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The Fascism of Donald Trump
No full textAuthoritarianism, mass arrests, political violence – Donald Trump’s regime fits the historical pattern of fascism, writes Ben Worthy
Risk of psychosis among patients with Dementia: the roles of loneliness, life satisfaction, autonomy, physical health and eyesight loss
Get PDFPrevious studies found that 34-63% of patients with dementia suffer from psychotic symptoms, and previous theories suggest that patients with dementia are cognitively vulnerable and thus more at risk of psychosis, but few studies have explored potential psychosocial and health explanations for the dementia-psychosis link. This study aimed to investigate whether risk factors such as loneliness, low autonomy/control, poor physical health, anxiety, eyesight/hearing loss, and experiences of discrimination act as mediators or moderators of the dementia-psychosis link. This was an analysis of the data of 7,575 adults aged 50 years old or over who took part in the 2021-2023 wave of the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) of whom 86 had dementia. Data were collected in computer-assisted interviews in participants’ households. A moderated-mediated Generalized Linear Model showed that dementia did not predict the odds of psychosis. Dementia was associated with psychosis through loneliness, poor autonomy/control, poor life satisfaction, poor physical health and eyesight loss as mediating variables. Discrimination did not moderate the association between dementia and psychosis. The results support the Lancet Commission’s recommendations about holistic approaches to dementia care. The results suggest that psychiatrists involved in dementia care should consider “social prescribing” of interventions that reduce patients’ loneliness, increasing autonomy/control and life satisfaction through organized activities, employment or volunteering. Psychiatrists are encouraged to consider a range of problems (e.g., in vision/hearing) that may make patients feel more cognitively vulnerable and, thus, more at risk of psychosis
Explainable Machine Learning to predict the cost of capital
Get PDFThis study investigates through explainable AI the impact of financial and non-financial factors on a firm's ex-ante cost of capital, which is the
reflection of investors' perception of a firm's riskiness. We apply the XGBoost algorithm and the Shapley value approach to a sample of more
than 1,400 listed companies worldwide. Results indicate the most relevant financial and non-financial indicators are: firm size, ROE, firm
portfolio risk, and regulatory quality. These factors influence firm's ex-ante cost of equity by changing its investors' risk perception. We also
suggest the relevance of ESG factors in predicting the cost of capital
Council of Europe expulsion and the European Convention on Human Rights: the foundations of involuntary treaty withdrawal
Get PDFArticle 58 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) contains a provision which allows for the involuntary withdrawal, or expulsion, of a State from the ECHR if it has been expelled from, or ceased to be a member of, the Council of Europe (CoE). By comparing Russia's exit from the ECHR in 2022 with that of Greece in 1969, this article demonstrates that involuntary withdrawal poses a number of legal problems—partly as a result of it not having been considered during the drafting of the ECHR or the Statute of the CoE, and partly because of the highly unclear basis on which involuntary withdrawal operates. The article then conducts a comparative analysis of other regional human rights systems and public international law principles on treaty withdrawal in order to suggest a more comprehensive legal foundation for expulsion
How to collaborate on eco education – and how not to
No full textWhen embedding sustainability education into the curriculum, the barriers to collaboration can lead to staff working in different ways – some more effective than others. Here’s how to find the space to collaborate in
How does Ramsar work? The case of Ndumo Game Reserve
Get PDFThe Convention on Wetlands is the intergovernmental treaty that provides the framework for the conservation and wise use of wetlands and their resources (Ramsar 2024). I use the example of Ndumo Game Reserve, a Ramsar Wetland of International Importance in northern KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, to question the effectiveness of the Convention and appeal for clarity on its implementation. As Ndumo meets all the criteria for intervention as an endangered Ramsar site, why has Ramsar SA refused assistance or advice from Ramsar? What to do when signatories of the Convention refuse to allow assessments, or accept advice or funding, for their threatened Ramsar wetlands
Bilingualism
No full textBook synopsis: All about bilingualism, in science and in life: the benefits and controversies, the individual experience, and the social significance.
Nearly half the world's people are bilingual, but many have no clear understanding of what—aside from being fluent in more than one language—bilingualism means. This lively introduction by linguist Penelope Gardner-Chloros covers everything a bilingual (or curious monolingual) individual might want to know. The book discusses how bilingualism affects brain development and performance in the young and old, its social and political significance throughout time and around the globe, and how people experience and describe it.
