematological remission and survival benefits.
Cutting edge deep-learning based tools for metagenomic research
Authors: Karin Eli Levy , Steinegger Martin
Published: February 2025

Recent years have seen incredible progress in the development of deep-learning (DL) tools for the analysis of biological data, with the most prominent example being AlphaFold2 for accurate protein structure prediction. DL-based tools are especially useful for identifying patterns and connections within sparsely labeled datasets. This makes them essential for the analysis of metagenomic data, which is mostly unannotated and bears little sequence similarity to known genes and proteins. In this review, we chose to present twelve tools which we deem as offering novel capabilities for metagenomic analysis by utilizing interesting DL techniques. This review is thus intended to be a solid starting point for any data scientist looking to apply advanced methods to explore metagenomic datasets. For each DL-based tool, we present its computational principles, followed by relevant examples of its application where possible and a note on its limitations.
“Dead Giveaway”
Authors: Austin Michael L.
Published: February 2025

This chapter examines a number of auto-tuned viral videos that were popular primarily in the early 2010s, paying particular attention to videos created by the Gregory Brothers. In these videos, Black people are misrepresented as “hilarious black neighbors,” reducing them to caricatures that harken back to blackface minstrelsy of the 1800s and blaxploitation films of the mid-twentieth century. The chapter also discusses a number of important ethical issues regarding the sampling, manipulation, and exploitation of the voices of marginalized communities, especially people of color and those with mental health issues, especially when these practices result in misrepresentations of these communities.
National Parliaments as a Global Institution
Authors: 9780192655684  , Alasuutari Pertti
Published: February 2025

This book scrutinizes national parliaments as an institution: how the current world order comprising national legislatures evolved, how the parliaments work, and how they form a global network or field in that there is a travel of ideas and information between them. It shows that in their structures and practices, legislatures are very similar. Phrases used, say, in the opening words of a session can be verbatim copies of those in other parliaments. Through such isomorphic, invariant practices, legislatures symbolize, sanctify, and naturalize the nation-state as the component part of world society. The global standardization of parliamentary practices has also constituted what is the world over understood by politics, radiating to the forms that political organization into parties, ideologies, and movements has assumed. Furthermore, the sacred principles observed constitute parliamentary practices as rituals. These principles are honored in frontstage sessions, whereas bargaining between conflicting group interests takes place in backstage occasions. Yet frontstage performances are important because they frame the issues and justify the decisions taken by commonly approved virtues and principles. In addition to passing (or proposing) laws, national parliaments legitimate rule and serve as switchboards in global governance and travel of ideas.
The Plan
Authors: Jackson Ashley , Stewart Andrew
Published: February 2025

This chapter defines the British ‘plan’ to regenerate national power, close the gap on America and the Soviet Union, and secure the Empire’s future. That plan had seven interlocking main elements. There was the need to assure the continuing unity of the Empire and to resist Soviet expansion and influence. Pursuing this element of the plan, the British had to accept the fact that America might abandon Europe as it had done in 1918, placing enormous burdens of leadership, responsibility, and cost upon their shoulders. A linked element of the plan was to prepare to meet not only traditional imperial defence requirements but to deter the Soviets and even face them on the battlefield. This meant using the military resources of the entire Empire and acquiring an independent nuclear capability. The British also planned to foster the re-establishment of European power in the international system, and to replenish British economic strength. Connected to this was another element of the plan, the need for cooperation with Washington in order to harness American support for British recovery and forward Anglo-American leadership of the world. This would underpin the new United Nations world organization, which itself was to be a vehicle for the global leadership of the ‘Big Three’ powers. The plan’s final element was the renovation of the Empire, materially through enlightened policies of colonial development and welfare, and stylistically through pugnacious, optimistic presentations of Britain’s modernized imperial mission as a boon for the people of the Empire and the well-being of the world.
Conclusion
Authors: Jackson Ashley , Stewart Andrew
Published: February 2025

