View Of Future Research Articles

The Brexitologic of Competitiveness

Abstract Adam Smith finalised his magnum opus An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations between 1773 (Boston Tea Party) and 1776 (Declaration of Independence), and in its final paragraph Britain should “endeavour to accommodate her future views and designs to the real mediocrity of her circumstances”. The Wealth of Nations was “aimed to influence British MPs [Members of Parliament] to support a peaceful resolution to the American colonies’ War of Independence”, A. Smith “urged legislators to awaken from the “golden dream” of empire and avoid “a long, expensive and ruinous war”“, and “rejection of the protectionist Corn Laws in favour of opening up to the world economy marked the start of an era of globalization which contributed to Britain’s prosperity”, as Yueh (2019, p. 16f) puts it. Over the years, industrialization brought about by the Industrial Revolution has been challenged by deindustrialization, globalization by deglobalization. So with the “Brexit issue” at stake, what has been the “Brexitologic of Competitiveness”? In an earlier relevant series of analyses published by Čiderová et al. between 2012-2014 our focus was on the Global Competitiveness Index (alias the GCI by the World Economic Forum) in a spectrum of territorial and temporal perspectives related to the European Union. Now, in this follow-up comparative study zooming out to globalization and zooming in to competitiveness, our focus is streamlined to the “openended Brexit issue” on the background of updates of the GCI (alias GCI 4.0) and the KOF Globalisation Index (the latter by ETH Zürich).

Ecology of language and politics: linguoaxiological notes

The article analyzes the Russian State Duma deputies’ propaganda materials published before the by-elections in the August issues of “Oblastnaya Gazeta” (Yekaterinburg, 2019). The methodological base of the research is A.P.Skovorodnikov’s notion of linguo-ecology, its object are propaganda texts-appeals. The procedure of linguistic and axiological measurement makes it possible to implement the task of diagnosing the ecological state of the political language. Within the analysis, there are systematized external and internal factors that have a negative impact on the ecological state of the political language and prevent forming our national idea. It is found out that the complex reanimation of totalitarian language ideologemes belonging to the Soviet era is connected not only with the loss of the mobilization function of the Leninist formula “peopleness–party-mindedness-idea-allegiance” (“narodnost’ – patrijnost’ – idejnost’”), but also with a change in the axiological marking of lexemes “party”, “party affiliation”, “ideological ideology”. The ecological consequences of lacking a nation-wide view of Russian political future are characterized. Considering the campaign strategy immersed in today’s axiological reality, integrating basic values and axiological constants are found out. The conclusions are formulated about the importance of creating a linguistically verified typology of axiologically marked verbal signs of the national cultural code, as well as about the need to update the precedent base of the political language.

A FREEZE IN TIME: PERCEPTION AND EXPERIENCE OF AMERICAN AND HONG KONG CHINESE OLDER ADULTS

According to self-continuity model, older adults are less likely to distinguish between the present and future, relative to younger adults. This mixed method design study aims at examining whether older adults perceive future as an infinite extension of present (i.e. “time freeze”) and investigating whether it is associated with life satisfaction, perceived control and perceived changes in future. 30 older adults from the US (aged 60-85, M = 78.4) and Hong Kong (aged 60-85, M =71.4) completed a structured interview and a survey. Findings revealed that 43% of Americans and 83% of Hong Kongers were experiencing ‘time freeze’. Individuals with a lower level of time freeze held more vivid and positive images of the future, and were achieving life goals actively, whereas individuals with a higher level of time freeze had comparatively more vague and neutral future views, and focused more on maintaining the current lifestyle.

