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Definir l'asile politique en Grande-Bretagne, 1815-1870
Get PDFPar sa situation insulaire et sa tradition d’accueil d’exilés politiques en provenance de toute l’Europe, l’Angleterre s’est imposée au cours du XIXe siècle comme la terre d’asile par excellence. Cependant, cette hospitalité bien réelle du pouvoir à l’égard des dissidents français, espagnols, italiens ou polonais était davantage fondée sur un vide juridique quant à leur expulsion que sur une législation aboutie. Le traitement juridique du droit d’asile a ainsi nourri de nombreux débats au parlement britannique visant à maintenir ensemble la nécessité de l’accueil et ses nécessaires limites
Multi-level Segmentation of Gynaecological Ultrasound Images using Texture-based Trainable Models
Get PDFHough transform generated strong image hashing scheme for copy detection
Get PDFThe rapid development of image editing software has resulted in widespread unauthorized duplication of original images. This has given rise to the need to develop robust image hashing technique which can easily identify duplicate copies of the original images apart from differentiating it from different images. In this paper, we have proposed an image hashing technique based on discrete wavelet transform and Hough transform, which is robust to large number of image processing attacks including shifting and shearing. The input image is initially pre-processed to remove any kind of minor effects. Discrete wavelet transform is then applied to the pre-processed image to produce different wavelet
coefficients from which different edges are detected by using a canny edge detector. Hough transform is finally applied to the edge-detected image to generate an image hash which is used for image identification. Different experiments were conducted to show that the proposed hashing technique has better robustness and discrimination performance as compared to the state-of-the-art techniques. Normalized average mean value difference is also calculated to show the performance of the proposed technique towards various image processing attacks. The proposed copy detection scheme can perform copy detection over large databases and can be considered to be a prototype for developing online real-time copy detection system
A Conceptual Exploration of Radicalisation
Get PDFInterest in radicalism has a long history, dating back at least to the stirrings of Enlightenment Europe. Scrutiny of processes of radicalisation, however, have a much more recent history, with an upsurge in interest following the 9/11 attacks in the US in 2001. Two key drivers have shaped the renewed interest. First, bureaucratic pressures in governments charged with dealing with the problem of terrorism have led to a number of attempts to profile terrorists and shape process models that can “explain” radicalisation. Second, a growing realisation that attacks after 9/11 – especially in Europe –were committed not by foreign radicals but by “homegrown” citizens, has led to an increase in policy circles in the human factors concerning how individuals become drawn into violent movements, from a societal and sociological perspective. In terms of research and modelling, there is growing recognition of two poles in the landscape: macro-level, or top-down models focus on the ideologies and ideologues who are pulling individuals into the radical movement. Micro-level, or bottom-up models, conversely, look at the individuals becoming radicalised and their personal life-stories and experiences. More recently, research into radicalisation has settled into a new narrative that offers a synthesised perspective on macro- and micro-level factors. This more enlightened approach stresses the context-specificity of radicalisation, in that, while environmental factors causing despair and humiliation may be broad and widely present, the circumstances in which any one individual will be drawn into a violent course of action will be highly variable. This, in turn, stresses the importance of continual and repeated empirical research into individual tipping-points leading to violent radicalisation
The Psychology of Online Lurking
Get PDFLurking, or passive online participation, is often defined as non-participation or minimal participation in online groups or communities. Although lurking has previously been
considered a negative behavior in online spaces, with lurkers accessing the social capital of online communities without providing anything in return, current perspectives
consider lurking as a legitimate form of online participation. Current literature shows that lurking is a more nuanced activity than previously considered, as individuals may not only vary in their participation across different online groups but their participation may
also vary over time within an online group. This chapter examines the key personal and situational factors associated with active or passive participation, as well as the differential outcomes linked to levels of engagement in online groups generally, followed by a more detailed exploration of lurking in the context of online support groups and education
IL-33 stimulates expression of the GPR84 (EX33) fatty acid receptor gene and of cytokine and chemokine genes in human adipocytes
Get PDFExpression of GPCR fatty acid sensor/receptor genes in adipocytes is modulated by inflammatory mediators, particularly IL-1β. In this study we examined whether the IL-1 gene superfamily member, IL-33, also regulates expression of the fatty acid receptor genes in adipocytes. Human fat cells, differentiated from preadipocytes, were incubated with IL-33 at three different dose levels for 3 or 24 h and mRNA measured by qPCR. Treatment with IL-33 induced a dose-dependent increase in GPR84 mRNA at 3 h, the level with the highest dose being 13.7-fold greater than in controls. Stimulation of GPR84 expression was transitory; the mRNA level was not elevated at 24 h. In contrast to GPR84, IL-33 had no effect on GPR120 expression. IL-33 markedly stimulated expression of the IL1B, CCL2, IL6, CXCL2 and CSF3 genes, but there was no effect on ADIPOQ expression. The largest effect was on CSF3, the mRNA level of which increased 183-fold over controls at 3 h with the highest dose of IL-33; there was a parallel increase in the secretion of G-CSF protein into the medium. It is concluded
that in human adipocytes IL-33, which is synthesised in adipose tissue, has a strong stimulatory effect on the expression of cytokine and chemokine genes, particularly CSF3, and on the expression of GPR84, a pro-inflammatory fatty acid receptor
Journalism and Correspondence
Get PDFThis essay looks not at Dickens the novelist, but Dickens the reporter, the reviewer, the journalist, the editor, the inveterate letter writer and even Dickens the poet. This is by no means a newly-emergent area of interest: Dickens’s career as a journalist is well-known, and the invaluable work of the Pilgrim editors has meant that scholars have long been aware of Dickens’s depth and verve as a correspondent. The argument that we should view Dickens not just as a novelist but as a writer of extraordinary range, who delighted in expressing himself in numerous mediums, is well-established. But, I argue, recent developments in digital technologies allow for a new understanding of Dickens’s engagement with these forms.