Whatever their plans to rebuild national power and sustain the Empire, the British elite could not turn back the hands of time and repair the damage done by the war, or arrest changes in the international system that were beyond anyone’s control. The book has demonstrated how much was expected from the future, and how the war had, and appeared to have, impacted upon the British Empire and British power from the perspective of 1945. This chapter draws all the strands together to construct an explanation of why the superpower vision failed and the plans and expectations of the political elite went largely unfulfilled. A range of factors account for the gap between the expectations of 1945 and the realities of the post-war world and are explored in this chapter. They include the rapidly expanding nature of the Soviet threat, American attitudes and actions, colonial and dominion nationalism, the working out of the revolution in military affairs that the global conflict had stimulated, and the cost of fighting a total war. There were then Britain’s financial and economic travails, at least some of which dated from before the war even began, the loss of prestige engendered by wartime defeats, the continuing decline of the legitimacy of imperialism both nationally and internationally, and the shifts in the language and discourse that attended it.
Trevarthen’s Primary Intersubjectivity
Authors: Harrison Alexandra Murray , Tronick Ed
Published: February 2025

Trevarthen’s contribution to the field of infancy studies is legendary and ranges from theories of intersubjectivity originating in bodily movements and sensations of infants in the womb to the ‘functional brain science’ of infant–caregiver communication and the aesthetic of communicative musicality. He developed his ideas about the intrinsic capacities of the infant and the infant’s self-awareness in the 1960s and 1970s, including expanding his theory to the creative sharing of adults and cultural experience. In an expansion of Trevarthen’s theory, we add the creation of hidden meanings made by reactivity levels, thresholds, set points, and other features of neurosomatic biopsychological systems that form polysemic bundles of meaning. These polysemic bundles of meanings populate dyadic states of consciousness that guide how individuals thrust themselves into the world. We suggest that dyadic states of consciousness are not static intersubjective endpoints. Rather, they are dynamic states continuously influencing the creation of newly emerging states of consciousness.
Empathy as Developmental Achievement
Authors: Solms Mark
Published: February 2025

This chapter argues that the function of empathy cannot be reduced to that of mirror neurones and thereby to the mechanism of embodied simulation. Empathy is not an inborn reflex; rather, it is a developmental achievement that is attained in the face of strong emotional resistances. This is why empathy is considered to be a good thing, both empirically and morally. Feeling your way into the affective state of others (accurately) is not only good for you, it is also good of you. Cast within a neuropsychoanalytic theoretical framework, this chapter describes and illustrates the emotional and cognitive roots of empathy with reference to an extreme clinical case: anosognosia for hemiplegia following right-hemisphere stroke.
Human Vocal Production Learning
Authors: Merker Bjorn
Published: February 2025

A hypothesis to account for our so far unexplained evolutionary path to vocal production learning—our capacity to learn to duplicate by voice sound patterns received by ear—is proposed. This capacity is essential for our singing and talking, but absent in other primates, making it a watershed adaptation on our path to humanhood. Many bird species and a scattering of mammals do, however, possess this capacity. Using recently uncovered features of the cerebral organization of vocal production learning in birds, I introduce the heterosomatic yoking hypothesis to account for its first beginnings in our line by way of the likelihood that our prehuman ancestors were under selection for beat-based group synchrony of voices. The hypothesis explicates how our chanting and stomping together in time, though functionally unrelated to vocal learning, nevertheless would have equipped us with a necessary neurological prerequisite for vocal production learning.
The Artistic Imagination of Colwyn Trevarthen
Authors: Kevin Nugent J. , Johnson Lise C. , Nicolson Susan , Paul Campbell
Published: February 2025

Forsaking the conventional objective approach to the study of the child, Colwyn Trevarthen and Berry Brazelton took the radical step of deciding to learn about babies by engaging and interacting personally with them. The picture that emerged from this approach is of the infant as a well-coordinated purposeful agent who deliberately communicates intentions and feelings to people. They describe the newborn as actively ‘looking for companionship’ and for engagement with mothers, fathers, other adults, peers, and siblings—whoever offers the baby human respect. This chapter discusses how Colwyn Trevarthen’s ideas and research influenced the development of the Neonatal Behavioral Assessment Scale (NBAS) and the Newborn Behavioral Observations (NBO) system. The chapter goes on to describe the NBO as a strengths-based relationship-building tool, used to support the choreography and music of communication.
Walking, Affective Ties, Words, and Play in an Autistic Child
Authors: Danon-Boileau Laurent , Rhode Maria
Published: February 2025

