Main Point Of Departure Research Articles

A nonequilibrium statistical mechanics derivation of the hydrodynamic equations of simple fluids using a noncanonical form of the Poisson bracket

The continuum level hydrodynamic equations of a simple fluid were derived by Irving and Kirkwood directly from discrete particle dynamics using statistical mechanics almost 75 years ago. Their elegant derivation demonstrated the fundamental molecular basis of macroscopic fluid flow and culminated in molecular expressions for the stress tensor and heat current density that have since been employed in countless molecular simulations to date. In this article, an alternative derivation is presented, which leads to more general expressions for the fundamental transport relationships and which arrives at them in a more straightforward chain of consistency that ensues directly from the Principle of Least Action. The main point of departure from the Irving–Kirkwood derivation is the application of a transformation mapping of the total momentum of each individual particle onto the sum of its peculiar momentum and its momentum relative to the local velocity field. This mapping provides a phase-space distribution function applicable in the space of particle positions and peculiar momentum, from which a noncanonical Poisson bracket can be derived in terms of the same set of microscopic variables. For a given dynamic variable, expressed in terms of particle positions and peculiar momenta, the expectation value of the noncanonical Poisson bracket of the dynamic variable is shown to correspond to the evolution equation of the expectation value of the dynamic variable. This allows for a direct derivation of all macroscopic density evolution equations (mass, momentum, and energy density fields) using a systematic procedure free of assumptions concerning the macroscopic state of the system. Furthermore, an explicit expression of the time evolution of the entropy density at the hydrodynamic level is derived following the same procedure. Finally, in the limit of short-range interparticle interactions, a molecular-based expression for the local stress tensor as properly defined from continuum mechanics is developed at the hydrodynamic level that elucidates the continuum mechanics connection of the general stress expression of Irving and Kirkwood.

Analysis of the Level of Agricultural Mechanization in Eritrea Based on USDA Data Sources

Mechanical power is one of the main drivers of agricultural production systems and a key parameter in assessing the level of agricultural mechanization (LAM). The LAM has so far been evaluated based on the amount of mechanical power available per unit area. However, as African nations have gained autonomy over the past several years, it is difficult to directly monitor and compare each country's progress in the existing LAM assessment. Thus, determining LAM progress in Eritrea and comparing it to that of other African countries is the main point of departure, on which this study places a prior emphasis. For this purpose, data is filtered from the datasheet made available online by the USDA. On a comparative basis, Eritrea is ahead of the other 33 African countries with an average annual LAM progress of 0.0013 hp/ha/year. Eritrea ranks 12th in the SSA and 3rd in the EA, indicating relatively good and promising progress. Based on the data analyzed, around 10% of the countries’ rates of advancement in the level of agricultural mechanization are less than their rates of decline; as a result, the rate (AAP (LAM)) is showing a negative value. It is clear, however, that the AAP (LAM) of Eritrea is ten times slower than that of the country ranked first (Zimbabwe).

A global rethinking of the attribution of agency to images

A global rethinking of the attribution of agency to images

Steps towards a Phenomenology of Video Games—Some Thoughts on Analyzing Aesthetics and Experience

This paper aims at conceiving a heuristic framework for analyzing video game aesthetics as well as the ways in which these aesthetics are experienced. As the main point of departure for the thoughts laid out throughout the article, I turn to phenomenological contributions to film, media and game studies—with a special emphasis on approaches to kinaesthesia. After discussing essential papers on the kinaesthetic experience of playing video games as well as drawing on a phenomenological approach to the intersubjective sharing of affects by means of kinaesthesia conceived within the field of developmental psychology, I turn to a series of brief game-analytical sketches that are supposed to highlight certain aspects of experiencing time, space, and materiality while playing video games. Finally, the specific quality of interactive intersubjectivity in video gaming is discussed, resulting in the introduction of the theoretical concept of auto-affectivity.