A review of data science in business and industry and a future view

AbstractThe aim of this paper is to frame Data Science, a fashion and emerging topic nowadays in the context of business and industry. We open with a discussion about the origin of Data Science and its requirement for a challenging mix of capability in data analytics, information technology, and business know‐how. The mission of Data Science is to provide new or revised computational theory able to extract useful information from the massive volumes of data collected at an accelerating pace. In fact, besides the traditional measurements, digital data obtained from images, text, audio, sensors, etc complement the survey. Then, we review the different and most popular methodologies among the practitioners of Data Science research and applications. In addition, because the emerging field requires personnel with new competences, we attempt to describe the Data Scientist profile, one of the sexiest jobs of the 21st Century according to Davenport and Patil. Most people are aware of the need to embrace Data Science, but they feel intimidated that they do not understand it and they worry that their jobs will disappear. We want to encourage them: Data Science is more likely to add value to jobs and enrich the lives of working people by helping them make better, more informed business decisions. We conclude this paper by presenting examples of Data Science in action in business and industry, to demonstrate the collection of specialist skills that must come together for this new science to be effective.

The Role of War Game in Educating and Training the Commanders

The war game is considered to be the most effective means of military training due to the fact that it simulates the reality since it provides a semi-real picture of the weapons and equipment used in the training. Consequently, it provides the trainee with the appropriate environment to freely deal with such weapons as well as military equipment which in turn help the trainee become acquainted with all aspects of use and significantly instill confidence in him when such equipment are actually needed in war. More importantly, war game provides environment similar to what is going on in the actual battlefields allowing the commanders to exercise the training as if they were in a real war. Based on this perspective, the war game has emerged as an advanced training means which provides an analogy of the battle atmosphere to a great extent and gives commanders the opportunity to make decisions. It also helps in providing the commanders with a future view which enables them to plan their future and to deal with any challenges they might encounter. In fact, the role of war play is not only limited to training, but also extends to the aspects of military education, preparation, and development. The notion of war game is not only a means for the commander to have knowledge about the war before it occurs so as to be able to realize whether the decisions taken are right or wrong, but also it has become an effective means on which the armies depend when they train and polish the commanders' capabilities as well as skills. In fact, the concept of war play is not exclusive to the military field but also it is employed by all agencies and departments that require a future vision in training or planning. This paper sheds some light on the notion of war game and its role in training and educating the commanders and staff.

The Fatalistic Decision Maker: Time Perspective, Working Memory, and Older Adults' Decision-Making Competence.

Prior research indicates that time perspective (TP; views of past, present, and future) is related to decision-making style. By contrast, no prior study considered relations between TP and decision-making competence. We therefore investigated associations between dimensions of the Swedish Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory (S-ZTPI) and performance on the Adult Decision-Making Competence (A-DMC) battery in a sample of older adults (60–90 years, N = 346). A structural equation model involving four A-DMC components as indicators of a general DMC factor and the six TP dimensions as the predictors revealed a significant negative association between the Present Fatalistic dimension and DMC. Given that age-related differences were apparent in DMC and that Present Fatalistic orientation increased with age, we tested a model by which the age-related differences in DMC were mediated by age-related differences in Present Fatalistic attitudes and in working memory. The results were consistent with full mediation of the age effects, with Present Fatalistic and working memory jointly accounting for a substantial amount of the variance in DMC (51%). The finding that DMC among older adults, in particular more cognitively demanding aspects such as applying decision rules, can be undermined by increased present fatalistic attitudes and declines in working memory is discussed in terms of theoretical frameworks highlighting the contribution of both motivational and cognitive factors to effective decision making.

Terror in Christchurch: Here comes the ‘Peace Train’

