bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Association of Fatal and Nonfatal Cardiovascular Outcomes With 24-Hour Mean Arterial Pressure
Authors: Melgarejo Jesus D. , Yang Wen-Yi , Thijs Lutgarde , Li Yan , Asayama Kei , Hansen Tine W. , Wei Fang-Fei , Kikuya Masahiro , Ohkubo Takayoshi , Dolan Eamon , Stolarz-Skrzypek Katarzyna , Huang Qi-Fang , Tikhonoff Valérie , Malyutina Sofia , Casiglia Edoardo , Lind Lars , Sandoya Edgardo , Filipovský Jan , Gilis-Malinowska Natasza , Narkiewicz Krzysztof , Kawecka-Jaszcz Kalina , Boggia José , Wang Ji-Guang , Imai Yutaka , Vanassche Thomas , Verhamme Peter , Janssens Stefan , O’Brien Eoin , Maestre Gladys E. , Staessen Jan A. , Zhang Zhen-Yu , Seidlerová J. , Tichá M. , Ibsen H. , Jeppesen J. , Rasmussen S. , Torp-Pedersen C. , Pizzioli A. , Hashimoto J. , Hoshi H. , Inoue R. , Metoki H. , Obara T. , Satoh H. , Totsune K. , Adamkiewicz-Piejko A. , Cwynar M. , Gąsowski J. , Grodzicki T. , Lubaszewski W. , Olszanecka A. , Wizner B. , Wojciechowska W. , Zyczkowska J. , Nikitin Y. , Pello E. , Simonova G. , Voevoda M. , Andrén B. , Berglund L. , Björklund-Bodegård K. , Zethelius B. , Bianchi M. , Moreira V. , Schettini C. , Schwedt E. , Senra H.
Published: December 2020

Major adverse cardiovascular events are closely associated with 24-hour blood pressure (BP). We determined outcome-driven thresholds for 24-hour mean arterial pressure (MAP), a BP index estimated by oscillometric devices. We assessed the association of major adverse cardiovascular events with 24-hour MAP, systolic BP (SBP), and diastolic BP (DBP) in a population-based cohort (n=11 596). Statistics included multivariable Cox regression and the generalized R
2
statistic to test model fit. Baseline office and 24-hour MAP averaged 97.4 and 90.4 mm Hg. Over 13.6 years (median), 2034 major adverse cardiovascular events occurred. Twenty-four-hour MAP levels of <90 (normotension, n=6183), 90 to <92 (elevated MAP, n=909), 92 to <96 (stage-1 hypertension, n=1544), and ≥96 (stage-2 hypertension, n=2960) mm Hg yielded equivalent 10-year major adverse cardiovascular events risks as office MAP categorized using 2017 American thresholds for office SBP and DBP. Compared with 24-hour MAP normotension, hazard ratios were 0.96 (95% CI, 0.80–1.16), 1.32 (1.15–1.51), and 1.77 (1.59–1.97), for elevated and stage-1 and stage-2 hypertensive MAP. On top of 24-hour MAP, higher 24-hour SBP increased, whereas higher 24-hour DBP attenuated risk (
P
<0.001). Considering the 24-hour measurements, R
2
statistics were similar for SBP (1.34) and MAP (1.28), lower for DBP than for MAP (0.47), and reduced to null, if the base model included SBP and DBP; if the ambulatory BP indexes were dichotomized according to the 2017 American guideline and the proposed 92 mm Hg for MAP, the R
2
values were 0.71, 0.89, 0.32, and 0.10, respectively. In conclusion, the clinical application of 24-hour MAP thresholds in conjunction with SBP and DBP refines risk estimates.
Ungrateful Children and Days of Mourning: Two Wampanoag Interpretations of the “First Thanksgiving” and Colonialism through the Centuries
Authors: Silverman David J.
Published: December 2020

When Boston entered its pandemic lockdown in early March, it forced the cancellation of the Congregational Library's symposium “1620: New Perspectives on the Pilgrim Legacy.” With the cooperation of the director of the library, the Rev. Stephen Butler Murray, the four presenters—Carla Gardina Pestana, David Silverman, John G. Turner, and Francis Bremer—agreed to have the QUARTERLY publish revised versions of their talks with Kenneth P. Minkema as the guest editor of the papers. Far from seeing Plimoth as a minor backwater in the English settlement of Massachusetts, each of the essays situates the history of Plymouth Colony in more complex contexts: in its web of Atlantic connections, in the Indigenous identification of Anglo settlement as a cause of mourning, in its participation in the processes of enslavement, and in its larger impact upon the puritan, New England Way.
The Yoke of Bondage: Slavery in Plymouth Colony
Authors: Turner John G.
Published: December 2020

When Boston entered its pandemic lockdown in early March, it forced the cancellation of the Congregational Library's symposium “1620: New Perspectives on the Pilgrim Legacy.” With the cooperation of the director of the library, the Rev. Stephen Butler Murray, the four presenters—Carla Gardina Pestana, David Silverman, John G. Turner, and Francis Bremer—agreed to have the QUARTERLY publish revised versions of their talks with Kenneth P. Minkema as the guest editor of the papers. Far from seeing Plimoth as a minor backwater in the English settlement of Massachusetts, each of the essays situates the history of Plymouth Colony in more complex contexts: in its web of Atlantic connections, in the Indigenous identification of Anglo settlement as a cause of mourning, in its participation in the processes of enslavement, and in its larger impact upon the puritan, New England Way.
Plimoth at 400 Editor's Introduction
Authors: Minkema Kenneth P.
Published: December 2020