This chapter shows how the psychoanalytic treatment of a very young girl with autistic features could change her access to walking and communication. Autistic children are often described as overreactive to other people’s emotional states, and yet indifferent to what happens around them. Their language is often paradoxical as it does not seem meant for communication. Most autistic children have difficulties in addressing others but often speak to themselves. As regards symbolic play, many show no interest in classical toys such as dolls but are keen on trains or little cars. This paper suggests explanations for such paradoxes and shows how more typical attitudes can appear during the treatment. Psychoanalysts believe that children develop if they can enjoy what they do and share that pleasure with adults who find meaning in what they see them doing. This trust in shared creative sublimation is very close to Colwyn Trevarthen’s theory of intersubjectivity and companionship.
Coordinates
Authors: Lancaster Tom , Blundell Stephen J.
Published: February 2025

Chapter 3 is concerned with coordinates. Sometimes we choose a geometric, coordinate-free approach, but often we have to choose a particular coordinate system. We consider Cartesian and non-Cartesian bases and how to transform from one to the other.
The gravitational field equations
Authors: Lancaster Tom , Blundell Stephen J.
Published: February 2025

In Chapter 13, we write down the Einstein field equation, which is the foundation of general relativity. The left-hand side of the Einstein field equation encodes geometry using the Ricci tensor and scalar to form the Einstein tensor. The right-hand side of Einstein’s equation encodes the energy-momentum of the matter fields.
Universes of the past and future
Authors: Lancaster Tom , Blundell Stephen J.
Published: February 2025

We apply all of the ideas developed in the last few chapters to a number of different model universes. The Robertson-Walker spaces filled with a perfect fluid provide a range of models, many of which start with a Big Bang. The Einstein Universe is static, but unstable; the Einstein-de Sitter model expands without bound and the Lemaître model has a coasting period. The standard models of cosmology have zero cosmological constant Λ, and all begin with a Big-Bang singularity.
The Schwarzschild geometry
Authors: Lancaster Tom , Blundell Stephen J.
Published: February 2025

In Chapter 21 we discuss the Schwarzschild metric, which describes a stationary, spherically-symmetric distribution of mass. The Schwarzschild metric is static, asymptotically flat. Birkhoff’s theorem says that any spherically-symmetric solution to Einstein’s equation is identical to the Schwarzschild solution.
Motion in the Schwarzschild geometry
Authors: Lancaster Tom , Blundell Stephen J.
Published: February 2025

The Schwarzschild metric describes a stationary, spherically-symmetric distribution of mass. We determine the possible motions allowed by a Schwarzschild metric in Chapters 22, including the examples of the gravitational redshift caused by Schwarzschild geometry and also the radial plunge, in which a massive particle starts at rest at infinity and plunges towards a star along a radial line.
Kruskal–Szekeres coordinates
Authors: Lancaster Tom , Blundell Stephen J.
Published: February 2025

We describe a set of coordinates which are useful for studying black hole singularities. These Kruskal-Szekeres coordinates successfully remove the singularity at the Schwarzschild radius. They suggest that the coordinates can be extended to cover, apparently unphysical, regions of spacetime. Kruskal coordinates and their link to Schwarzschild coordinates can be understood by analogy to the relation between Minkowski coordinates and accelerating Minkowski coordinates. The conformal structure of the extended system reveals how the singularity can be thought of as living at the edge of spacetime.
Hawking radiation
Authors: Lancaster Tom , Blundell Stephen J.
Published: February 2025