On 15 March 2019, a white supremacist gunman shot dead 50 Muslim worshippers at two mosques in Christchurch, Aotearoa, New Zealand. His actions changed forever the safe haven known as ‘God’s Own’. New Zealanders were shocked that such an event had happened here. Many Kiwis believed the nation to be safe, given its geographic isolation from the terrorist targets of Europe and the United States of America. However, the atrocity has exposed an unhealthy underbelly that has long permeated New Zealand’s socio-culture. Racism and discrimination have forefronted ensuing conversations. This article explores the nation’s history of discrimination preceding the terrorist attack. In doing so, we expose something subtly denied: that New Zealand is not the egalitarian land of milk and honey that many Kiwis believed it to be. We suggest that the terrorist attack not only highlighted the nation’s discrimination but also provided its liminal moment. Part of that liminality was Cat/Yusuf Steven’s performance, in Christchurch, of ‘Peace Train’. We compound our exploration of Aotearoa New Zealand’s history of discrimination by asking how the lyrics of ‘Peace Train’ provide a way to view our past and provide an opportunity to perceive a way forward for the nation, given the tragedy of terrorism. We suggest that ‘Peace Train’ is a metaphorical illumination of the nation’s liminality, and that it provided a road map of unity that helped to guide many Kiwis in understanding and coming to terms with not only what had happened but also a future view of how Kiwis might see themselves.

AI-powered banana diseases and pest detection

BackgroundBanana (Musa spp.) is the most popular marketable fruit crop grown all over the world, and a dominant staple food in many developing countries. Worldwide, banana production is affected by numerous diseases and pests. Novel and rapid methods for the timely detection of pests and diseases will allow to surveil and develop control measures with greater efficiency. As deep convolutional neural networks (DCNN) and transfer learning has been successfully applied in various fields, it has freshly moved in the domain of just-in-time crop disease detection. The aim of this research is to develop an AI-based banana disease and pest detection system using a DCNN to support banana farmers.ResultsLarge datasets of expert pre-screened banana disease and pest symptom/damage images were collected from various hotspots in Africa and Southern India. To build a detection model, we retrained three different convolutional neural network (CNN) architectures using a transfer learning approach. A total of six different models were developed from 18 different classes (disease by plant parts) using images collected from different parts of the banana plant. Our studies revealed ResNet50 and InceptionV2 based models performed better compared to MobileNetV1. These architectures represent the state-of-the-art results of banana diseases and pest detection with an accuracy of more than 90% in most of the models tested. These experimental results were comparable with other state-of-the-art models found in the literature. With a future view to run these detection capabilities on a mobile device, we evaluated the performance of SSD (single shot detector) MobileNetV1. Performance and validation metrics were also computed to measure the accuracy of different models in automated disease detection methods.ConclusionOur results showed that the DCNN was a robust and easily deployable strategy for digital banana disease and pest detection. Using a pre-trained disease recognition model, we were able to perform deep transfer learning (DTL) to produce a network that can make accurate predictions. This significant high success rate makes the model a useful early disease and pest detection tool, and this research could be further extended to develop a fully automated mobile app to help millions of banana farmers in developing countries.

Art: a conversation partner in theological education

ABSTRACTThis article explores the role of art as a source for theological reflection. Art extends an invitation for viewers to discover connections between their experiences and their frameworks for interpreting reality and meaning. This examination draws on Tim Gorringe’s argument that art offers a secular parable with a three-fold function: (i) leaning into an eschatological view of an alternative future; (ii) inviting a vision of shalom that contributes to a greater good; and (iii) inviting viewers to attend to what is, and, therefore, to see more deeply. This engagement with art stimulates theological conversation toward insight as viewers ponder their responses and integrate their experiences with their meaning-making frameworks. In this way, art provides a significant resource for ministry and an invaluable source for reflection within the theological endeavour.

Literature Review on All-Optical Photonic Crystal Encoders and Some Novel Trends

The all-optical encoder (AOE) based on photonic crystals (Ph.Cs.) is one of the most important devices in computing systems. The essential related parameters are the delay time, the switching speed and the contrast ratio (CR). Moreover, the design simplicity, the compact size and the multi-wavelength operation have come as a fabrication and functional relevant attributes. Throughout the upcoming lines, an introduction for the important assessment factors and definitions will be presented. Finite difference time domain (FDTD) and plane wave expansion (PWE) methods were used for analyzing all structures. An intensive overview of the photonic crystals (AOE) was achieved for the recently published (4x2) and (8x3) types. The corresponding functional parameters for each design were explored, and comparison tables were organized. Finally, numerical methods were discussed with the accompanying commercial software packages; then a future view for the higher-performance operation was attained.