SUFISM AS A TURKISH RENAISSANCE

The Turkish Sufis, who created the Turkish Renaissance for centuries, should also be called Turkish philosophers. They take a human-centered religion and worldview as their main point of departure. In their humanistic approach, Islam has been adapted to Anatolian Turkish culture. Because Turkish Sufism is the practical view of Turkish philosophy in Anatolia. In addition, every Turkish philosopher has taken a philosopher, a philosophical system or a gnostic view from the ancient times and the Islamic world as a guide. From Ahmed Yesevi to Otman Baba, the Turkish Sufism tradition combined and reinterpreted Islam with all cultures that lived in Anatolia, creating a Turkish-style world view. It is imperative to understand this four-hundred-year period in shaping the way the Turks view people, life and existence. Turkish Sufism is also the proof of the fact why the history of the Turks should be based on centuries before Islam, when viewed from the perspective of philosophy of history. Thus, historically, culturally and religiously, Turkish Sufism, Islam that started with Farabi, refers to an original Renaissance, not a transition period between the Western Renaissance that started in Italy three years later. A Republic culture that keeps faith and secularism in consensus for the two worlds has taken its spiritual inspiration from the Renaissance culture of Turkish Sufism philosophy.

A Satisficing Framework for Environmental Policy Under Model Uncertainty

We propose a novel framework for the economic assessment of environmental policy. Our main point of departure from existing work is the adoption of a satisficing, as opposed to optimizing, modeling approach. Along these lines, we place primary emphasis on the extent to which different policies meet a set of goals at a specific future date instead of their performance vis-a-vis some intertemporal objective function. Consistent to the nature of environmental policymaking, our model takes explicit account of model uncertainty. To this end, the decision criterion we propose is an analog of the well-known success-probability criterion adapted to settings characterized by model uncertainty. We apply our criterion to the climate-change context and the probability distributions constructed by Drouet et al. (2015) linking carbon budgets to future consumption. Insights from computational geometry facilitate computations considerably and allow for the efficient application of the model in high-dimensional settings.

The Sociolinguistic Integration of Immigrant Populations: Reflections on Its Study

Taking as its main point of departure the research carried out in the Madrid context by the Hispalin-UAH team of the IN.MIGRA2-CM project, the goal of this article is to reflect on the role of the linguistic dimension within the process of the social integration of migrant populations. It trains its sights on the need to work from a cognitive angle which may help to show how those involved in the process construct and re-define the new context, and on the need to consider the host population—as the prime conditioner of the process—and to identify and analyse in depth the components of identity that are modified as a result of cultural contact.

Reframing teacher knowledge: a research and development agenda

This article undertakes a reframing of the concept of teacher knowledge. It argues that in order to help teachers create more powerful learning environments, a much more general framing is required—one that incorporates a teacher’s perceptions, inclinations and orientations as well as their understandings and related proficiencies. A main point of departure is the Teaching for Robust Understanding (TRU) framework, which focuses on essential dimensions of classroom practice. Questions of teacher knowledge are reframed as: “How can we reconceptualize teacher knowledge (perhaps better, teacher proficiency) so that it encompasses the broad range of perceptions, orientations, understandings and proficiencies that support teachers in crafting learning environments from which students emerge as knowledgeable, flexible, and resourceful thinkers and problem solvers? How can it be organized so that it can be worked on productively? This paper explores these issues. It employs the TRU framework as the initial mechanism for reframing, while drawing on Schoenfeld’s (How we think. Routledge, New York, 2010) work on teachers’ decision making and Schoenfeld and Kilpatrick’s (International handbook of mathematics teacher education, volume 2: tools and processes in mathematics teacher education. Sense Publishers, Rotterdam, pp 321–354, 2008) work on teacher proficiency to suggest what should be included in an expanded framing of teacher knowledge.

