1,361 research outputs found
Cutting'aesthetic teeth' : Flannery O'Connor's habit of art
No full textDissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro de Comunicação e ExpressãoEste trabalho foi sugerido pela afirmação de Flannery O'Connor que sua "dedicação estética" nasceu através do contato com Art and Scholasticism de Jacques Maritain. O propósito foi chegar a uma interpretação do sentido da frase. Uma investigação detalhada foi feita do conteúdo de Art and Scholasticism, posteriormente contrastada com os resultados de uma pesquisa feita em seus ensaios e suas cartas, o que revelou numerosos ecos de diversos trechos constando no texto de Maritain. Três pontos principais foram escolhidos como critérios na análise do hábito artístico de O'Connor: 1) a prática de arte implica uma luta; 2) a arte somente pode ser percebida pelos sentidos; e 3) a prática de arte exige do artista a dedicação indivisa à obra nascente. O estudo conclui que, para O'Connor, o brotar da dentição estética, através da leitura de Art and Scholasticism, significou que, ao perceber na análise da natureza da arte algo com que podia concordar, ela reconheceu tanto sua própria capacidade de tornar-se uma artista literária, quanto sua vontade de assumir a tarefa de desenvolver em sua pessoa o hábito de arte
Preventing terrorism? conflict resolution and nationalist violence in the Basque Country
No full textThis study examines the debates on nationalism, terrorism and conflict resolution, and intends to identify, on the one hand, the reasons why and the instances in which nationalist discourses usurp the notions of political violence and present it as a legitimate option for opposing a State, and on the other, whether there exist circumstances where conflict resolution techniques and approaches can be useful in isolating terrorist discourses from the nationalist ones, without necessarily criminalising the latter. The study employs a critical and discourse analysis approach to explaining ethno-nationalist and terrorist phenomena, arguing that a contextualisation of the nationalist and terrorist objects of study is necessary in order to comprehensively analyse the relationship between the two, and the instances where the former gives rise to the latter. The purpose of the study is to develop a theoretical framework for the understanding of nationalism and terrorism as interconnected practices, and looks into ways in which conflict resolution can intervene and prevent the infusion of the two.
In order to test this framework, the thesis examines the Basque conflict and discusses how the discriminatory practices of the Francoist dictatorship towards the Basques played a catalytic role in their acceptance of violence as a legitimate vehicle of pursuit of the nationalist aim of independence, and how the radicalisation of counter-terrorist practices after the democratic transition further distanced the civil society from both the State and the militant group. The study analyses the role of the Basque civil society, and how it became the primary actor in the transformation of the conflict by rejecting violent practices from both the State and ETA, while at the same time promoting a more civic aspect of the Basque nationalist discourse. This attitude allows the thesis to conclude that, contrary to theories of conflict resolution, the State can combat terrorism most effectively when it allies with civil society in the alteration of perceptions that perpetuate violence, but instead favour a strictly political approach to the pursuit of political objectives, like self-determination
PRICE-FIXING OVERCHARGES: LEGAL AND ECONOMIC EVIDENCE
No full textThis paper surveys hundreds of published social-science studies of private, hard-core cartels that contain 699 observations of long-run overcharges. The primary finding is that the median cartel overcharge for all types of cartels over all time periods is 25%: 19% for domestic cartels, 32% for international cartels, and 31% for all successful cartels. Thus, international cartels have historically been about 68% more effective in raising prices than domestic cartels. Cartel overcharges are skewed to the high side, pushing the mean overcharge for all types of cartels over all time periods to 42%. "Peak" cartel overcharges are typically double those of the long-run averages. These results are generally consistent with the few, more limited, previously published works that survey cartel overcharges. There is no evidence that convicted cartels are markedly less effective than unpunished ones. The results of a second survey of final verdicts in decided U.S. horizontal collusion cases, only three of which were international cartels, show an average median overcharge of 21% and an average mean overcharge of 30%. Outside the United States, 62 decisions of competition commissions cited median average overcharges of 25% and a mean of 47%. There are three significant policy implications. First, there is a view among some antitrust writers that there is little evidence that cartels raise prices significantly for a period long enough to justify the height of current U.S. cartel penalties. This survey's results, which are based upon an extraordinarily large amount of data spanning a broad swath of history of all types of private cartels, sharply contradict these views. In fact, the data suggest that U.S. penalties ought to be increased. Mean overcharges are three times as high as the level presumed by the U.S. Sentencing Commission. Surprisingly, bid rigging was no more injurious than other forms of collusion, which suggests that the USSC should amend its Guidelines that currently treat bid rigging more harshly than other forms of collusion. Second, the principal antitrust authorities abroad often base their typical or maximum fines on a 10% harm presumption. Average fines imposed since 1995 by Canada and the EU on identical cartels have been lower than U.S. government fines, yet overcharges generated by cartels discovered outside the United States are higher than North America-centered cartels. Consequently, anticartel laws and fine-setting practices abroad are in even greater need of strengthening. Third, cartels with multi-continental price effects are the most harmful type. Despite the evident increases in cartel detection rates and the size of monetary fines and penalties in the past decade, a good case can be made that current global anticartel regimes are under-deterring. While the recent worldwide trend towards the intensification of cartel penalties has been desirable, global cartels are more difficult to detect, have less fear from entry of rivals, achieve higher levels of sales and profitability, and systematically receive weaker corporate sanctions than comparable domestic cartels. Antitrust sanctions worldwide should be higher for global cartels than for other types.International Relations/Trade,