Quantification of otolith functions and gravitational recognition using 3-dimensional eye movement analysis and a description of Listing's plane

Chronic vertiginous conditions worsen the subjects' QOL over the long term. The problem has been brought into acute focus with the recent rapid aging of the society. To quantify this chronic vertiginous status, we have proposed the use of a 3-dimensional eye movement analysis, and also a description of the Listing's plane. In this manuscript, we provide an outline of our previous study and our future view.

Future View of Regenerative Research for Vestibular Disorders

Future View of Regenerative Research for Vestibular Disorders

Energy transition dynamics: Does participatory modelling contribute to alignment among differing future world views?

A large international classification, assurance, and advisory services company provides for an energy microcosm where two opposing energy camps project initiated were assumed to be present. This research applies a case study design to analyse the contribution of participatory modelling to align differing views of energy futures. The modelling process as an intervention in a pretest and posttest setting is outlined. The hypothesis that the organization contained differing world views among respectively renewable and Oil & Gas professionals was however only marginally supported. Similarly, a survey showed no effect of the modelling intervention. We discuss the role of modelling at societal and organizational levels and indicate that even if the modelling effort includes dozens of participants and frequent workshops, if the model effort is minor and marginal to the transformational issue, one cannot expect participatory modelling to contribute strongly to alignment to a new direction. We also argue that there might be limits to positive findings of impacts of participatory modelling efforts if the issues are of high complexity. Finally, we find that the potential self‐confirming bias of participatory modelling accounts argues for expanding measuring effects to encompass also those organizational members outside the core participants teams.

European Union Electricity Markets: Current Practice and Future View

The European Union (EU) aims to develop an integrated electricity market as an efficient instrument to achieve the energy policy targets of security, affordability, and sustainability. Many milestones have already been reached, including the implementation of a European platform for the simultaneous clearing of day-ahead markets, the design of several platforms for coordinating intraday and regional balancing markets, and the enforcement of guidelines for the design of capacity mechanisms (CMs). There are still many challenges ahead for this market: the integration of large amounts of renewable energy, the proliferation of distributed resources, higher consumer engagement, and the sheer scale and complexity of a market serving 500 million citizens. This is a fascinating task that will keep us busy in the coming years.

Inter-Organizational IT Governance Research

The current operational environment for organizations is changing, which has effects on IT functions and IT activities. Various forms of networks, collaborations, and alliances are operational models, which organizations are using to an increasing extent. This reality has brought with it a need for improved IT governance (ITG). ITG research for inter-organizational arrangements will be needed. In the research, the target is to identify the current state of the inter-organizational ITG research among the information systems (IS) domain. The literature review covers academic articles and conference proceedings during this millennium. The findings of the current literature review reveal that interest towards ITG research is still quite limited. The future view of inter-organizational ITG research is quite clear: more research will be needed in the inter-organizational area, which is the current playground for several organizations today.

Predicting the Top-N Popular Videos via a Cross-Domain Hybrid Model

Predicting the top-N popular videos and their future views for a large batch of newly uploaded videos is of great commercial value to online video services (OVSs). Although many attempts have been made on video popularity prediction, the existing models has a much lower performance in predicting the top-N popular videos than that of the entire video set. The reason for this phenomenon is that most videos in an OVS system are unpopular, so models preferentially learn the popularity trends of unpopular videos to improve their performance on the entire video set. However, in most cases, it is critical to predict the performance on the top-N popular videos, which is the focus of this study. The challenge for the task are as follows. First, popular and unpopular videos may have similar early view patterns. Second, prediction models that are overly dependent on early view patterns limit the effects of other features. To address these challenges, we propose a novel multifactor differential influence prediction model based on multivariate linear regression. The model is designed to improve the discovery of popular videos and their popularity trends are learnt by enhancing the discriminative power of early patterns for different popularity trends and by optimizing the utilization of multisource data. We evaluate the proposed model using real-world YouTube data, and extensive experiments have demonstrated the effectiveness of our model.