When Boston entered its pandemic lockdown in early March, it forced the cancellation of the Congregational Library's symposium “1620: New Perspectives on the Pilgrim Legacy.” With the cooperation of the director of the library, the Rev. Stephen Butler Murray, the four presenters—Carla Gardina Pestana, David Silverman, John G. Turner, and Francis Bremer—agreed to have the QUARTERLY publish revised versions of their talks with Kenneth P. Minkema as the guest editor of the papers. Far from seeing Plimoth as a minor backwater in the English settlement of Massachusetts, each of the essays situates the history of Plymouth Colony in more complex contexts: in its web of Atlantic connections, in the Indigenous identification of Anglo settlement as a cause of mourning, in its participation in the processes of enslavement, and in its larger impact upon the puritan, New England Way.
Children, Motherhood, and the Social Death of Childless Women: The Social and Theological Construction of Infertility in the Hebrew Bible and in Cameroon
Authors: Yafeh-Deigh Alice
Published: December 2020

This paper reviews the biblical mandate to have children in tension with the claim that God holds the exclusive power to open and close wombs. What are the social and cultural implications of this theological assertion for procreative disadvantaged women in the Hebrew Bible (Sarah [Gen.16], Rebecca [Gen. 25], Rachel [Gen. 29–30], Samson’s mother [Judges 13], and Hannah [1 Sam 1])? Focusing on children’s value, I will examine the implications of procreative sexual ethics for Cameroonian women with permanent infertility. The conclusion further proposes a reconceptualized and subversive motherhood model using the Naomi-Ruth narrative, constructing family beyond biology or genetics.
The Child Snatched Away: Reading Revelation Through a Childist Lens
Authors: Betsworth Sharon
Published: December 2020

A great deal of biblical interpretation over the past 30 years has focused upon imagery related to women in the book of Revelation. Very little scholarship has discussed children in Revelation, likely because there are very few in the Apocalypse. However, the limited passages in which children are present deserve to be examined with a focus upon the child. This article will discuss two passages in Revelation which refer to children, Rev. 2:18–29 and Rev. 12:1–5, with the latter receiving greater attention. I will analyze these passages using childist interpretation, building upon Kathleen Gallagher Elkins’s study of feminist and childist interpretation, which uses Rev. 12 as a case study to apply both methods to the same text. Imperial-critical reading will enhance the interpretation of these passages. As I discuss Rev. 12, I will also compare the myth of three Greek child gods, Apollo, Dionysius, and Persephone, to the child snatched away in Rev. 12:5, to understand more fully how this child fits within the overall message of Revelation.
Diagoras and Philippus ‘the Atheist’ in Philodemus’ On Piety
Authors: Vassallo Christian
Published: December 2020

At the end of his treatise On Piety, Philodemus systematically criticizes Stoic theology, employing an excursus on Diagoras as part of his critique. Arguing against Diagoras’ detractors, Philodemus, relying on a testimonium by Aristoxenus, claims that, in his poetic writings, Diagoras did not commit any act of impiety. On the contrary, he argues that, despite their practice of calling the gods by name in their treatises, the Stoics ended up destroying the gods more radically than ‘atheists’ like Philippus and others. This paper attempts to shed new light on this Herculanean testimonium to Diagoras and, above all, suggests a solution for identifying the otherwise unknown figure of Philippus ‘the Atheist’.
Answering Yes/No Questions in Biblical Hebrew Dialogue
Authors: Moshavi Adina
Published: December 2020

The question-response interchange in biblical dialogue is of great linguistic as well as literary interest. In order to successfully serve purposes such as characterization and plot development, question-response interactions in a literary composition must authentically reflect the linguistic forms and conversational practices characterizing natural spoken language. The present study analyzes the linguistic characteristics and patterns of use of responses to questions in Biblical Hebrew dialogue. Its findings show that the semantics and syntax of answers to yes/no questions are closely related to the affiliation or misaffiliation of the answer with the question’s accompanying assumptions, expectations, and agendas. These associations between semantic/syntactic types and social cooperativeness, which closely resemble those found in modern spoken conversation, contribute to the authenticity of the style of biblical dialogue, and enable the question-response interaction to function effectively on the literary level.
Non-Accusative ʾt and the Syntactic Profile of Late Biblical Hebrew
Authors: Samet Nili
Published: December 2020

This paper examines the widespread classification of ʾt before the nominative as a trademark of Late Biblical Hebrew. The paper begins by defining the nature and scope of this syntactic usage and reviewing its possible explanations. Next, a full list of the relevant examples is presented and alleged post-biblical cognates are examined. This data leads to the conclusion that contrary to the common scholarly sentiment, ʾt nominativi cannot be considered a late feature within Biblical Hebrew. The evidence from Mishnaic Hebrew that was erroneously associated with ʾt nominativi enables, however, the identification of a hitherto unknown late biblical structure, namely, the demonstrative ʾt ʾšr. Biblical occurrences of this usage are recognizable in Jeremiah, Zechariah, and Qohelet. The paper concludes that while ʾt nominativi is by no means a late usage, the demonstrative ʾt ʾšr may be classified as late with more certainty. This conclusion calls for a re-examination of the syntactic profile of LBH as drawn in the influential works of the field, chiefly those by Kropat and Polzin.
The “Molten Sea” Revisited
Authors: Shapira David
Published: December 2020

According to the biblical account (1 Kgs 7:23–26), in the middle of the courtyard of the temple stood a large water vessel of cast brass. Commentators and researchers have put forward various suggestions as to the form of the Molten Sea and its purpose in the temple.

