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"Walker Evans and Robert Frank: A Mutual Admiration"
No full textResearch paper submitted to American University in partial fulfillment of the Degree of Master of Arts; approved as non-thesis optio
May Stevens' Feminist Art: Portraying Patriarchy and Re-telling Women's History
No full textResearch paper submitted to American University in partial fulfillment of the Degree of Master of Arts; approved as non-thesis optio
Men at Work: Treasury Section Murals about Heavy Industry during the Great Depression
No full textResearch paper submitted to American University in partial fulfillment of the Degree of Master of Arts; approved as non-thesis optio
The Women Before and Behind Gerrit van Honthorst's Easel: Deconstructing Several Models, Patrons, and Students
No full textResearch paper submitted to American University in partial fulfillment of the Degree of Master of Arts; approved as non-thesis optio
Cruelty, Plague, and the Death of the Masterpiece: Robert Rauschenberg and Antonin Artaud
No full textResearch paper submitted to American University in partial fulfillment of the Degree of Master of Arts; approved as non-thesis optio
The chemical nature of Aluminum corrosion: V. Energy transfer in Aluminum dissolution
No full textPublished in: J. Electrochem. Soc., Vol. 129, No.3, pp.464-467.The transfer of energy during the dissolution of aluminum is represented by a potential energy surface. In chloride solution, the high energy aluminum metal ionizes rapidly to the Al+++ ion which also hydrolyzes rapidly. At the start of the reaction, in the microsecond range, there are two species available for reaction, Al+++ and . The reaction follows two alternative paths; the energy levels of the alternative species, and have been measured. These two species react further to form a reasonable stable basic aluminum chloride that is transformed slowly to and finally to . The energy levels of these species have been measured. Reaction in sulfate solution differs because the intermediate species, and occupy low energy levels, and the basic aluminum sulfate has a lower energy than . In most practical cases of aluminum corrosion, the reaction proceeds in the reverse direction. The reactants are the oxide‐covered aluminum surface and the anion combining to form the basic aluminum salt
Can statistics tell us what we do not want to hear?: The case of complex salary structures
No full textPublished in: Statistical Science, 1993, Vol. 8, No.2, 144-179.It often appears that the most, indeed perhaps the only,
effective role of statistics is to bolster decisions policymakers were
prepared to take on other grounds. The secondary effects of smoking,
the sex differential in SAT scores, the census undercount controversy,
the validity of DNA evidence and the evidence of the relation of the race
of the victim to the imposition of the death penalty all provide examples
of the intertwining of political and statistical considerations. Although
the court in Alabama v. United States (1962) attributed to statistics the
power to speak, if courts do not want to hear what the statistics are
saying they just do not listen.
Moreover, it sometimes appears that statistics are less likely to be
relied upon if they challenge one's own interest. Confronted at their own
institutions with an analysis of faculty salaries showing evidence of
discrimination, often the very faculty whose stock-in-trade is to persuade
others of the efficacy of statistics refuse to believe what is presented to
them.
Courts share this skepticism; this paper examines the courts' treatment
of the statistical issues involved in studying possible discrimination in
faculty salaries
Increased maternal prenatal adiposity, inflammation, and lower Omega-3 fatty acid levels influence child negative affect
No full textPublished in: Frontiers in Neuroscience, October 2019, Vol. 13, Article 1035.Objective: Increased maternal adiposity during pregnancy is associated with offspring risk for psychiatric disorders. Inflammation secondary to adiposity is believed to be an important mechanism through which this effect occurs. Although increased adiposity introduces risk, not all children of overweight mothers develop these problems. Gestational factors that modify this risk are not well-understood. If maternal increased adiposity exerts its effects on offspring outcomes by increasing inflammation in the gestational environment, then anti-inflammatory inputs such as omega-3 fatty acids may be one protective factor. The goal of this study was to investigate whether maternal pre-pregnancy body mass index (BMI) and omega-3 fatty acid levels independently and/or interactively predicted offspring infant negative affect, an early life marker of risk for psychopathology.
Methods: Data came from a prospective study of women recruited during pregnancy and their 6 month old infants (N = 62; 40% female). Maternal pre-pregnancy BMI was pulled from medical charts and third trimester omega-3 fatty acid concentrations were assessed in plasma. Child negative affect was assessed using observer- and maternal-ratings at 6 months of age. Maternal inflammation was indexed by third trimester plasma levels of interleukin-6, tumor necrosis factor-alpha, and monocyte chemoattractant protein-1.