The Web as an Adaptive Network: Coevolution of Web Behavior and Web Structure
No full textMuch is known about the complex network structure of the Web, and about behavioral dynamics on the Web. A number of studies address how behaviors on the Web are affected by different network topologies, whilst others address how the behavior of users on the Web alters network topology. These represent complementary directions of influence, but they are generally not combined within any one study. In network science, the study of the coupled interaction between topology and behavior, or state-topology coevolution, is known as 'adaptive networks', and is a rapidly developing area of research. In this paper, we review the case for considering the Web as an adaptive network and several examples of state-topology coevolution on the Web. We also review some abstract results from recent literature in adaptive networks and discuss their implications for Web Science. We conclude that adaptive networks provide a formal framework for characterizing processes acting 'on' and 'of' the Web, and offers potential for identifying general organizing principles that seem otherwise illusive in Web Scienc
COMMENTS ON THE STRUCTURAL CONVERGENCE HYPOTHESIS
No full textMarket convergence, food systems, North America, European Union, Agribusiness,
The effects of early developmental stress and exercise intervention on neurodegeneration in a rat model of Parkinson's disease
No full textIncludes bibliographical references (p. 224-253).Early developmental stress has been shown to produce numerous deleterious effects, e.g. the later development of affective disorders, and this has been related to chronic enhanced hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activity. Animal studies have shown that maternally separated rats exhibit increased anxiety- and depression-like behaviour in adulthood, although other evidence shows hyperactivity and impulsivity in such cases. Given that stress has these behavioural effects, it is of interest to determine whether early developmental stress might enhance the toxicity of a later unrelated neural insult. The 6-hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA) model of Parkinson's disease involves the selective unilateral lesion of nigrostriatal dopamine neurons. In this group of studies it was hypothesized that maternal separation might enhance the toxic effects of 6-OHDA
Geoscience education and public outreach in Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado, U.S.A.
No full textINTEGRATING PREDICTIVE HYDROGEOLOGIC AND GEOCHEMICAL ASSESSMENTS IN PIT-LAKE REGULATION AND RECLAMATION IN NEVADA
No full textOn the interaction of adaptive timescales on networks
No full textThe dynamics of real-world systems often involve multiple processes that influence system state. The timescales that these processes operate on may be separated by orders of magnitude or may coincide closely. Where timescales are not separable, the way that they relate to each other will be important for understanding system dynamics. In this paper, we present a short overview of how modellers have dealt with multiple timescales and introduce a definition to formalise conditions under which timescales are separable. We investigate timescale separation in a simple model, consisting of a network of nodes on which two processes act. The first process updates the values taken by the network’s nodes, tending to move a node’s value towards that of its neighbours. The second process influences the topology of the network, by rewiring edges such that they tend to more often lie between similar individuals. We show that the behaviour of the system when timescales are separated is very different from the case where they are mixed. When the timescales of the two processes are mixed, the ratio of the rates of the two processes determines the systems equilibrium state. We go on to explore the impact of heterogeneity in the system’s timescales, i.e., where some nodes may update their value and/or neighbourhood faster than others, demonstrating that it can have a significant impact on the equilibrium behaviour of the model
Writing and the rights of reality: usurpation and potentiality in Derrida, Plato, Nietzsche, and Beckett
No full textThe thesis critically evaluates Jacques Derrida's conferral of the rights of reality on writing, focussing on his theory of an arche-text in light of the speculative nature of this theory. The theory is initially considered in the context of Derrida's elucidation of the usurpatory status of writing within the Platonic and Nietzschean texts. This consideration reveals an admission of writing's usurpatory status by both writers while at the same time demonstrating their awareness of the intrinsically speculative nature of this view, the significance of writing lying in its ability to exteriorise the radically indeterminate status of consciousness m relation to reality rather than its ability to displace consciousness or reality The analyses, therefore, not only bring the Derridean hypothesis of a repressive or phonocentric metaphysical episteme into question but also exhibit the historical and philosophical role of potentiality in relation to writing, writing's ultimate significance lying in its capacity to exteriorise our existence as a mode of potentiality. Accordingly, in the second half of the thesis the Derridean theory of writing is countered with a specifically Aristotelian theory of the text as it is exhibited in the prose of Samuel Beckett, an author whose significance lies in his close alignment with Derridean theory within contemporary criticism. It is demonstrated that this identification has obviated an awareness of the significance of potentiality within the Beckettian text, his work consequently being appraised in the previously neglected context of Aristotelian metaphysics
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