In this article, I argue that the description in 1 Kings offers definitive conclusions as to the biblical author’s intent regarding the form of the “Sea” and its volume (in בת units), and can resolve the outstanding question in the literature as to the equivalent of a בת in modern units of volume measurement. I shall also point to evidence in support of the view of other researchers that the Molten Sea held a purely symbolic role, while the practical functions of water for sacrificial purposes were provided by the bases (1 Kgs 7:27).
Arabic as a Language of the South Asian Chancery: Bahmani Communications to the Mamluk Sultanate
Authors: Walravens Meia
Published: December 2020

A growing body of literature on trade and cultural exchange between the Indian Ocean regions has already contributed significantly to our understanding of these processes and the role of language and writing within them. Yet, the question remains how Arabic correspondence played a part in communications between South Asian powers and the rulers in the Red Sea region. In order to begin filling this lacuna, this article studies epistolary writings from the Bahmani Sultanate (748/1347-934/1528) to the Mamluk Sultanate (648/1250-922/1517) during the second half of the ninth/fifteenth century. The contextualisation and discussion of three letters render insight both into the (up to now unstudied) issues at play in Bahmani-Mamluk relations and into the nature of these Arabic texts.
From Context to Content of Human Rights: The Drafting History of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and the Enigma of Article 7
Authors: Plagis Misha Ariana , Riemer Lena
Published: December 2020

The context that leads to human rights treaties being drafted or adopted has garnered much attention, especially concerning the developments in the 1970s. However, the link to the content of those human rights treaties is often missing in the analysis. In addition, less attention has been paid to one of the major developments at the time: The adoption of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights. The article engages with these gaps from the perspective of the drafting process of the African Charter, using the unique wording of article 7 to illustrate four significant political and historical factors that helped determine its content.
Aiding and Abetting and the International Criminal Court’s Bemba et al. Case: The icc Trial and Appeals Chamber Consider Article 25(3)(c) of the Rome Statute
Authors: Ventura Manuel J.
Published: December 2020

This article discusses the icc’s Bemba et al. Trial and Appeal Judgments concerning aiding and abetting under Article 25(3)(c) of the Rome Statute. It analyses three issues that were addressed at trial and some of which were considered on appeal: (i) the actus reus contribution threshold; (ii) encouragement or moral support and the principal perpetrators; and (iii) the mens rea of ‘purpose’. It concludes that the Bemba et al. Trial Judgment provided clarity on the mens rea under Article 25(3)(c), while the Bemba et al. Appeal Judgment settled the question of whether a principal perpetrator needs to be aware of the aider and abettor’s encouragement or moral support for it to have an effect on the crime. However, the Bemba et al. Appeal Judgment ignored the question of whether there is a minimum contribution threshold for the actus reus of aiding and abetting, despite the issue being clearly raised.
The “Mouthless People”: Some Remarks on the Shahr Yeri Statue-Stela Complex, Iran
Authors: Dan Roberto , Cesaretti Andrea
Published: December 2020

This article proposes a general re-evaluation of the archaeological site of Shahr Yeri, the most striking feature of which is the presence of over five hundred of what we may call statue-stelae. Despite the fact that the site and the statue-stelae have been known since at least 1978 and are of great archaeological interest, they have been relatively little studied in the past. The goal of this paper is to present a general review of the site and the statuestelae identified there, unique both with regard to their number and their iconographic features.
What is the Bundahišn?
Authors: Agostini Domenico , Thrope Samuel
Published: December 2020

The Bundahišn (meaning primal or primordial creation) is one of the most important Zoroastrian texts. Redacted in the 9th century, though containing earlier, Sasanian material, the Bundahišn deals with a wide variety of topics ranging from spiritual and material creation to the resurrection of the body and the restoration of the world. This article will address a number of previously underexplored scholarly questions: What type of text does the Bundahišn constitute? To which genre does it belong? How does it relate to the literary context of its own era? In the attempt to answer these questions, the article will compare this Zoroastrian book with two contemporary Islamic and Jewish texts: the Epistles of the Ikhwān al-Ṣafā’ and Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer.
Coinage of Davit Bek, Leader of the Armenian Army in Kapan (1722-1728)
Authors: Akopyan Alexander V.
Published: December 2020

This article is devoted to the Iranian copper coins of the 17th-18th centuries with the countermark “saber” (shamshīr) that were recently found in Armenia. Numismatic analysis shows that their production was carried out by Davit Bek, the leader of the Armenian army in Kapan in 1722-1728, after 1725 or 1726, when he received the right of anonymous coinage from Shah Ṭahmāsp II. The symbolism of the image chosen for overstriking Iranian coins is also discussed.
Two Passing Clouds: The Rainy Season of Mīrzā Bīdil and Amānat Rāy’s Persian Version of Bhāgavata Purāṇa 10.20
Authors: Pellò Stefano
Published: December 2020

