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Food politics and development
No full textWorld Development, Volume 134, October 2020, Article number 105024.Food has become both a pivotal topic in development and a lens through which to integrate and address a range of contemporary global challenges. This review article addresses in particular the interrelationship between food and sustainable, equitable development, arguing that this is fundamentally political. We offer a set of approaches to understanding food politics, each underlain by broader theoretical traditions in power analysis, focused respectively on food interests and incentives; food regimes; food institutions; food innovation systems; food contentions and movements; food discourses, and food socio-natures. Applications of these approaches are then illustrated through a set of problematiques, providing a (selective) overview of some of the major literatures and topics of note in food politics and development. Starting with the role of the state and state-society relations in different forms of food regime, we then consider the role of science and technology (and its discourses) in shaping agricultural and food policy directions before looking in more detail at rural livelihoods in agri-food systems and the politics of inclusive structural transformation. Broadening beyond agri-food systems then brings us to interrogate dominant narratives of nutrition and review literature on the cultural politics of food and eating. A concluding section provides a synthesis across the cases, drawing together the various approaches to power and politics and showing how they might be integrated via an analytical framework which combines plural approaches to describe different pathways of change and intervention, raising critical questions about the overall direction and diversity of these pathways, their distributional effects, and the extent of democratic inclusion in decisions about food pathways. We find this extended ‘4D’ approach helpful in highlighting current food systems inequities and the political options for future food systems change, and conclude by considering how it might be harnessed as part of a future interdisciplinary, engaged research agenda
An open framework for infinite walking with saccadic redirection
No full textProceedings of the ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology, VRST
1 November 2020, 26th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology, VRST 2020; Virtual, Online; Canada; 1 November 2020 through 4 November 2020; Code 164456.In this project we created an expandable framework for allowing infinite walking in virtual reality in a closed play area. A saccade is a rapid eye movement with a unique property: the eye temporarily gathers reduced information - saccadic suppression. We leverage the suppression to redirect the user's walking towards the center of the play area by rotating the virtual world around the camera's location. With the VR environment and corresponding pre and post experience questions we could already show an improvement in understanding on a set of participants. Modern VR hardware such as the Vive Eye Pro allows a reasonable sample rate of eye movement measurements. A self-developed VR testing environment was used and with corresponding pre and post experience questions we tested a group of participants regarding general motion and VR- sickness parameters. We found a certain angle for the maximum saccade rotation which was base of further testing. We found, that our framework and the default settings successfully allow saccadic redirection with only marginal discomfort for the users
Volumetric capture for narrative films
No full textProceedings of the ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology, VRST
1 November 2020, 26th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology, VRST 2020; Virtual, Online; Canada; 1 November 2020 through 4 November 2020; Code 164456.Volumetric capture is a technique that allows to create "holographic" recordings of actors, sets and props. The technique can be used to create immersive stories that sometimes reflect aspects of reality better than realistic 3D models. For example, volumetric captures of actors do not seem to cause uncanny valley effect. In this paper, we provide an overview of volumetric capture technology and its application to narrative filmmaking
Artists as Social Entrepreneurs: Expanding the Arts Scene in the Fourth Sector
No full textThis paper presents research on the growing fourth sector, exploring whether this highly collaborative sector offers better-aligned support structures for arts organizations than the traditional sectors of nonprofit, government and private businesses. The fourth sector combines institutional knowledge from the three traditional economic sectors of nonprofit organizations, for-profit businesses and public (or government) entities, offering blended business models and emphasizing the importance of social impact and purpose-driven business. This paper also explores the identity of artists, as they are viewed by society, how they are positioned within their organizations, and what role business models play in influencing this identity. Along with the identity of artists, this paper approaches the question of how business models can better serve artists, and how artists can better position themselves as thought leaders in society. It concludes with the determination that the artist identity is strongly aligned with that of a social entrepreneur, and the opportunities of the fourth sector may offer more value to artists than the opportunities of the nonprofit sector.Arts managementArtDegree Awarded: M.A. Art. American Universit
Lord Acton and Political Dogmatism: An Historicist Critique
