1,720,996 research outputs found
Ambiguities in human and elephant interactions? Stories of bones, sand and water from Castel di Guido (Italy)
No full textGeoarchaeological and taphonomical studies have been carried out on the sequence and on the faunal remains of Castel di Guido (Central Italy), a Middle Pleistocene site with Acheulean industry and faunas including Elephas (Palaeoloxodon) antiquus, Bos primigenius, Equus ferus and other taxa. Investigation focused on remains accumulated on the bottom of a depressed area, probably an ephemeral stream channel sometimes acting as a seep. The assemblage resulted prevalently from human activity, as shown by the selection of the faunas, by the thorough fracturing of the bones, and by the occurrence of abundant chipped stone industry and bone bifaces. It is still a matter of debate whether the animals were hunted or scavenged.
The present-day distribution of the remains does not represent exactly their original configuration, as in most sites of this type and age. More likely, the objects are partly in their original position and partly reworked, and lie within a complex palimpsest of several phases of fluvial transport and human activity, with the addition of external inputs of reworked bones and artefacts
Machine learning methods for generating high dimensional discrete datasets
Full text linkThe development of platforms and techniques for emerging Big Data and Machine Learning applications requires the availability of real-life datasets. A possible solution is to synthesize datasets that reflect patterns of real ones using a two-step approach: first, a real dataset X is analyzed to derive relevant patterns Z and, then, to use such patterns for reconstructing a new dataset X ' that preserves the main characteristics of X. This survey explores two possible approaches: (1) Constraint-based generation and (2) probabilistic generative modeling. The former is devised using inverse mining (IFM) techniques, and consists of generating a dataset satisfying given support constraints on the itemsets of an input set, that are typically the frequent ones. By contrast, for the latter approach, recent developments in probabilistic generative modeling (PGM) are explored that model the generation as a sampling process from a parametric distribution, typically encoded as neural network. The two approaches are compared by providing an overview of their instantiations for the case of discrete data and discussing their pros and cons. This article is categorized under: Fundamental Concepts of Data and Knowledge > Big Data Mining Technologies > Machine Learning Algorithmic Development > Structure Discover
Smart Data Exchange
No full textThe problem of exchanging data, even considering incomplete and heterogeneous data, has been deeply investigated in the last years. The approaches proposed so far are quite rigid as they refer to fixed schema and/or are based on a deductive approach consisting in the use of a fixed set of (mapping) rules. In this paper we describe a smart data exchange framework integrating deductive and inductive techniques to obtain new knowledge. The use of graph-based representation of source and target data, together with the midway relational database and the extraction of new knowledge allow us to manage dynamic databases where also features of data may change over the time
Are there marrow cavities in Pleistocene elephant limb bones, and was marrow available to early humans? New CT scan results from the site of Castel di Guido (Italy)
Full text linkCT-scan analyses were carried out on limb bones of straight-tusked elephants (Palaeoloxodon antiquus)from the Middle Pleistocene site of Castel di Guido (Italy), where bifaces made of elephant bone were found in association with lithics and a large number of intentionally modified bone remains of elephants and other taxa. CT-scans show that marrow cavities are present within the limb bones of this taxon. Though rather small compared to the size of the bones, these cavities suggest that bone raw material procurement may not have been the unique goal of intentional elephant bone fracturing, and the marrow may also have been extracted for consumption
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
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