This paper deals with a chapter of Amānat Rāy’s Persian verse translation of the Bhāgavata Purāṇa, completed in Delhi in 1732-33, and a section of the Ṭūr-i maʿrifat by his poetic and philosophical mentor Mīrzā ʿAbd al-Qādir Bīdil (1644-1720), a mathnawī describing the monsoon in a hilly region of present day Rajasthan. The aim of our brief analysis is to introduce a debate on the poetics of physis in early modern Persian literary culture, in the context of a wider project on Bīdil and nature. Through a guided reading of the two authors’ description of the cloud (abr), its interactions with the Sanskritic literary practices and conventions, and the diverse intertextual ties, we show how the connected analogical and metaphorical procedures employed create two complementary ways of dealing with the phenomenology of (natural) existence.
Classical New Persian samārō/ūγ ‘mushroom’
Authors: Asatrian Garnik
Published: December 2020

The paper is devoted to the etymology of the Classical New Persian term for mushroom, samārō/ūγ, with some notes about other mycological terms in this language.
The Future of the UN Human Rights Council: Insights at the Inter-Luminated Juncture of Thought and Experience
Authors: Okafor Obiora C.
Published: December 2020

A relatively young body with roots in an older institution, the UN Human Rights Council has enjoyed some success and continued to serve important positive goals, many of them not easily realized. However, the system has always had significant internal and external limitations and continues to be beset by many problems – some more serious than others, and others more imagined than real. In our own time, the rise of right-wing populist regimes around the world, the continuities and discontinuities of the challenge that this sort of populism has posed to multilateralism in global governance, the economic crises that recently beset many parts of the world leading to serious resource constraints among many of the States that contribute the most to the UN’s budget, and the on-and-off withdrawals of the US (one of the most powerful States in the world) from the Council amidst charges of selectivity, appear to have combined to produce heightened crisis within and about that body. What to do? Informed by the cross-fertilization of the author’s academic thought and practical experience at the UN, the article offers an analysis of the Council’s attainments (including its embrace of a broader and more inclusive agenda, upr reduction of selectivity, the reform of its system of appointing special procedure mandate holders, increase in the number of standing invitations issued by States to such mandate holders, and establishment of an effective sids/ldcs fund); discusses the problems that presently confront the Council (many of which have already been referred to above); and works out in some detail some of the ways in which these difficulties can be effectively ameliorated so as to enhance the Council’s performance in the near- to medium-term future.
Public Assemblies between the UN System and the Comparative Jurisprudence
Authors: Mohammed Islam
Published: December 2020

This entry outlines the UN jurisprudence of the Human Rights Committee (HRC) on public peaceful assemblies. It compares the protection of the right (freedom of assembly) in the UN system with the protection provided on a supranational/regional level and the domestic (constitutional) level, relying on the landmark cases on each of the discussed themes. The entry aims at exploring the underlying values, scope, and limitations of the right to freedom of assembly in the UN system and the comparative jurisprudence. The underlying values of the right to freedom of assembly explain the rationale for the legal protection of the right. Moreover, the entry examines the scope of the right of freedom of assembly, in order to draw the boundaries of the right and define its content. The analysis of the limitations focuses on the advance notice requirement and permit system, limitations on the time, place or manner of the assembly, and restrictions associated with heckler’s veto or having a hostile crowd. The discussion on limitation assesses whether there are historical, societal, and demographic factors that can restrict the exercise of the right to freedom of assembly, or if different regions/States are equally subjected to the same normative principles. Finally, the entry sketches the challenges and normative reflections, regarding the right to freedom of assembly, in light of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020.
Adapting the Human Rights System to the Cyber Age
Authors: Douhan Alena F.
Published: December 2020

Cyber technologies have changed all spheres of contemporary life at both the national and international levels. At the same time, legal regulation in the sphere stays far beyond technical developments. As a result, an enormous number of new terms and concepts have been invented in the area. It is maintained sometimes that the changes are so drastic that the very notion of sovereignty is outdated and the individual becomes a key actor of international relations. Consequently, there is a clear need to assess the impact of cyber technologies on the enjoyment of human rights. Due to the absence of proper legal regulation, the necessity or possibility to state the emergence of the new ‘fourth’ generation of human rights on the Internet is already discussed. The present article focuses on the status of different categories of human rights in the digitalized world. It concludes that the development of cyber technologies may hardly cause the emergence of a new generation of human rights but rather results in the need to adapt the whole system of the existing human rights to the emerging reality.
Empirical Research on Constitutional Drafting Processes Following War or Internal Disturbances in Iraq, Tunisia, Kosovo and Sudan
Authors: Abubaker Habiba
Published: December 2020

Constitutional drafting is a complex procedure. Every year, nonetheless, the world witnesses the birth of several constitutions. The drafting of constitutions, however, differs greatly from one to the other; this depends mainly on the state of affairs in each State and the causes behind the need for a new constitution. In post-conflict States, the success of the constitutional drafting process depends on various factors including, inter alia, the inclusiveness of the process; transparency; equal representation in the bodies involved in the drafting; public participation; as well as the role the international community plays. All of these factors have great implications on the success, or failure, of not only the constitutional drafting process, but also on the whole peace-building process in post-conflict societies. In other words, a successful constitutional drafting process must be nationally-led and owned while targeting the root causes of the conflict. While it may be aided by international components, the process must reflect the geo-ideological differences within a State, whether cultural, tribal, ethnic or religious. This article gives an empirical account of the constitutional drafting processes adopted as a consequence of internal conflict in Iraq, Tunisia, Kosovo, and Sudan. The paper discusses the general drafting process; the bodies involved; procedural shortcomings; and any international influence.
Constitutional Bases to the Common Fisheries Policy of the European Union
Authors: Fitzmaurice Malgosia , Rosello Mercedes
Published: December 2020