No full textJohn Emerich Edward Dahlberg-Acton (1834-1902), “Lord Acton,” is a much-praised figure within the American conservative movement, and among free-market or “classical” liberals. His attempts to reconcile his devout Roman Catholicism with a love of of freedom have inspired many conservatives who had assumed a tension between devotion to liberty and to religious faith. However, the fitness of Acton's legacy for conservatism and liberalism has rarely been critically examined. This dissertation examines Acton's work using a textual hermeneutic. The primary approach involves a study of Lord Acton's ideas as expressed in his own works, especially those dealing with the subjects of historical methods and historical criticism. The research demonstrates that despite his protests otherwise, Lord Acton's work often contained a distinctive form of abstract, ahistorical thinking. Acton's efforts in reconciling liberty and authority contain distinctive weaknesses indicating a moral rigidity that undermines his analysis. Lord Acton relies upon a progressivist vision of history that often contradicts conservative views of human nature. Despite his association with laissez-faire capitalism, evidence suggests that Acton was not a free-market ideologue, and held far more nuanced economic views. The author concludes that while Acton is a gifted scholar, his approach is not fully compatible with conservative values, with his economic ideas representing a possible exception. Additionally, Acton's moral rigidity is challenging for liberalism, in that it could encourage an illiberal dogmatism to arise within liberal thought.Political scienceHistoryActon, Catholicism, History, LibertyPoliticsDegree Awarded: Ph.D. Politics. The Catholic University of Americ
The Grace Concealed in suffering: Developing Virtue and Beatitude
No full textThe Grace Concealed in Suffering: Developing Virtue and BeatitudeSuffering, despite being a fundamental and universally experienced human phenomenon, is an enigma to most people. When they experience it, many ask, “Why me?” Some will turn to God for help when trouble arises while others will blame Him for perceived injustices. A few will even lose faith in God altogether. Because of the death and resurrection of Christ, a rich tradition of Christian thought recognizes that suffering can be morally redeeming but these insights are not brought together and clearly articulated with other aspects of moral theology in comprehensive theological works like St. Thomas’s Summa theologiae and the Catechism of the Catholic Church. This failure to provide a concentrated and comprehensive discussion of the meaning of suffering makes Catholic moral teaching less accessible to many within and external to the tradition, fails to give solace to many who suffer, and causes many to deny God’s existence. This dissertation develops a theology of suffering based on Sacred Scripture, the thought of St. Thomas, and appropriate magisterial documents including the Catechism of the Catholic Church and John Paul II’s Apostolic Letter on suffering, Salvifici doloris, along with more recent work in medicine, philosophy and theology. This theology, consistent with Catholic doctrine, views suffering as the God-given ability to sense evil, or more accurately stated, the absence of goods significant enough to threaten our existence physically, psychologically, socially or spiritually. It identifies four tasks of suffering that lead humans to the eternal bliss of the beatific vision: to build virtue, to reorient the soul to God, to unleash our love toward those who suffer, and to redeem the person who suffers for the benefit of others. It then describes how God withholds goods, which humans perceive as evil, to provide us with opportunities to build the virtues which allow us to share in the divine nature, man’s true end, using suffering to motivate us to avoid vice and pursue the goods that have been withheld. Finally, the dissertation explains that suffering is actually a religious calling and describes how one can answer that call in a way that leads to eternal joy.TheologyReligionPhilosophy of ReligionEvil, Grace, Pain, Providence, Suffering, TheologyMoral Theology/EthicsDegree Awarded: Ph.D. Moral Theology/Ethics. The Catholic University of Americ
Intelligent Control of Closed-Kinematic Chain Robot Manipulators
No full textClosed-kinematic chain mechanism (CKCM) manipulators have attracted much attention in the industry and research community as they can minimize drawbacks of open kinematic chain manipulators such as low stiffness, poor stability, small payload, accumulated and amplified errors from link to link. A CKCM manipulator was first implemented in the design of the Stewart Platform (SP) that has six degrees of freedom (DOF). Nowadays, the SP has a wide application area in spacecraft simulation, medical rehabilitation and high-speed assembly operation.In order for a robot to track a desired path, a closed-loop feedback controller employs sensors to be aware of its surroundings and then adjusts an appropriate control strategy to achieve desired performance like the way a human brain reasons. In general, robotic systems are complicated, time-varying and highly nonlinear systems with uncertainties, disturbances in their working environment [3]. Thus, it is essential for a robotic system to possess a controller that has a capability to adapt and improve itself under changing conditions without human intervention.Moreover, due to the closed-loop mechanical structure, without consideration of synchronization among control loops, the tracking performance of the above controller will be degraded. In other words, in order to improve the tracking performance, all actuators should move synchronously along a pre-calculated path. Thus, the synchronized control approach is the key to achieve good trajectory tracking for CKCM manipulators.By applying the Model Reference Adaptive Control (MRAC) Theory based on the Lyapunov stability theorem we developed two new intelligent control schemes, namely the Centralized Adaptive Synchronized Control Scheme (CASCS) and the Decentralized Adaptive Synchronized Control Scheme (DASCS). These two new control schemes are performance-based and thus their implementations do not require the dynamics of the manipulator. The developed control schemes ensure the global asymptotic convergence of tracking errors while forcing all active joints to move in a predefined synchronous manner at high speed, even in the presence of uncertainties and sudden changes in payload. Computer simulation and experimentation conducted on two CKCM manipulators validate the effectiveness of the CASCS and DASCS in handling model uncertainty and sudden payload changes and show that they have better performance than conventional MRAC schemes without joint error synchronization.RoboticsElectrical engineeringAdaptive Control, CKCM Manipulator, Model-Free, Parallel Robot, Stewart Platform-Based Manipulator, Synchronized ControlElectrical Engineering and Computer ScienceDegree Awarded: Ph.D. Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. The Catholic University of Americ