In Chapter 28 we discuss black hole thermodynamics. Black holes radiate Hawking radiation through a process where a particle-antiparticle pair is created at the event horizon. Energy is transported out to infinity. A set of laws of black hole mechanics can be formulated that closely resemble the laws of thermodynamics. Surface gravity is analogous to temperature and the area of the event horizon is analogous to entropy.
Exterior and Lie derivatives
Authors: Lancaster Tom , Blundell Stephen J.
Published: February 2025

In Chapter 33, we meet the derivatives that are naturally adapted to a coordinate-free description of a manifold: the exterior derivative and the Lie derivative.
Introduction
Authors: Hamilton Tomas
Published: February 2025

Chapter 1 introduces the arms trade, its connection to atrocity, and the potential for accountability through International Criminal Law. It sets out the proposal that individuals, whether businesspeople, state officials, or arms traffickers, can be held responsible for crimes committed with weapons they supply, even if their actions are remote from the actual violence. Indeed, the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) has considered investigating arms traders, but has never brought charges. The chapter unpacks the items, actors, and conduct of the global trade, and the blurred distinctions between its lawful and unlawful sectors. It presents three research questions, about existing arms regulation, the evolution of complicity doctrines, and the perceptions of legal practitioners. A central theme emerges: the structural causes of violence and system criminality are often eclipsed by an assumption that the paragon of international justice is to hold political and military leaders to account.
Imagining the Arms Trade in ICC Case Selection
Authors: Hamilton Tomas
Published: February 2025

Chapter 7 examines how the International Criminal Court (ICC)’s institutional culture may play an under-acknowledged role in the selection of cases for investigation and prosecution. The prevailing view among ICC judges and lawyers, discussed in the previous chapter, was that arms traders are not appropriate targets to pursue, a perspective that appeared rooted in cultural beliefs about the Court’s objectives and aspirations, rather than on legal grounds. Case selection under the Rome Statute (discretionary in nature) is open to being shaped significantly by these perceptions, while the legalistic culture of the Court tends to obscure or deny the influence of non-legal factors in decision-making. The ICC’s tendency to favour cases against military and political figures reveals that these doctrines are not as monolithic and abstract as often suggested. Rather, they are dynamically shaped by beliefs about the Court’s aims and purposes. Acknowledging and addressing these cultural biases, the chapter argues, could broaden the range of actors prosecuted, to include arms traders, ultimately enhancing the Court’s mandate to provide accountability.
Introduction
Authors: Heinzen Jasper
Published: February 2025

Honour is widely regarded as a cause of violence. Anxieties over reputation inured societies at war and individual duellists to the loss of life in the nineteenth century. However, honour’s interplay between ‘outer’ concerns with status and ‘inner’ virtue also gave it a humanitarian purpose. No custom epitomized more than parole the potential of honour to alleviate the suffering of prisoners of war and internees. Building on customary reciprocities of the knightly class in the high Middle Ages, early modern armies permitted officers and civilian detainees of equal rank to pledge their reputation as men of integrity in return for different degrees of freedom. In the process, honour became a tradeable commodity that required a modicum of trust between enemies.
Honour Betwixt and Between
Authors: Heinzen Jasper
Published: February 2025

The chapter explores the emotional compartmentalization honed by participants in wars of the mid-nineteenth century. They submitted to the growing destructive capabilities of military technology to achieve victory with grim determination, yet many lavished compassion on opponents once they had been disarmed and taken prisoner. Three case studies, namely the Crimean War (1853–1856), the French intervention in Mexico (1862–1868), and the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871), illuminate the emotional disposition that permitted such transitions. The success of captivity-as-hospitality varied when national prejudices gained the upper hand, but in the Franco-Prussian War the turbo-charged politicization of parole yielded unexpected areas of convergence between enemies who found themselves in agreement in their views on the core values of military honour.
How Do We Decide Who Is Sentenced to Death?
Authors: Costanzo Mark
Published: February 2025