Aspects of Federalism Implementation for Development and Prosperity

In Nepal‘s context, concepts like 'development' and 'prosperity' are two age-old (suppressive Rana oligarchy, uni-Panchayat regime and its aftermath) mirages chased by rulers for the ruled ones almost seem to be unattainable. Nevertheless, the mirages of 'development' and 'prosperity' can be materialized when one readily changes his/her antediluvian attitude of fatalism (Bista 1991) and low work ethics. In a recent political paradigm shift from unitary monarchism-oligarchy to multi-party federalism, those two mirages have again been reiterated as Nepalese people's dream and discourse (claimed as Oli-vision) in political arena. In our recent practice, federalism is in its infancy and as a form of government may not matter much first about separating or devolution of political power more effectively, avoiding the power concentration and bringing government responsibilities closer to the citizens. In fact, what acutally matters is its action-oriented effective implementation for separating 'development' from 'fatalism' before it turns frequently into a vicious nightmare. Thus, this paper aims to explore some pertinent aspects or preconditions/hindrances of implementing federalism effictively for achieving the aforesaid goal of 'development' and 'prosperity' within our prevalent general socio-political and bureaucratic trend of 'Balaram syndrome' (a metaphor of ethical degradation of mankind), 'bholi' and 'chiya' syndrome, 'sida-bida' syndrome, nepotism, cronyism, medieval mindset, malpractices of blind capitalism and absence of good governance. In this paper, my main point of departure in methodological tool as such is a closer observation of socio-political trends in Nepalese society and its relevant literature.

Retributivism, Consequentialism, and the Risk of Punishing the Innocent: The Troublesome Case of Proxy Crimes

This paper discusses differences between two major schools in philosophy of criminal law, retributivism and consequentialism, with regard to the risk of (unintentionally) punishing the innocent. As it is argued, the main point of departure between these two camps in this respect lies in their attitude towards the high evidentiary threshold in a criminal trial: while retributivism seems to strongly support setting this standard high, consequentialists may find it desirable to relax it in some cases. This discussion is set in the context of proxy criminalization, i.e. a situation, in which some suspicious behaviour (i.e. behaviour that is only in some correlation with wrongful conduct, while not being substantially wrongful in itself) is criminalized. Since proxy criminalization may be understood as an effective lowering of the evidentiary threshold, its employment is justifiable from the consequentialist perspective, while being highly problematic for the retributivists.

A Simple Framework for Climate-Change Policy under Model Uncertainty

We propose a novel framework for the economic assessment of climate-change policy. Our main point of departure from existing work is the adoption of a satisficing, as opposed to optimizing, modeling approach. Along these lines, we place primary emphasis on the extent to which different policies meet a set of goals at a specific future date instead of their performance vis-a-vis some intertemporal objective function. Consistent to the nature of climate-change policy making, our model takes explicit account of model uncertainty. To this end, the value function we propose is an analogue of the well-known success-probability criterion adapted to settings characterized by model uncertainty. We apply this decision criterion to probability distributions constructed by Drouet et al. (2015) linking carbon budgets to future consumption. The main result that emerges is the superiority of medium carbon budgets in line with a 3°C target (i.e., 2000-3000 GtCO2) in preventing large future consumption losses with high probability. Insights from computational geometry facilitate computations considerably, and allow for the efficient application of the model in high-dimensional settings.

A Simple Framework for Climate-Change Policy Under Model Uncertainty

We propose a novel framework for the economic assessment of climate-change policy. Our main point of departure from existing work is the adoption of a satisficing, as opposed to optimizing, modeling approach. Along these lines, we place primary emphasis on the extent to which different policies meet a set of goals at a specific future date instead of their performance vis-a-vis some intertemporal objective function. Consistent to the nature of climate-change policy making, our model takes explicit account of model uncertainty. To this end, the value function we propose is an analogue of the well-known success-probability criterion adapted to settings characterized by model uncertainty. We apply this decision criterion to probability distributions constructed by Drouet et al. (2015) linking carbon budgets to future consumption. The main result that emerges is the superiority of medium carbon budgets in line with a 3°C target (i.e., 2000-3000 GtCO2) in preventing large future consumption losses with high probability. Insights from computational geometry facilitate computations considerably, and allow for the efficient application of the model in high-dimensional settings.