The European Union possesses constitutional characteristics that have permitted a unique approach to the organization and exercise of public authority in matters of marine fisheries regulation. The resulting system, known as the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP), is underpinned by the international law of the sea and other multilateral legal frameworks, yet also contains significant special features. Through extensive legislation and successive reforms the CFP has evolved into a complex body of principles, rules and institutions, growing in ambition and sophistication with each iteration. Yet, its success is not only dependent on its capacity for evolution, but also on the stability of its constitutional foundations, and the extent to which it can coherently support the plurality of idiosyncrasies and interests that characterize the Member States and their diverse fishing interests and cultures.
Pragmatism and Verbal Behaviourism. Mead’s and Sellars’ Theories of Meaning and Introspection
Authors: Baggio Guido
Published: December 2020

The article highlights George Herbert Mead’s and Wilfrid Sellars’ reliance on a behaviourally-grounded conception of meaning as strictly related to the possibility of distinguishing mental from non-mental phenomena as both related to the semantic dimension. Mead’s position is in fact akin to Wilfrid Sellars’ argument that the concepts of ‘inner events’ are essentially inter-subjective. Thoughts are displayed as consisting of related linguistic acts linked inferentially through intra-linguistic moves that respond to a particular ‘language practice’ governed by norms. Introspection is an ‘inner conversation’ (Mead), namely an ‘inner’ speaking analogous to linguistic activity that does not involve actual equivalents of the words in the mind (Sellars).
A Problem for Environmental Pragmatism: Value Pluralism and the Sustainability Principle
Authors: Loman Okke
Published: December 2020

In this article, I suggest that the recently emerged perspective of environmental pragmatism encompasses self-contradicting principles. For many years, it was deemed impossible for environmental ethics to formulate justified environmental policy. Environmental pragmatism, and its primary scholar Bryan G. Norton, has promoted a new outlook in that debate by proposing an ideal methodology based upon classic American pragmatism. In this methodology, a community can determine what is morally righteous by (i) conducting open-ended inquiry and (ii) considering all relevant stakeholders in a rational discourse. Environmental pragmatism must therefore accommodate reasonable value pluralism. Moreover, Norton claims that these criteria should be complemented with what I call the ‘sustainability criterion’. However, this principle of righteous decision- making appears inconsistent with the two aforementioned commitments. This article considers why this is the case.
Ownership and First-Person Authority from a Normative Pragmatist Perspective
Authors: Presti Patrizio Lo
Published: December 2020

Mental episodes are typically associated with subjective ownership and first-person authority. My belief that an apple is red is had by me; it is mine and I’m in a privileged position to know it. Your experience of red is had by you; it is yours and you are in a privileged position to know it. The two assumptions are that mental events are had by individuals to whom they occur, and that owners are in a privileged epistemic position to fallibly report their own. This paper asks how to understand ownership and first-person authority (section 1). It argues that the two assumptions should not be accepted by default (section 2). A normative pragmatism is specified, on which mental episodes are not owned, but owed to practices of reason articulation (section 3). Finally, a positive account of ownership and first-person authority is considered (section 4).
The Metaphysical Grounding of Logical Operations: John Dewey’s Theory of Qualitative Continuity
Authors: Cherlin Paul Benjamin
Published: December 2020

In John Dewey’s logical theory, qualities or qualitative relations account for the capacity to distinguish and associate the objects of reflective thought; they are antecedent to reflective analysis and necessary for coherent processes of inquiry. In Dewey’s writings that are specifically “metaphysical” in orientation, he is much more vague about the function of qualities, but does call them “generic traits of existence.” As such, they appear to be central to his mature ontological theory. In order to more fully understand the metaphysical import of qualitative relations, I first examine the details of Dewey’s logical theory, and then generalize those details in accordance with Dewey’s larger theory of nature. The end result is a novel interpretation of Dewey’s metaphysics.
The Future of Europe: The Beginning of a New Era in EU Governance?
Authors: Józon Mónika
Published: December 2020

The paper offers insight into the current practice of the passerelle(s), the enhanced cooperation and the flexibility clause, which may serve in the future the implementation of the Commission’s White Paper on the Future of Europe (2017) without Treaty revision, in light of recent developments in the policy of the new Commission, Council and European Parliament on the future of EU integration. The ex-ante and ex-post control mechanisms available at Member State level concerning the freedom of their governments to support such European initiatives, are also discussed from a comparative perspective. The paper concludes by presenting the risks associated with the activation of these mechanism of integration.
Autistic Communication and Imagination Sub-Traits Are Related to Audiovisual Temporal Integration in the Stream–Bounce Illusion
Authors: Yaguchi Ayako , Hidaka Souta
Published: December 2020