This chapter describes the process by which jurors decide who is sentenced to death. The question of the death penalty in US jurisprudence has been debated by the Supreme Court for decades. Justices and legislators have worked over both trial procedures and jury instructions in an effort to correct problems with capital sentencing. These efforts aim at fashioning a process that minimizes arbitrary sentencing decisions based on legally irrelevant criteria such as race, wealth, and gender while simultaneously allowing jurors to consider the unique circumstances of each case. The issue confronting the Court has been whether this delicate balance can be achieved in practice, whether death sentencing can be both fair and rational.
Is the Death Penalty Cruel and Unusual?
Authors: Costanzo Mark
Published: February 2025

Debates about the legality of the death penalty in the United States span decades. Of importance, the Supreme Court has been asked repeatedly to define the Eighth Amendment’s phrase “cruel and unusual punishment” as it pertains to capital punishment. The chapter explores the history of executions, the means of state-sponsored killings, and the relative “humaneness” of the various methods used. From hanging, to firing squads, electric chairs, gas chambers, and lethal injection, the process of execution has been repeatedly refined and sanitized. Although the US public finds the idea of physical torture reprehensible, the psychological torture of death row receives little notice.
A Categorization of Theories of Normativity
Authors: Copp David
Published: February 2025

This chapter identifies three fundamentally different ideas about normativity. (1) Normative formalism claims there is no such thing as robust normativity. There is only the normativity found in games. If this is correct, there is no problem providing a naturalistic account of normativity. (2) Normative conceptualism claims that normativity is fundamentally a property of our concepts and ways of thinking. Naturalists could concede that normative concepts lack naturalistic analyses since this concession is compatible with a naturalistic view about the world. (3) Normative objectualism claims that there are robustly normative properties, such as the property of wrongness, and there are robustly normative states of affairs, such as torture’s being wrong. These properties and states of affairs have the property of being robustly normative. The chapter argues that a philosophically satisfying theory of robust normativity must be objectualist. And it must provide a reductive (presumably naturalistic) metaphysical analysis of robust normativity.
Naturalism II: Structural Varieties
Authors: Copp David
Published: February 2025

The naturalist holds that ethical properties are natural properties, but this raises many questions. What is the relation between ethical properties and non-normative natural properties? Reductive naturalists think there are reductive naturalistic metaphysical analyses of the ethical properties and of the property of being robustly normative. Non-reductive naturalists do not accept this. Naturalists might be expected to hold that ethical facts are metaphysically grounded by non-normative natural facts, but some might not accept this. This chapter discusses technical questions about reduction, metaphysical analysis, and grounding. For example, is a metaphysical analysis of a property compatible with identifying it with the proposed analysans property? The chapter says “yes.” It proposes that a metaphysical analysis is a theory about the essential nature of the analysandum. Are there two distinct grounding relations, metaphysical grounding and normative grounding? This chapter says “yes.” If there is only one grounding relation, some metaethical positions are untenable.
Naturalism III: Substantive Varieties
Authors: Copp David
Published: February 2025

This chapter explores five naturalist theories. It asks, what kinds of non-normative natural properties figure in their analyses of ethical properties? What account can they give of robust normativity? (1) Cornell Realism is a kind of non-reductive naturalism and does not answer these questions (Sturgeon, Boyd, etc.). (2) The Canberra Plan proposes that the content of “mature folk morality” determines which non-normative natural facts are the moral facts (Jackson and Pettit). It does not purport to explain robust normativity. (3) Neo-Humean Subjectivism holds that facts about a person’s reasons reduce to facts about their desires, either actual desires (Schroeder), or desires in ideal circumstances (Smith, etc.). (4) Neo-Aristotelian Naturalism holds that the nature of human beings and their ways of life fixes the criteria of goodness for humans (Foot, Hursthouse, Bloomfield). (5) Pluralist-Teleology offers a unified account of normative moral, prudential, and epistemic reasons. It analyzes robust normativity in relation to “problems of normative governance” (Copp).
The Negotiation of Moral Improprieties in the Everyday Interactions of Young Adult Romantic Partners
Authors: Korobov Neill
Published: February 2025