Compromise not consensus: designing a participatory process for landslide risk mitigation

With the escalating costs of landslides, the challenge for local authorities is to develop institutional arrangements for landslide risk management that are viewed as efficient, feasible and fair by those affected. For this purpose, the participation of stakeholders in the decision-making process is mandated by the European Union as a way of improving its perceived legitimacy and transparency. This paper reports on an analytical-deliberative process for selecting landslide risk mitigation measures in the town of Nocera Inferiore in southern Italy. The process was structured as a series of meetings with a group of selected residents and several parallel activities open to the public. The preparatory work included a literature/media review, semi-structured interviews carried out with key local stakeholders and a survey eliciting residents’ views on landslide risk management. The main point of departure in the design of this process was the explicit elicitation and structuring of multiple worldviews (or perspectives) among the participants with respect to the nature of the problem and its solution. Rather than eliciting preferences using decision analytical methods (e.g. utility theory or multi-criteria evaluation), this process built on a body of research—based on the theory of plural rationality—that has teased out the limited number of contending and socially constructed definitions of problem-and-solution that are able to achieve viability. This framing proved effective in structuring participants’ views and arriving at a compromise recommendation (not, as is often aimed for, a consensus) on measures for reducing landslide risk. Experts played a unique role in this process by providing a range of policy options that corresponded to the different perspectives held by the participants.

Carelessness or curatorial chutzpah? On controversies surrounding street art in the museum

SummaryTaking the exhibition Art in the Streets, which was shown at The Geffen Contemporary at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles from 17 April to 8 August, 2011, as its main point of departure, the present article discusses street art's association with the institutions of the art world. Art in the Streets sparked a lot of debate before, while and after it took place. The article primarily focuses on two aspects of the controversies connected with the exhibition. First, it looks at the reaction of conservative American commentators, who saw Art in the Streets as problematic because of its apparent validation of vandalism as art. The article argues that this critical response should be understood not just as the result of pre-existing animosity towards graffiti and street art, but also as an expression of a particular idea about the role museums play in society. Second, the article considers the reaction to Art in the Streets of street art aficionados, who saw the museum's representation of street based artistic expressions as problematic. The criticism from within the street art world was fuelled by the removal of a commissioned artwork by the Italian artist BLU from the façade of the museum building prior to the opening of the exhibition. On the one hand, it is argued that this curatorial decision can be seen as symptomatic of the show's failure to integrate a non-institutional form of expression in an institutional context. On the other hand, it is argued that the removal can be related to the whitewashing process which takes place in the street every day, thus effectively reproducing in the institutional environment the conditions under which street art is produced. With an outset in a number of artistic responses to Art in the Streets, the article is concluded by a more overarching discussion about street art's relationship with the institutional art world. Here it is argued that the relevance and perceived authenticity of street art is challenged by the interest from excluding and conservational art institutions, which street art to some extent exists in opposition to. Given the unsanctioned nature of street art, as well as street art's connection to the street, it is further argued that while institutions can create shows that document and discuss the history of art in the street, and can show artworks derived from this context, street art proper cannot exist in an institutional context.

The expansion of international society after 30 years: Views from the European periphery

Since its publication three decades ago, Hedley Bull and Adam Watson’s The Expansion of International Society has served as the main point of departure for historically informed discussion of how today’s states system emerged and then went on to envelop the world. In a recent article, Iver Neumann criticized Bull and Watson’s conceptualization for being Euro-centric, in the sense that these scholars only ascribed agency to the European side of the relationship between an entrant and international society. For International Relations, it is particularly apposite that the new entrants to international society themselves came from suzerain systems, such as Habsburg-dominated or the Ottoman-dominated one. Neumann’s example was Russia, whose experiences with Mongol suzerainty and, before that, with being a part of a suzerain system centred on Byzantium, infused Muscovy with experiences and memories that formed the reference point for what to expect when getting in contact with international society. This forum broadens this debate by looking not only at one state, but at a set of Central and South-Eastern European states with experiences and memories from various suzerain systems. The articles discuss when and how Romania, Slovakia, Serbia and Turkey began to aspire for membership in international society; experiences, memories and ideas such as translatio imperii that informed what they made of the entry; and how and in what degree the ensuing tensions remain today.