Results: Maternal pre-pregnancy BMI was associated with increased infant negative affect whereas eicosapentaenoic acid was associated with less infant negative affect. Maternal omega-3 fatty acid levels moderated the effect of BMI on infant negative affect, such that omega-3 fatty acids buffered children against the negative consequences of increased adiposity. Supporting the role of maternal inflammation in these associations, maternal BMI and omega-3 fatty acid levels interacted to predict maternal third trimester inflammation. Further, maternal inflammation was associated with increased infant negative affect.
Conclusion: Results suggest that omega-3 supplementation during pregnancy may protect against offspring behavioral risk associated with increased maternal adiposity
Lithic Animacy and Agency: Imagining Minerals in the Roman World
No full textAs the first large-scale study of minerals as imagined by Romans, this dissertation offers insights into Roman views of material agency, animacy, and the population of the inhabited world. What Romans thought of minerals transcended their decorative, practical, and scientific uses. As Roman jurists described enslaved persons as both agents and instruments, so, too, did Romans consider minerals at times instruments for cooking or for killing, yet also agents cooperating for painting or for healing. Almost every Greek or Latin text refers to minerals, some of which are dedicated volumes describing them. Known as ‘lapidaries’, these catalogs occurred in alchemical texts, poetry, encyclopedic works, materia medica, and exegeses. The dissertation privileges the catalogs of the first century Pliny the Elder, Dioscorides, and pseudo-Democritus the alchemist, while comparing them with Greek antecedents. The study also considers the development of mineral lore within later Roman writings, where pagans and Christians used minerals for theological polemics. With a philological methodology for reading these pre-scientific texts, this study is thus situated in Classical Studies, but uses a multi-disciplinary framework from the ‘material turn’ in material-cultural-studies. Animal Studies, too, and Ecology Studies offer paradigms for studying non-human agencies. Chapters address what Romans imagined minerals did and the relationships they thought minerals formed. After the Introduction, Chapter One introduces the corpus of Greek and Latin lapidaries from the fourth century BC through the seventh century AD. Chapter Two analyzes citations that lapidarists used to justify themselves as authorities in dialog with Roman literature. Chapter Three considers the animacies of mountains and of minerals as born out of the Earth. Chapter Four considers relationships that early imperial authors imagined minerals formed with each other. Chapter Five considers the vibrant relationships minerals formed with humans. The Conclusion points to future paths for research. Whether as mountains battling miners, or as earths crushed and transfigured into pigments, or as gems radiating for Christ, minerals shaped humanity as much as they were moulded.Classical literatureClassical studiesScience historyAgency, Alchemy, Early Christian Studies, Lapidaries, Mineralogy, PlinyGreek and LatinDegree Awarded: Ph.D. Greek and Latin. The Catholic University of Americ
Kant’s Transcendental Idealism and Analogical Predication
No full textI argue for an interpretation of Kant’s distinction between appearances and things in themselves (his doctrine of transcendental idealism). Traditional interpretations have understood it as a metaphysical distinction that concerns the basic structure of reality. But on these readings, the distinction raises two problems in particular that are difficult to resolve. The first has to do with whether and in what sense the object which appears is identical with a thing in itself. The second has to do with a problem of reference: is it possible for us to refer successfully to things in themselves, and if not how can the concept of a thing in itself function in Kant’s philosophy? In order to avoid these problems, some interpreters have defended the view that the distinction is not metaphysical at all; it concerns not things but only the way we think about things. I argue that these deflationary readings cannot do justice to Kant’s text; we have to treat the distinction as metaphysical. But I also show that the paradoxes of the traditional readings can be avoided in light of Kant’s doctrine of ‘symbolic judgments’ or ‘judgments according to analogy’. The distinction is metaphysical; it concerns the way things are. But it cannot be understood according to a traditional species and genus framework. The distinction marks out different ways of being without marking out different kinds of being, and our representation of this distinction requires using judgments according to analogy. I introduce Kant’s doctrine of analogy by a comparison with Thomas Aquinas’s doctrine of analogy, who employed analogy to resolve similar metaphysical paradoxes. Then I develop Kant’s doctrine on his own terms and show how it can be used for a fresh interpretation of transcendental idealism.PhilosophyEpistemologyMetaphysicsanalogy, Aquinas, Kant, symbolic cognition, things in themselves, transcendental idealismPhilosophyDegree Awarded: Ph.D. Philosophy. The Catholic University of Americ