This chapter discursively examines morality as social and relational fluency within the context of everyday conversations between young adult romantic partners. The analytic focus is on interactively occasioned moral improprieties, including negative category attributions of nonpresent others, insults, criticisms, and accusations of infidelity among young adult heterosexual romantic couples engaged in spontaneously recorded natural conversations in their natural ecological contexts, and in speed-dates involving potential romantic partners. The general finding across both data sets is that far from being adversarial, the range of moral improprieties explored tended to be useful for pursuing affiliation/intimacy precisely because they presented interactive trouble. The data suggest that morally risky forms of social action may serve as preliminaries for intimacy between potential romantic partners. In this way, it can be argued that the ways romantic partners affiliate around quotidian moral breaches are part of the nitty-gritty work of maintaining a close relationship.
Narrating the Indian Hip Hop OG
Authors: Singh Jaspal Naveel , Cardozo Elloit
Published: February 2025

The chapter shows how Indian hip hop narrators evoke the OG (Original Gangsta) as a figure of personhood indexing chronotopic firstness and underground authenticity to construct morality in discourse. Drawing on the sociolinguistic and discourse analytical literature on stance, the chapter explicates how the narrative figure of the OG constructs moral (deontic) stances that are intertwined with knowledge-related (epistemic) stances and how such stance-taking allows narrators to position themselves and others in relation to past and future identities (chronotopes). The narratives discussed in this chapter are taken from linguistic-ethnographic interview research in four Indian cities in 2021 as well as from the lyrics of Indian rap songs.
SamBop NYC
Authors: Gidal Marc
Published: February 2025

This book explains the music, demographics, cultural issues, and industry surrounding Brazilian jazz composed and performed in New York City by professional musicians between 2000 and 2020. An ethnomusicological study based on original fieldwork and fifty-plus interviews, the book describes how musicians combine nationally associated genres and navigate the music industry while they expand their self-identities transnationally. Chapter 1 compares an original dataset of 173 musicians, their instruments, and social categories (nationality, race, and gender) to published data about Brazilian immigrants in the United States and jazz musicians in New York. It argues that systemic racism, sexism, and classism have caused imbalanced demographics among the musicians: approximately 70 percent are male and 70 percent are white; half are Brazilians, a quarter are US-born Americans, and the rest immigrated from Japan, Israel, Canada, Europe, and elsewhere in South America. Chapter 2 applies a framework of transnational polymusicalities—combining transnationalism with bimusicality from ethnomusicology—to interpret musicians’ affinities and identifications with Brazil and the United States, acquired through prolonged engagement with music. Chapter 3 considers the popularity of bossa nova among Brazilian-jazz fusions, as well as its relationship with jazz and, compared to Carnival samba, its alternative image of femininity and romance. Chapter 4 explains the fusion of genres in samba jazz, an improvised, up-tempo, instrumental style related to bossa nova. Chapter 5 outlines changing business practices by musicians, show presenters, and record producers from the 1990s into the Covid-19 pandemic that started in 2020.
“Bossa Nova York”
Authors: Gidal Marc
Published: February 2025

Chapter 3, “ ‘Bossa Nova York’: Popularity, Singers, and Anxieties,” discusses several topics concerning the prominence of bossa nova among Brazilian-jazz fusions in New York City between 2000 and 2020 and its relationships with jazz. A comparison of several renditions of the song “Dindi” by Antônio Carlos Jobim and Aloysio de Oliveira illustrates distinctive musical interpretations and nuances of musical notation. Portraits of three prominent singers of bossa nova—Maúcha Adnet, Luciana Souza, and Vinícius Cantuária—highlight their connections to jazz practices of interpretation, improvisation, and experimentation. Turning to North American stereotypes of Brazil, bossa nova suggests alternative notions of Brazilian femininity and romantic intimacy compared to the prevailing stereotype abroad of dancing women in Carnival parades and hypersexuality. Lastly, musicians hold differing opinions about the popularity of bossa nova in New York’s jazz industry, which has caused anxieties for those who try to perform other types of Brazilian jazz.
The Lay of the Land
Authors: Kraemer David
Published: February 2025