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is characterized by atypical social communication and restricted and repetitive behaviors; such traits are continuously distributed across nonclinical and clinical populations. Recently, relationships between ASD traits and low-level multisensory processing have been investigated, because atypical sensory reactivity has been regarded as a diagnostic criterion of ASD. Studies regarding an audiovisual illusion (the double-flash illusion) reported that social communication difficulties are related to temporal aspects of audiovisual integration. This study investigated whether similar relationships exist in another audiovisual illusion (the stream–bounce effect). In this illusion, two visual objects move toward each other, coincide, and pass each other, and the presentation of a transient sound at their coincidence induces a dominant perception that they bounce away from each other. Typically developing adults were recruited to perform experimental trials involving the stream–bounce effect. We measured their ASD traits using the Autism-Spectrum Quotient. The total quotient score was not related to any behavioral measurements of the effect. In contrast, for participants with higher difficulty in communication, the greatest magnitude of the stream–bounce effect occurred when the presentation timing of the sound tended to follow the visual coincidence. Participants with higher difficulty in imagination also showed the greatest magnitude of the effect when the presentation timing of the sound preceded that of the visual coincidence. Our findings regarding the stream–bounce effect, along with previous findings regarding the double-flash illusion, suggest that atypical temporal audiovisual integration is uniquely related to ASD sub-traits, especially in social communication.
Integrating the Thought of Mencius and Xunzi and the Problem of Modernizing Chinese Society
Authors: Huang Yushun
Published: December 2020

How should people today deal with the teachings of Mencius 孟子 and Xunzi 荀子? This is a question of utmost importance in reviving Confucianism. The thought of Mencius and Xunzi has many inherent complexities and contradictions. After all, they have been revised, reconstituted, and reused alongside shifts in lifestyles and social structures; their respective influence also waxed and waned accordingly. Xunzi’s teachings flourished during China’s transition from monarchical feudalism to imperial autocracy, an indication that Xunzi’s thinking has Legalist elements. The rulers in the imperial period adopted “sole veneration of Confucian learning” [du zun rushu 獨尊儒術], so the suspiciously Legalist teachings of Xunzi went into decline while the orthodox Confucian teachings of Mencius were on the rise. At the same time, Xunzi’s thought continued to play an important, perhaps even fundamental, role in hidden ways. This is the political path of being “openly Confucian, covertly Legalist” [yang ru yin fa 陽儒陰法] practiced under autocratic authority. As Chinese society began to modernize, Xunzi’s teachings enjoyed a revival, revealing that some of its strains were compatible with modern Enlightenment ideas. Further, this modern revival of Xunzi occurred on the heels of a Confucian revival. The fact that the two then more or less continued to coexist indicates the need to rethink the two schools of thought in an integrated way. To do this, I take a page from modern value systems and consider the existing distinctions between Mencius’s and Xunzi’s thinking via a “profit and loss analysis.”
Systematic revision of the North American velvet ant genus Invreiella Suárez (Hymenoptera: Mutillidae) with description of eleven new species
Authors: WALDREN GEORGE C. , WILLIAMS KEVIN A. , CAMBRA ROBERTO A. , PITTS JAMES P.
Published: December 2020

The velvet ant genus Invreiella Suárez, 1966 is redescribed and revised. Females are grouped into five species-groups, with eleven new species described based on females: I. acuminata Waldren, sp. nov., I. australis Waldren, sp. nov., I. bimaculata Waldren, sp. nov., I. breviclypeata Waldren, sp. nov., I. chihuahuensis Waldren, sp. nov., I. cuernavaca Waldren, sp. nov., I. erythrocephala Waldren, sp. nov., I. manleyi Waldren, sp. nov., I. mesomexicana Waldren, sp. nov., I. suarezi Waldren, sp. nov., and I. tequila Waldren, sp. nov. One new combination is included, I. cephalargia (Mickel, 1924), comb. nov., formerly placed in Pseudomethoca Ashmead, 1896. Additionally, I. curoei Quintero & Cambra, 2011 is synonymized with I. cardinalis (Gerstaecker, 1874), syn. nov., and I. megacantha (Cockerell & Casad, 1894), stat. resurr., is treated as a nomen dubium. The lectotype of Mutilla satrapa Gerstaecker, 1874 originally designated by C. Mickel is here validated. An illustrated key to species is included.
New distribution records of the genus Saga Charpentier, 1825 (Orthoptera: Tettigoniidae: Saginae) from Iraq
Authors: KHUDHUR FARHAD A. , AHMED SORAN H.
Published: December 2020

Genus Saga Charpentier, 1825 along with four other genera (Clonia Stål, 1855; Cloniella Kaltenbach, 1971; Emptera Saussure, 1888 and Peringueyella Saussure, 1888) comprises the tettigoniid subfamily Saginae. These genera are distributed throughout three separated biogeographical zones; in the South-Southeast of Africa, genus Emptera in India and genus Saga in Palaearctic region (Kolics et.al., 2012 & Şirin et.al., 2019). The predatory bush crickets of the genus Saga are the largest Palearctic orthopterans, with 16 species, of which ten inhabit Asia (Azerbaijan, Armenia, Caucasus, Turkey, Syria, Palestine, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Iran, and Iraq), the rest occur in Europe (one of them ranging to Western Siberia) (Kaltenbach, 1964, 1967, Bader & Massa, 2001, Şirin et.al., 2019 & Cigliano et al. 2020). Six of these species are endemic to Turkey (Saga beiri, S. capadocica, S. hakkarica, S. longicaudata, S. puella and S. rhodiensis) (Şirin et.al., 2019), while the six European taxa are (S. natoliae, S. pedo, S. campbelli, S. gracilis, S. hellenica and S. rammei) (Kolics et.al., 2012). In the East Mediterranean countries S. ledereri occur in Syria and Lebanon, S. ornata in Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine and Syria (Kaltenbach, 1964, 1967 Cigliano et al. 2020). Among the non-European Saga species, S. ephippigera has the broadest geographic range, extending from Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine and Syria to Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Caucasus, Transcaucasus and Karabagh, while S. syriaca is found in Syria, Lebanon, Turkey and Iraq (Kirby,1906, Kaltenbach, 1967, Bader & Massa, 2001, Arsalan & Candan, 2019, Şirin et.al., 2019 & Cigliano et al. 2020).
Corrections to the description of Tasmanura (Pseudachorutinae)
Authors: GREENSLADE PENELOPE
Published: December 2020