Religion as a Basic Human Good
No full textIn recent years, there have been a number of books and articles that have presented arguments for and against the idea that there should be special legal protection of religious freedom. One question to which such treatments respond can be articulated thus: Are there strong philosophical grounds for positing a distinct right of religious freedom that would sometimes justify immunity from otherwise generally applicable laws? Various thinkers working within the tradition of natural law argue that such a distinct right should be protected by law on account of what they argue is a distinct fundamental aspect of human well-being, namely, religion. Up until now, there has not been a book length treatment of this purported basic good and the various considerations of it that are relevant for the issue of religiousfreedom. In this work I examine the nature of basic goods in general before analyzing the good of religion specifically. Since a common obstacle to respect for religious freedom is the claim that its pursuit is inherently irrational and even irresponsible, I also defend the basic rationality of religious belief, at least in its paradigm cases. Finally, I discuss the relationship between religion and freedom and respond to any additional objections from those who acknowledge the good of religion but do not see why religious freedom requires specific legal protection.PhilosophyEthicsPhilosophy of ReligionEthics, Natural Law, Philosophy of Law, Philosophy of Religion, Political Ethics, Religious FreedomPhilosophyDegree Awarded: Ph.D. Philosophy. The Catholic University of Americ
Learning Control of Closed-Kinematic Chain Mechanism Manipulators
No full textHuman beings possess the ability to learn from experience from their repeated activities. For example, professional athletes exercise repeatedly to acquire an ideal form of motion, e.g. their serves in tennis or their free kicks in soccer, etc. Researchers have wondered if robots are able to learn automatically from previous tasks and improve their performance at the next trial. To perform repeatable tasks, robot manipulators can be taught off-line by a so-called teaching and playback scheme. To improve repeatable tasks, an online learning process is based on iteration rules that generate a current actuator input which is better than the previous one under the condition that a desired output is specified. This dissertation presents a trajectory control scheme whose development is based on iterative learning theory, for a class of robot manipulators with closed-kinematic chain mechanism (CKCM). The control scheme consists of two control systems: the feedback control system and the learning control system. The feedback control system consists of a Proportional-Integral-Derivative (PID) feedback servo with a model-based feedforward compensation. The learning control system takes on the form of a PID-type learning to provide additional inputs to improve the robot performance after each trial. The stability of thePID-type learning law is established with a gain design procedure. The proposed control scheme will be developed and evaluated by computer simulation and experimentation. In particular, the developed control scheme will be applied to a simulation model of a six degree-of-freedom (DOF) CKCM manipulator and a two DOF planar CKCM manipulator whose kinematics and dynamics will be developed for computer simulation. The optimized gains of the control scheme will then be applied to the above two CKCM manipulators for experimental evaluation. Finally, comparative performance evaluation of the developed control scheme will be conducted with respect to other existing learning control schemes and its superior performance manifests its contribution to the state-of-the-art of learning control of CKCM manipulators.RoboticsEngineeringCKCM Manipulators, Iterative Learning Control, Learning control, Parallel robots, Robot ManipulatorsElectrical Engineering and Computer ScienceDegree Awarded: Ph.D. Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. The Catholic University of Americ
The Discernment of Charism(s) as the Foundation for the Mission of the Domestic Church
No full textThis project in ministry focuses on how charisms are instrumental for the mission of families in the world. The term “domestic church” will be examined by exploring the sacramental foundation of marriage and the role of the Holy Spirit in the lives of the Church and of the believer. My hypothesis is that, by discerning and utilizing individual and corporate charisms, families can live out their prescribed mission in the world. Practically, I will review the six individual sessions held for 130 married participants that led them to create family mission statements. Finally, an examination of the survey results will evaluate the participants’ increased understanding of their identity and role as a “domestic church” and will demonstrate whether the project had any practical impact on their day-to-day lives.ReligionSpiritualityCharism, Domestic Church, FamilySpiritualityDegree Awarded: D.Min. Spirituality. The Catholic University of Americ