This chapter documents the inaccuracies of the canonical Jewish myth of exile, exploring the consequences of its distortions. The myth, preserved even in modern histories of the Jews, relates that 2,000 years ago Jews were forced into exile by the Romans, following which they suffered at the hands of others for millennia, all while hoping for return. This narrative misrepresents much of Jewish experience, and it ignores the fact that humans justify their existence. In truth, Jews have spent most of their history in diaspora, where they have often flourished, and they have repeatedly justified their lives there. The traditional explanation of exile as punishment for sin ignores these justifications, which render “exile” in a much more positive light. As narratives are crucially important as expressions of human identities, it is essential to ask whether the “canonical” Jewish narrative has served the needs of diaspora Jews.
The Online Extension of Autobiographical Memory
Authors: Wang Qi
Published: February 2025

The Internet and social media have afforded individuals with new ways of remembering and sharing personal experiences with others, resulting in a tangible online extension of autobiographical memory with infinite possibilities. This chapter applies the triangular theory of self in the Internet Age to analyzing the characteristics of autobiographical memory and its online extension—in the digital form on social media platforms and in the transactive form in the cyber community—in the digitally mediated society. Taking a psycho-cultural perspective, the analysis shows how psychological characteristics and cultural norms influence the dynamic interaction between the social media user and the cyber community in the process of co-constructing the online extension of autobiographical memory and further affecting individuals’ sense of self and well-being. The chapter concludes with a discussion of limitations in current research, the methodological challenges and strategies in studying autobiographical memory in the age of the Internet and social media, and future directions.
The Changing Dynamics and Consequences of Memory Retrieval in the Age of the Internet
Authors: Storm Benjamin C. , Bittner Dana-Lis , Yamashiro Jeremy K.
Published: February 2025

The Internet is increasingly affecting the nature and dynamics of human memory. In the current chapter, recent research is reviewed, focusing on how the Internet is changing the way information is learned and remembered and the consequences of such changes on the general functioning of memory. In some ways, the Internet has the potential to expand the power of memory, providing access to more information than otherwise possible. In other ways, it has the potential to supplant or disrupt internal processes, preventing the types of flexible and constructive processes that are critical for the adaptive use and updating of memory. These and other potential consequences are discussed, especially as they relate to memory retrieval, focusing on both what is known now and some of the questions and challenges that remain to be investigated.
Remembering in Pandemic Time
Authors: Worcman Karen , Garde-Hansen Joanne
Published: February 2025

During pandemic time, the Museu da Pessoa (Museum of the Person) of Brazil, like other organizations in many parts of the world, created open calls for individuals to share their daily lives, work challenges, and dreams for creating memories and hopes for the future. It was a reversion to the traditional private diaries of sharing stories on open platforms, and it reconfirmed a slower approach to memory work that this digital museum has developed since the early 1990s. The method of “social memory technology” employed was particularly attuned to remembering carefully, without time pressure and in ways that paid attention to the many non-events that individuals want to see in museums that are indicative of slower, lived, and ordinary lives. This chapter draws attention to the ways in which this digital museum engaged in fast and slow methods of remembering using the Internet to produce slow memory work that is compassionate and creates memories of pandemic time as a period of degrowth.
The Exploration Principle
Authors: Fisher Greg
Published: February 2025

Entrepreneurial progress entails exploring a problem domain deeply and generating a wide range of solutions. This means that an entrepreneur should avoid just settling on the first idea they have to solve a problem. Innovation, differentiation, and product novelty often come from exploring a wide range of options. It takes work, effort, and mental energy to explore many solutions, but out of this work, effort, and mental energy the most creative ideas emerge. And the more one explores a wide range of solutions, the easier it becomes. The diamond framework is a useful model to conceptualize and carry out the exploration principle. On the left side of the diamond the problem to be tackled is captured. The center of the diamond represents divergence across a wide array of possible solutions. The right side of the diamond represents convergence to the best possible solution from all the options.
The Prototype Principle
Authors: Fisher Greg
Published: February 2025