Pioneering scholarship in the mid to late twentieth century established the continuing and significant role these other forms of writing played in Dickens’s career. A cohesive author-centred narrative of Dickens’s progression from reporter and sketch artist to mature journalist, editor and owner was established. Dickens as editor was pictured as a dominant, unyielding force, the very ‘Conductor’ he imagined himself to be. More recently, there has been a focus on the ambiguities of authorial identity implied by Dickens’s negotiation of these roles. There has been an emphasis on the collaborative nature of both earlier and later enterprises, previously subsumed under the ‘Charles Dickens’ brand. There has also been a move towards recognising the importance of issues such as nation, race, and gender to these works. A more complex, more multifarious Dickens has emerged as a result.
Digitisation builds on this and yet goes still further: revealing new information as to subject matter, style, trends in editorial policy and patterns of contribution through the comprehensive, detailed knowledge of these texts and their contexts it makes possible. This is particularly the case in relation to his later work as an editor in relation to which open-access digitisation has uncovered numerous previously unknown contributors and relationships, and editorial choices that challenge previous understandings of his character as editor. Moreover, digitisation has the ability to derail the tendency towards the canonisation of certain articles and letters and the invisibility of others, produce a more nuanced contextualisation of the texts based upon quantifiable data, and paradoxically underline the material nature of the texts as objects while allowing for new forms of analysis through the use of advanced computer-based stylistics.
Digitisation, I argue, opens up possibilities for a more intricate consideration of Dickens and his miscellaneous engagements with the periodical press, as well as a correspondent and a poet—one that destabilises the myths (often self-fashioned) and acknowledges the changeable and sometimes contradictory nature of his fulfilment of these roles. In arguing this I will consider the recent critical work by scholars such as Sabine Clemm, Nikki Hessell, James Mussell, Catherine Waters and Robert L. Patten and older work by Anne Lohrli, Ella Ann Oppenlander, Harry Stone, Michael Slater and John Drew, which established the ways of thinking about Dickens as a journalist and correspondent that led to current discussions
Efficacy of internet-delivered mindfulness for improving depression in caregivers of people with spinal cord injuries and chronic neuropathic pain; A randomized controlled feasibility trial
No full textObjectives: To explore the feasibility and efficacy of web-based mindfulness training for carers of people with spinal cord injury (SCI).
Design: Randomized controlled feasibility study with three-month follow-up.
Setting: Community setting.
Participants: Spouses/family caregivers of people with SCI and chronic neuropathic pain were recruited via the direct care team and advertisements. Participants were aged over 18 years (no upper age limit), with internet access for the duration of the study. Participants were randomly allocated to an eight-week online mindfulness training intervention (N=28), or to receive eight weeks of psychoeducational materials on SCI and chronic pain (N=27).
Interventions: An established web-based, mindfulness training course was delivered over eight weeks. Participants completed ten minute mindfulness practices, twice per day, six days per week, totaling 960 minutes. The control group received a weekly email with psychoeducational materials (based on the established elements) on SCI and pain, for eight weeks.
Main Outcome Measure: Depression severity.
Results: Mindfulness reduced depression severity more than psychoeducation at T2 (mean difference = -.891, 95% CI [-1.48, -.30]) and T3 (mean difference = -1.96, 95% CI [-2.94, -.97]). Mindfulness training also reduced anxiety at T2 (mean difference = -.888, 95% CI [-1.40, -.38]) and T3 (mean difference = -2.44, 95% CI [-3.20, -1.69]).
Conclusions: Results indicate that internet-delivered mindfulness training offers unique benefits, and is viable for caregivers of people with SCI and chronic neuropathic pain. Further work should explore the feasibility of combined education and mindfulness training incorporating both patient and caregiver, for optimum benefit
On Inherent Incoherence of Gaunilo’s Island
Get PDFVarious attempts have been made to save Gaunilo’s ‘ideal’ island by proposing different criteria for its maximal greatness or perfection. This paper addresses a recent proposal that ‘an ideal island is conceivable if it’s defined as any island exhibiting an ideal ratio of great-making island properties’ (Milo Crimi, ‘Ideally sized islands: Reply to Danielyan, Garrett and Plantinga’, Analysis 77 (2), 273-278) and shows that it fails because the idea of an island – indeed of anything that is finite, delineated and circumscribed as a necessary condition of its own conception - cannot accommodate maximal greatness or perfection; neither can a determined quantitative relation between finite relata constitute a criterion of maximal greatness or perfection