Definitions Of Basic Concepts Research Articles

Ambient multimodality: towards advancing computer accessibility and assisted living

The aim of this paper is to point out the benefits that can be derived from research advances while implementing concepts such as ambient intelligence and ubiquitous/pervasive computing for promoting universal access in the information society, that is, for contributing to enable everybody, especially people with physical disabilities, to have easy access to all computing resources and information services that the upcoming worldwide information society will soon make available to the general public as well as to expert users. Following definitions of basic concepts relating to multimodal interaction, the significant contribution of multimodality to developing universal access is briefly discussed. Then, a short state of the art in ambient intelligence research is presented, including references to some major research projects either in progress or recently completed. The last section is devoted to bringing out the potential contribution of advances in ambient intelligence research and technology to the improvement of computer access for physically disabled people, hence, to the implementation of universal access. This claim is mainly supported by the following observations: (1) most projects are aiming at implementing ambient intelligence focus research efforts on the design of new interaction modalities and flexible/adaptive multimodal user interfaces; outcomes of these projects may contribute to improving computer access for users with physical disabilities; (2) such projects target applications meant to support users in a wide range of daily activities which will have to be performed simultaneously with the related supporting computing tasks; therefore, users will be placed in situational contexts where they will be confronted with similar difficulties to those encountered by physically disabled users, since they will have to share out their perceptual and motor capabilities between one or several daily activities and the computing tasks meant to support them; (3) ambient intelligence applications being intended for the general public, a wide range of interaction devices supporting a great variety of input and output modalities will be available, making it possible to provide physically disabled users with appropriate human–computer interaction means tailored to their individual needs at a reasonable expense.

Panbiogeografía, componentes bióticos y zonas de transición

Recognition of biotic components is a key element for understanding evolution in space-time. Panbiogeography represents a biogeographic approach that may be applied to identify these biotic components. A revision of the panbiogeographic approach is provided herein, including definitions of basic concepts (individual and generalized tracks, nodes, baselines, and main massings) and methods (manual, connectivity and incidence matrices, track compatibility, and parsimony analysis of endemicity). As an example of this approach, 70 biotic components of Latin America and the Caribbean are identified, briefly characterized, and arranged in a biogeographic system of three regions, seven subregions, and two transition zones. The relevance of the recognition of biotic components and transition zones is discussed.

Generating test cases from class vectors

Specifications are the primary source for obtaining test cases in software testing. Specification based testing is becoming more and more important when black box components and COTS are widely used in software development. An important issue in system testing is to identify all the legitimate input. One of these systematic approaches is deriving test cases from classification tree. This approach partitions the input domain into classifications which are further partitioned into classes. Test cases are combinations of classes. Relations between classification and classes are identified and are used to construct the classification tree. From the classification tree, combination table is constructed. Test cases are derived from the combination table. However, human decisions are required in determining whether test cases derived from the combination table are legitimate. This problem is incurred by the limitation of the expressive power of classification trees which cannot express the relations among classes precisely. We propose an enhancement by expressing the relations among classes and the relations among classifications directly in vectors. We call this new approach Class Vectors. This paper presents the class vector approach with formal definitions of basic concepts and entities. We find that the expressive power of class vectors is higher than classification trees, that is, this approach can express the information given in the specification in a better way and derive all legitimate test cases with minimal human decisions. Furthermore, a method of generating legitimate test cases using class vectors is described. This method is derived from the formal semantics of class vector, hence it is theoretical sound. Finally, we discussed that the proposed method requires the least amount of human decisions, can be highly automatic and has good usability.

On the triad disease, illness and sickness.

The point of departure for this article is a review of the discussion between Twaddle and Nordenfelt on the concepts of disease, illness, and sickness, and the objective is to investigate the fruitfulness of these concepts. It is argued that disease, illness, and sickness represent different perspectives on human ailment and that they can be applied to analyze both epistemic and normative challenges to modern medicine. In particular the analysis reveals epistemic and normative differences between the concepts. Furthermore, the article demonstrates, against Nordenfelt's claim, that the concepts of disease, illness, and sickness can exist without a general theory of health. Additionally, the complexity of different perspectives on human ailment also explains why it is so difficult to give strict definitions of basic concepts within modern health care.