Gardner-Chloros looks at how both children and adults, become bilingual, how this affects learning, and what it means to be a bilingual family or family member. Drawing on the latest research, she offers a comprehensive but accessible account of the cognitive effects of bilingualism, and how the bilingual brain differs from the monolingual one. With the help of real examples, she outlines the impact of bilingualism on everyday speech and writing, from formal literature to social media, and lets speakers of various languages and backgrounds describe, in their own words, their experience of bilingualism and its impact on their lives. Informative, engaging, and wide-ranging, Bilingualism is the indispensable resource on a common but little understood phenomenon of far-reaching personal, social, political, and historical significance
Neural associations between inhibitory control and counterintuitive reasoning in science and maths in primary school children
Get PDFEmerging evidence suggests that inhibitory control (IC) plays a pivotal role in science and maths counterintuitive reasoning by suppressing incorrect intuitive concepts, allowing correct counterintuitive concepts to come to mind. Neuroimaging studies have shown greater activation in the ventrolateral and dorsolateral prefrontal cortices when adults and adolescents reason about counterintuitive concepts, which has been interpreted as reflecting IC recruitment. However, the extent to which neural systems underlying IC support science and maths reasoning remains unexplored in children. This developmental stage is of particular importance, as many crucial counterintuitive concepts are learned in formal education in middle childhood. To address this gap, functional magnetic resonance imaging data were collected while 56 7–10 year-olds completed counterintuitive science and maths problems, plus IC tasks of interference control (Animal Size Stroop) and response inhibition (Go/No-go). Univariate analysis showed large regional overlap in activation between counterintuitive reasoning and interference control, with more limited activation observed in the response inhibition task. Multivariate similarity analysis, which explores fine scale patterns of activation across voxels, revealed neural activation similarities between (i) science and maths counterintuitive reasoning and interference control tasks in frontal, parietal and temporal regions, and (ii) maths reasoning and response inhibition tasks in the precuneus/superior parietal lobule. Extending previous research in adults and adolescents, this evidence is consistent with the proposal that IC, specifically interference control, supports children’s science and maths counterintuitive reasoning, although further research will be needed to demonstrate the similarities observed do not reflect more general multi-demand processes
Credit market tightness and zombie firms: theory and evidence
Get PDFWe develop a simple model of financial intermediation with search and matching frictions between banks and firms. The model links credit market tightness {encapsulating the abundance of credit{ to the search and opportunity costs of credit intermediation. Search costs generate lending to unprofitable firms (i.e., zombies) and the opportunity costs of searching exert countervailing forces on the incentives for banks and firms to participate in zombie lending, generating an inverted U-shaped relationship between credit market tightness and the share of zombie lending. High bargaining power of firms decreases the opportunity cost of firms foregoing credit relationships, reduces the share of zombie firms and increases the efficacy of capital injections to reduce zombie lending. Using data for 31 industries in Japan over the period 2000-2019, we test and corroborate our theoretical predictions by constructing theory-consistent measures of credit market tightness and bargaining power. Consistent with our theory, the findings reveal that capital injections are more effective in industries with higher credit market tightness and greater bargaining power of firms
Efficient ontology-mediated query answering: extending DL-lite_R and Linear ELH
Get PDFThe OWL 2 QL profile of the OWL 2 Web Ontology Language, based on the family of description logics called DL-Lite, is designed so that data stored in a standard relational database system (RDBMS) can be queried through an ontology via a rewriting mechanism, i.e., by rewriting the query into an SQL query that is then answered by the RDBMS system, without any changes to the data. In this paper we propose a language whose expressive power goes beyond that of DL-Lite while still allowing query answering via rewriting of queries into unions of conjunctive two-way regular path queries (UC2RPQs) instead of SQL queries. Our language is an extension of both OWL 2 QL and linear ELH: OWL 2 QL is extended by allowing qualified existential quantification on the left-hand side of concept inclusion axioms, and linear ELH by allowing inverses in role inclusion axioms. We identify a syntactic property of the extended language that guarantees UC2RPQ-rewritability. We propose a novel rewriting technique for conjunctive queries (CQs) under our ontology language that makes use of nondeterministic finite state automata. We show that CQ answering in our setting is NLOGSPACE-complete with respect to data complexity and NP-complete for combined complexity; we also show that answering instance queries is NLOGSPACE-complete for data complexity and in PTIME for combined complexity
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