映画以外のデジタルコンテンツの映画館上映(ODS)の将来像展望(B-2 メディアデザイン,研究発表,芸術工学会2011年度秋期大会in金沢)

映画以外のデジタルコンテンツの映画館上映(ODS)の将来像展望(B-2 メディアデザイン,研究発表,芸術工学会2011年度秋期大会in金沢)

Combined use of a backcast scenario and cross-impact matrix analysis to identify causes of uncertainty in a nascent transport infrastructure project

The transport planning decision process is, in theory, underpinned by rational analysis of travel behaviour and application of transport economics but project outcomes do not always follow the results of that analysis. Uncertainty is evident at all stages of the project development, as the concept emerges and as it moves through the subsequent assessment and decision processes. This research has investigated and demonstrated a method that quantifies the factors contributing to uncertainty, focussing on the early stages of the project lifecycle.The method used a back-cast scenario to describe a future view of a transport project. The causal relationships between elements of the planning and decision processes that led to the scenarios were discussed in structured interviews with stakeholders, and each conversation was coded using qualitative analysis techniques to identify the active elements of the process. Causality between the elements was explored to evaluate their influences and dependencies with those elements found to be simultaneously both highly influential and highly dependent were identified as those driving uncertainty. The sensitivity of the analytical element of this process to its parameters was also examined to quantify their contribution to the uncertainty in the analysis and to establish robust values for these parameters.The specific scenario presented here was based on a disused railway where several studies evaluating its re-opening have resulted in contradictory views on its mode of use and on the achievable benefits. In the scenario, the rail service is re-instated for light rail use in conjunction with a new sustainable urban area anchored on an existing small village. In this case, the results showed that local politics and leadership were the most influential factors in the project while the economic environment, the utility of the proposal, and planning policy contributed most to the uncertainties in the project.Although these results emerged from a specific scenario, the methodology was demonstrated to be a powerful generic tool to identify the elements that create criticalities in the planning and decision process. Therefore, the integrated method has application in other areas of project inception and planning, much wider than in the transport application demonstrated here.

Earth Observation for Security and Defence: The European Union Satellite Centre Experience and Future Views

The European Union Satellite Centre (SatCen) was founded in 1992 under the framework of the Western European Union. Today it is a Council agency of the European Union. It supports decision-making and actions under the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP), in particular the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP). It thus provides the European External Action Service, as well as European Union crisis management missions and operations, products and services based on the exploitation of relevant space assets and collateral data, including satellite and aerial imagery, and related services. The Centre, under the operational direction of the High Representative for the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Mrs Frederica Mogherini, is located in Torrejón de Ardoz, Spain. It has approximately 130 members of staff and a global budget of EUR 26 million

Mutually-Beneficial Renewable Energy Systems

Recognizing the present mass extinction of species and populations worldwide, considerable effort is underway to resolve tensions between achieving high levels of renewable energy development and protecting ecosystems and biodiversity. Moving beyond common mitigation measures designed to avoid or minimize adverse impacts, this paper takes a relational view of energy futures to explore the opportunities and implications of rethinking renewable energy systems as processes for restoration and healing of human-nature relationships. In a relational view, avoiding or minimizing harm is necessary but insufficient for establishing healthy enduring relationships based on mutual benefit between humans and nonhuman nature. The primary aim of the paper is to identify a set of practices for renewable energy technologies that support ecological enhancement through their deployment and use, as discovered through recent research and practice. The paper first presents the case for mutual benefit as a crucial principle for guiding renewable energy developments due to reasons of practice, ecology, ethics, and culture, and goes on to provide examples of mutually-beneficial energy development across a range of technologies. The study reveals options for renewable energy systems as a whole to be assembled, operated and repurposed for the co-benefit of humans and nonhuman nature.