The Dictionary of anthropology

An authoritative reference work, the Macmillan Dictionary of Anthropology covers the entire range of scholarship in this field, from the early ethnographers to the most recent research. This concise guide provides succinct definitions of basic concepts, summarizes key issues and the development of the major theoretical schools, and discusses the contribution of some 250 British, American and European anthropologists. Its clear and lively style enables the reader to approach such formidable topics as the works of Levi-Strauss or the influence of semiology, and all 2000 entries are fully cross-referenced and include bibliographical details. The Dictionary is an introduction for the general reader, a handbook for students of anthropology and many related disciplines, and a reference tool for academic anthropologists. It covers both physical and cultural and social anthropology, takes account of literature in all languages, and, with its wide range and high level of scholarship, is a significant contribution to the understanding of its subject.

Transference in child analysis

The concept of transference is central to the theory and practice of psychanalysis. In child analysis, you face specific difficulties when handling it. Child analysis has from the 1920s onwards been dominated by two names: Anna Freud and Melanie Klein. A major controversy between these two arose over precisely the question of transference. In this article, their different views come to expression in a fictive dialogue on vignettes from an analysis with a 4-year old girl. I will show that the disagreement between Anna Freud and Melanie Klein is at least partly due to the fact that they did not always clarify their definitions of basic concepts, and further, that they did not discover that their definitions sometimes differed. We can also guess that the differences between their respective positions were exaggerated for polemical reasons. If you probe at depth, it turns out that both Klein's and Anna Freud's views of transference are more complex than we might expect at first. Their different views mirror different ways of describing development, the inner world, the structure and formation of the personality.

Quantum spaces: notes and comments on a lecture by S. L. Woronowicz

Introduction. The concept of quantum spaces has been under study for some time now, and recently it has been attracting a growing amount of attention. This is in part due to the interest in quantum groups, which are considered a very promising concept by many, both physicists and mathematicians. It seems that quantum groups appear quite naturally in low-dimensional quantum field theory and statistical mechanics, they have also found important applications in the theory of knots. Other potential hoped-for applications include a possible role of quantum spaces in a future quantized theory of gravity. The theory of quantum spaces, and quantum groups in particular, is at present in a phase of rapid growth. One of the consequences of this is that the language used in the field still remains somewhat ambiguous, even concerning the definition of basic concepts. Here, the category of locally compact quantum spaces will be

Binary quantum logic and generating semigroups

A refined definition of basic concepts for logic describing physical systems is proposed. Within the suggested formalism of generating semigroups the active logic of questions and passive logic of answers are introduced. The objects for which both logics are isomorphic are called self-adequate. It is shown that the assumption of self-adequacy implies that the object is either quantum or classical. The possibility of application of the theory to non-self-adequate objects is discussed.

Near-rings with chain conditions on right annihilators

Throughout this note, N will denote a (Left) near-ring with two-sided zero. Definitions of basic concepts can be found in (9).We prove first that a right ideal I in a d.g. near-ring has a right identity if and only if x ∈ xI for each x ∈I. This enables us to study the structure of regular d.g. near-rings with chain conditions on right annihilators. Specifically we will prove that a regular d.g. near-ring with both the maximum and the minimum conditions on right annihilators is a finite direct sum of near-rings which are either rings of matrices over division rings or non-rings of the form MG(Γ) for a suitable type 2 N-module Γ. Finally we consider the case of maximum condition on N-subgroups.

Recent advances in the psychology of the self: An outline of basic concepts

ECENT R ADVANCES in the psychoanalytic understanding of narcissism have created a great interest in the discussion of the theoretical and clinical issues related to the narcissistic line of development. The following is offered, more or less briefly, as a survey of the essence of Heinz Kohut’s5-s recent contributions to an evolving psychology of the self. In addition, some references will be made to extraclinical applications, especially in the area of historical studies. In a young and rapidly growing science as psychoanalysis, it is always difficult to discuss the state of theoretical knowledge at any one time, to take a crosssectional point of view. There are two main reasons for this. Firstly, the focus of scientific interest is unevenly distributed and shifts during successive developmental phases to different aspects of the theoretical structure. In psychoanalysis, for example, initial investigations were drawn to the newly discovered unconscious forces and one can speak of a period of id analysis. With the growing appreciation of defensive and adaptive mechanisms, the primary concern of psychoanalytic investigators became what is known as ego psychology. One could mention other foci of interest to illustrate the uneven, stop-and-go development of different strands in the theoretical web that makes a unified integration difficult at a particular point in time. The second difficulty in the way of conceptualizing a neat and nicely harmonious theory is another characteristic common to all young and growing sciences, namely the lack of precise definitions of basic concepts. Here I am referring to the need to keep the definitions of working concepts sufficiently imprecise so that the resulting theoretical structure remains flexible and open to further speculative elaboration, testing by experiment and elaborating development. Psychoanalytic educators have long recognized, therefore, the difficulty of teaching psychoanalytic theory in a cross-sectional view. Instead, the student of psychoanalysis has !o acquire his theoretical understanding by tracing the various strands of theory through their development, that is in a longitudinal view. The initial epoch-making discoveries of Sigmund Freud during the decade before the turn of the century were the unique achievements of a self-analysis by a genius who was able to integrate insights into himself with the observations he had made on hysterical patients. Freud’s choice of hysteria as the neurosis par excellence was influenced by teachers like Charcot and Breuer, by the fin-de-siicle