Is Administrative Law Still Relevant? How the Battle of Sanctions Shaped EU Criminal Law

The idea of this chapter is to investigate the extent to which the EU legislator still invokes administrative sanctions to deal with irregularities in the market and explain why the history of administrative sanctions has shaped modern EU criminal law. Administrative sanctions have always formed a crucial part of the EU’s enforcement strategy, particularly with regard to competition fines as well as sanctions in the domain of agriculture and fisheries policies in the EU. Yet with the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty, and thereby the granted legislative competences in criminal matters, one would perhaps have thought that there was no need for administrative sanctions in the EU anymore. The distinction administrative law versus criminal law used to be the main point of departure for the debate on sanctions back in the old days when the pillars of the EU still determined the realm of competence of the EU’s involvement in criminal law proper.

Public Learning and Private Learners: The Separation of Public and Private in Renaissance Literature and Pedagogy

AbstractAlthough Michael McKeon’s The Secret History of Domesticity is both a major achievement in public sphere theory and builds a major bridge between studies of the Restoration and the Renaissance, it also suggests a further examination of evidence from before the civil wars. While the opening chapter considers the pre‐16th‐century developments of privacy in politics, economics and religion, the book’s literary and cultural evidence focuses overwhelmingly on the 17th and 18th centuries. Taking the topic of education as the main point of departure, this article argues that the conceptual separation of public and private can be seen in Tudor evidence such as Richard Mulcaster’s pedagogy manual, Positions (1581), Dudley Fenner’s Artes of Logike and Rhethorike (1584) and even in the statutes of London’s Gresham College (1596). Although the language of public and private in these texts is inchoate and provisional, these Elizabethan educational texts also participate in what McKeon identifies as the emergence of the modern categories of publicity and privacy.

A GPS-based Mobile Dynamic Service Locator System

The mobile network providers have provided the most widely used means of communication. In an attempt to expand on this frontier, we propose and develop a GPS-based Mobile Service Locator System to help individuals in different walks of life, find addresses and locate their services of interest using their mobile devices. Notably, the proposed system is able to determine the proximity distances between the user and the locations of the desired service. It is flexible and extendible to easily incorporate additional mobile service providers and new services. A main point of departure from existing similar systems is that it is the GPS-based rather than the mobile-based service provider to allow for a more accurate location calculation.

Impossible Mourning

Focusing on the way in which sexual difference is articulated in Sophocles' Antigone , I offer a reading that reverses the dialectic most commonly ascribed to the play. While most interlocutors of this classic tragedy connect its heroine to divine law and the private realm and see Creon as a representative of human law and politics, I trace what I call a Sophoclean reversal at the core of the play, suggesting that, through a series of negations and contaminations, things are the opposite of what they seem to be. Using Hannah Arendt's distinction between the private and public realms as my main point of departure, I show how such a reading reveals the internal contradiction and inherent impossibility of a society whose foundation is the exclusion of women from political life. Such a society, just like Antigone, is an anti seed : it carries within it the necessity of its own downfall.

Mind the governance gap: oil vulnerability and urban resilience in Australian cities

Australian cities currently face high levels of oil vulnerability, which is often unevenly distributed, particularly within the middle and outer suburbs of the greater metropolitan areas (Dodson and Sipe, 2006). New urban policies and planning practices are needed to avoid, remedy or mitigate the impacts of oil price rises and create urban resilience (Newman et al. 2009). Whilst the lack of scholarship around oil vulnerability is slowly beginning to be addressed within the Australian urban planning context, an emphasis on the links between urban governance and urban resilience is still largely marginalised despite its acknowledged central role in the quest of urban resilience. Our main point of departure is the re-conceptualisation of oil vulnerability as a planning and governance deficit within Australian cities. We identify a number of gaps that combine to inhibit the capacity for the development of urban resilience in the face of oil vulnerability and depletion scenarios.