Entrepreneurial progress entails rapidly building a prototype of the identified solution. To make progress as an entrepreneur one needs to act, and one key action to take is building a prototype version of the proposed solution. Building a prototype facilitates deep learning and meaningful experimentation. A prototype can achieve fidelity in terms of what it looks like (aesthetics) or how it works (functionality). Therefore, as an entrepreneur thinks about developing a prototype of their product or service, they can first seek to make the prototype look right and only then work toward making it functional, or vice versa, where they make it functional first and only then start making it look good. These options create multiple paths to using a prototype to work toward creating a fully functional product that looks good and works as it should.
The Story Principle
Authors: Fisher Greg
Published: February 2025

Entrepreneurial progress entails crafting a narrative. Entrepreneurship is about creating a future that does not yet exist. But doing so requires not only that an entrepreneur is able to make sense of what they are doing but also that they are able to share with others what they are doing to garner support and input. As humans, we have evolved to be most receptive and responsive to information conveyed in the form of a story. Therefore, if an entrepreneur wants to get a better sense of what they are doing and get others to buy into it, they need to be able to transform their ideas about where we have come from and where we are going into a story. This entails crafting a context for the story, specifying characters, describing a challenge that leads to a conflict, and a course of action to overcome that conflict that leads to a climax and a conclusion.
The Affordable Loss Principle
Authors: Fisher Greg
Published: February 2025

Entrepreneurial progress stems from specifying the resources you can afford to lose in pursuing your idea. Specifying upfront what you are willing to invest (and hence lose) in starting a venture and setting that aside cognitively and/or physically so that you know what you have on hand to get the venture started can be incredibly freeing; it allows an entrepreneur to focus on the most important issues to make progress rather than constantly being paralyzed by fear of failure and wondering whether what they are doing makes sense or whether they are putting their livelihood at risk. Doing this also dictates that founders find creative ways to bring their idea to market within the resources and connections they can assemble. This forces an entrepreneur to look for the cheapest alternatives and come up with creative ways of doing things at little or no cost to themselves.
Our Rehearsal and Teaching Philosophy
Authors: Fullard Annie , Cotter-Lockard Dorianne
Published: February 2025

This chapter details the authors’ teaching philosophy, representing the foundation of the strategies and techniques for productive rehearsals. Elements of this philosophy include creating a positive environment for learning through empathy, humor, and co-leadership. These elements inspire and support artistic excellence. Cultivating respectful relationships within the ensemble is highlighted as integral to the rehearsal process. The authors move beyond the traditional concepts of leading and following by introducing the concepts of initiating, inspiring, responding, and reflecting. The principles described in this chapter reflect the philosophy of our mentor and former member of the Cleveland String Quartet, Peter Salaff.
Techniques for Sound Production
Authors: Fullard Annie , Cotter-Lockard Dorianne
Published: February 2025

This chapter offers insight into developing an expressive and nuanced sound. The authors share ideas for producing sound inspired by color, visual art, and vocal techniques. The chapter includes a section on articulation and producing a blended ensemble sound which builds on the prior chapter on intonation. The articulation section includes a discussion of legato, staccato, and emphasis markings such as sforzando, fortepiano, and tenuto. Practice techniques related to vibrato are included, followed by sound production techniques related to families of instruments based on interviews with noted chamber music performers and the authors’ experience. Appendix D provides additional sound production strategies for stringed instruments related to right-hand technique.
Renewing Historical Performance through an Embodiment of Historical Acting Techniques
Authors: Wentz Jed
Published: February 2025

This chapter explores one possible method for returning creative and expressive power to the performer of music in a historically grounded fashion: by hearing and feeling one’s own body in the act of declaiming, the musician can, using their own subjective experience, truly become an orator communicating authentically with the audience of today. In this approach, each new memory of the sound of the affected declamatory voice serves as an additional weapon in the expressive arsenal of the performer, to be drawn on imaginatively in the act of making music. A demonstration of an annotated passage from George Vandenhoff’s The Art of Elocution (1846) serves as an example not only of nineteenth-century musical speech but also more broadly of the potential for artistic transformation through an iterative process of oratorical training and performance, stimulating the imagination through the sounds and images of well-chosen declamatory texts.