The original description of the Tasmanian endemic genus Tasmanura Womersley was based on a misunderstanding of its gross morphology. This probably led to a misidentification of the genus from South Africa. To prevent similar misidentifications, the genus is redescribed here from the holotype and comments made on its distribution and habitat as well as current and future risks to its persistence.
Oxybelus lusitanicus spec. nov., a new Crabronid wasp species from Portugal
Authors: CROSS IAN
Published: December 2020

Oxybelus lusitanicus spec. nov., a new European Crabronid wasp species is described and diagnosed. It is currently known only from two regions of Portugal. An amendment to the relevant section of Guichard’s (1993) most recent English language key to European Oxybelus Latreille, 1796 is included.
All our problems solved? Implementing peer learning in a geriatric hospital setting: A discussion paper
Authors: Olsson Cecilia , Carlson Elisabeth , Sundin-Andersson Christina , Josse-Eklund Anna
Published: December 2020

Educational models that facilitate an increased number of students while maintaining clinical education of good quality are needed. This discussion paper presents how peer learning was implemented in a geriatric hospital setting allowing for an increase in student numbers. Conclusively, a stringent implementation of peer learning facilitated an effective way of using existing supervision resources, while maintaining a good quality of clinical education. It is also important that the process is anchored in both educational and clinical settings with a clear division of responsibilities. Finally, all collaborative partners need to acknowledge the significance of high-quality clinical education.
First brachytherapy treatment of prostate cancer in Nigeria using low dose rate radioactive iodine 125
Authors: Adeyemi Oludare Folajimi , Mghari Rachid
Published: December 2020

Background

We report the first prostate brachytherapy in Nigeria, using low dose radioactive iodine 125 (I-125) permanent seeds implant.

Case Presentation

The low dose rate brachytherapy using I-125 implants was performed in a private clinic in the city of Benin, Edo state of Nigeria. This pilot study reports the case of the first two patients with prostate cancer. The patients were treated under spinal anesthesia using 2 ml of heavy bupibacaine which is equivalent to 10 mg of bupibacaine. Biopsy, total blood count, electrolytes, urea, creatinine, urinalysis, electrocardiogram, chest X-ray, prostate-specific antigen and bone scan were checked prior to the procedure. The first two prostate cancer patients who were in low risk category successfully received the treatment in the first day of the clinic’s operations. This paper describes the settings in which these clinical operations occurred, detailing the type of technology used, the clinical procedure and the obtained dose distribution.

Conclusions

The paper ends with discussing the overall cost of the investment and the challenges encountered as well as the perspectives of extending the brachytherapy practice to treat other cancer diseases, such as breast and genealogical cancers.
gpps: an ILP-based approach for inferring cancer progression with mutation losses from single cell data
Authors: Ciccolella Simone , Soto Gomez Mauricio , Patterson Murray D. , Della Vedova Gianluca , Hajirasouliha Iman , Bonizzoni Paola
Published: December 2020

Background

Cancer progression reconstruction is an important development stemming from the phylogenetics field. In this context, the reconstruction of the phylogeny representing the evolutionary history presents some peculiar aspects that depend on the technology used to obtain the data to analyze: Single Cell DNA Sequencing data have great specificity, but are affected by moderate false negative and missing value rates. Moreover, there has been some recent evidence of back mutations in cancer: this phenomenon is currently widely ignored.

Results

We present a new tool, , that reconstructs a tumor phylogeny from Single Cell Sequencing data, allowing each mutation to be lost at most a fixed number of times. The General Parsimony Phylogeny from Single cell () tool is open source and available athttps://github.com/AlgoLab/gpps.

Conclusions

provides new insights to the analysis of intra-tumor heterogeneity by proposing a new progression model to the field of cancer phylogeny reconstruction on Single Cell data.
iDPGK: characterization and identification of lysine phosphoglycerylation sites based on sequence-based features
Authors: Huang Kai-Yao , Hung Fang-Yu , Kao Hui-Ju , Lau Hui-Hsuan , Weng Shun-Long
Published: December 2020

Background

Protein phosphoglycerylation, the addition of a 1,3-bisphosphoglyceric acid (1,3-BPG) to a lysine residue of a protein and thus to form a 3-phosphoglyceryl-lysine, is a reversible and non-enzymatic post-translational modification (PTM) and plays a regulatory role in glucose metabolism and glycolytic process. As the number of experimentally verified phosphoglycerylated sites has increased significantly, statistical or machine learning methods are imperative for investigating the characteristics of phosphoglycerylation sites. Currently, research into phosphoglycerylation is very limited, and only a few resources are available for the computational identification of phosphoglycerylation sites.