Theoretical Geography: Some Speculations

The argument of the paper is presented in three parts. First, some preliminary semantic issues are dealt with. These include definitions of basic concepts, and discussions of systems of interest to geographers, the role of associated disciplines and the theoretical development of a discipline. Secondly, a historical review is presented of the development of theoretical geography. Thirdly, there are some speculations on the future of theoretical geography, with particular reference to research and teaching. THE theoretical development of a discipline is an important component of the development of the discipline as a whole, even though it often actively involves only a few of the practitioners. I believe this to be true of geography and hence that the subject of theoretical geography is worth discussion. I also strongly suspect that the time is particularly ripe for such a discussion. Geography has had its so-called quantitative revolution and I believe that there is often a confusion between 'quantitative' and 'theoretical'. I should like to try to resolve the confusion and to indicate that theoretical development is much more important than quantification. Also, I suspect there is a mystique associated with the theoretical branch of any discipline, and perhaps especially associated with theoretical geography, and I should like to try to dispel this mystique. I believe that my argument leads to several important conclusions about research and teaching in geography at all levels, and I shall try to summarize these at the end of my lecture. The argument is divided into three parts. First, I shall tackle some preliminary issues of semantics. Secondly, I shall review briefly the historical development of theoretical geography, using examples from urban geography and from geomorphology as illustrations. Thirdly, I shall speculate about the future of theoretical geography. PRELIMINARIES: CONCEPTS, DISCIPLINES AND THEORETICAL DEVELOPMENT

Basic concepts for maximum allowable concentrations of toxic substances

Exact definition of basic concepts and terms is of paramount importance to the question of maximal allowable concentrations of toxic substances in industrial atmospheres. The differences existing in various countries are often due to differences in the interpretation of basic concepts. Mutual agreement on the question of basic concepts will facilitate a rapprochement of points of view, and, perhaps, even an agreement on specific problems and individual standards. The term maximal allowable concentration, (M.A.C.), should be used to denote such concentrations of various harmful chemical substances in the form of gases, vapours and dusts in industrial atmospheres, which, by their constant effect on workers during normal daily work over an indefinite period of time, can produce no pathological change or disease detectable by current methods of examination. M.A.C.'s, therefore, can produce neither acute, nor chronic occupational poisoning. The establishment of M.A.C.'s of toxic substances and the design of preventive measures against occupational poisoning under actual conditions must have regard to the possibility of penetration of toxic substances not only through the respiratory tract, but also through the skin and through the digestive organs. However, the respiratory tract is most important. Therefore the main preventive measure against occupational disease will be the avoidance of contamination of atmospheres with toxic substances, and the effort to preserve the highest possible cleanness of air in industrial plants is fully justified. The establishment ofM.A.C.'s as a fundamental element in legal provisions concerning occupational hygiene (which provisions are obligatory for all industrial institutions) pursues the humane aim of complete protection of the health of labourers working for many years in industrial plants. The establishment ofM.A.C.'s is intended for: (a) organizations and persons designing technological processes and production facilities, in order that these facilities may secure minimal escape of toxic substances into factory atmospheres; (b) calculating air exchange when designing ventilating systems for plants where toxic gases and vapours arise; (c) the medical inspection of the condition of the atmosphere in workrooms. In our opinion, the M.A.C.'s of toxic substances should not serve only for the narrow purpose of medical inspection of factory atmospheres, but should also become a primary governing factor in the design of technological