Result

We present a bioinformatics investigation of phosphoglycerylation sites based on sequence-based features. The TwoSampleLogo analysis reveals that the regions surrounding the phosphoglycerylation sites contain a high relatively of positively charged amino acids, especially in the upstream flanking region. Additionally, the non-polar and aliphatic amino acids are more abundant surrounding phosphoglycerylated lysine following the results of PTM-Logo, which may play a functional role in discriminating between phosphoglycerylation and non-phosphoglycerylation sites. Many types of features were adopted to build the prediction model on the training dataset, including amino acid composition, amino acid pair composition, positional weighted matrix and position-specific scoring matrix. Further, to improve the predictive power, numerous top features ranked by F-score were considered as the final combination for classification, and thus the predictive models were trained using DT, RF and SVM classifiers. Evaluation by five-fold cross-validation showed that the selected features was most effective in discriminating between phosphoglycerylated and non-phosphoglycerylated sites.

Conclusion

The SVM model trained with the selected sequence-based features performed well, with a sensitivity of 77.5%, a specificity of 73.6%, an accuracy of 74.9%, and a Matthews Correlation Coefficient value of 0.49. Furthermore, the model also consistently provides the effective performance in independent testing set, yielding sensitivity of 75.7% and specificity of 64.9%. Finally, the model has been implemented as a web-based system, namely iDPGK, which is now freely available athttp://mer.hc.mmh.org.tw/iDPGK/.
Convolutional neural network for automated mass segmentation in mammography
Authors: Abdelhafiz Dina , Bi Jinbo , Ammar Reda , Yang Clifford , Nabavi Sheida
Published: December 2020

Background

Automatic segmentation and localization of lesions in mammogram (MG) images are challenging even with employing advanced methods such as deep learning (DL) methods. We developed a new model based on the architecture of the semantic segmentation U-Net model to precisely segment mass lesions in MG images. The proposed end-to-end convolutional neural network (CNN) based model extracts contextual information by combining low-level and high-level features. We trained the proposed model using huge publicly available databases, (CBIS-DDSM, BCDR-01, and INbreast), and a private database from the University of Connecticut Health Center (UCHC).

Results

We compared the performance of the proposed model with those of the state-of-the-art DL models including the fully convolutional network (FCN), SegNet, Dilated-Net, original U-Net, and Faster R-CNN models and the conventional region growing (RG) method. The proposed Vanilla U-Net model outperforms the Faster R-CNN model significantly in terms of the runtime and the Intersection over Union metric (IOU). Training with digitized film-based and fully digitized MG images, the proposed Vanilla U-Net model achieves a mean test accuracy of 92.6%. The proposed model achieves a mean Dice coefficient index (DI) of 0.951 and a mean IOU of 0.909 that show how close the output segments are to the corresponding lesions in the ground truth maps. Data augmentation has been very effective in our experiments resulting in an increase in the mean DI and the mean IOU from 0.922 to 0.951 and 0.856 to 0.909, respectively.

Conclusions

The proposed Vanilla U-Net based model can be used for precise segmentation of masses in MG images. This is because the segmentation process incorporates more multi-scale spatial context, and captures more local and global context to predict a precise pixel-wise segmentation map of an input full MG image. These detected maps can help radiologists in differentiating benign and malignant lesions depend on the lesion shapes. We show that using transfer learning, introducing augmentation, and modifying the architecture of the original model results in better performance in terms of the mean accuracy, the mean DI, and the mean IOU in detecting mass lesion compared to the other DL and the conventional models.
Mitochondrial DNAs provide insight into trypanosome phylogeny and molecular evolution
Authors: Kay C. , Williams T. A. , Gibson W.
Published: December 2020

Background

Trypanosomes are single-celled eukaryotic parasites characterised by the unique biology of their mitochondrial DNA. African livestock trypanosomes impose a major burden on agriculture across sub-Saharan Africa, but are poorly understood compared to those that cause sleeping sickness and Chagas disease in humans. Here we explore the potential of the maxicircle, a component of trypanosome mitochondrial DNA to study the evolutionary history of trypanosomes.

Results

We used long-read sequencing to completely assemble maxicircle mitochondrial DNA from four previously uncharacterized African trypanosomes, and leveraged these assemblies to scaffold and assemble a further 103 trypanosome maxicircle gene coding regions from published short-read data. While synteny was largely conserved, there were repeated, independent losses of Complex I genes. Comparison of pre-edited and non-edited genes revealed the impact of RNA editing on nucleotide composition, with non-edited genes approaching the limits of GC loss. African tsetse-transmitted trypanosomes showed high levels of RNA editing compared to other trypanosomes. The gene coding regions of maxicircle mitochondrial DNAs were used to construct time-resolved phylogenetic trees, revealing deep divergence events among isolates of the pathogensTrypanosoma bruceiandT. congolense.

Conclusions

Our data represents a new resource for experimental and evolutionary analyses of trypanosome phylogeny, molecular evolution and function. Molecular clock analyses yielded a timescale for trypanosome evolution congruent with major biogeographical events in Africa and revealed the recent emergence ofTrypanosoma brucei gambienseandT. equiperdum, major human and animal pathogens.