Digital Literacy: A Demand for Nonlinear Thinking Styles

This paper makes a case for a direct relationship between digital literacy and nonlinear thinking styles, articulates a demand for nonlinear thinking styles in education and the workplace, and states implications for a connection between nonlinear thinking styles visual literacy, and intuitive artistic practice.

Conceptualizing American power and security in a post -9/11 security context: Conflict, resistance, and global security, 2001–present

In a post-Cold War, post-9/11 world, the advent of US global supremacy resulted in the installation, perpetuation, and dissemination of an Absolutist Security Agenda (hereinafter, ASA). The US ASA explicitly and aggressively articulates and equates US national security interests with the security of all states in the international system, and replaced the bipolar, Cold War framework that defined international affairs from 1945-1992. Since the collapse of the USSR and the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks, the US has unilaterally defined, implemented, and managed systemic security policy. The US ASA is indicative of a systemic category of knowledge (security) anchored in variegated conceptual and material components, such as morality, philosophy, and political rubrics. The US ASA is based on a logic that involves the following security components: (1) hyper militarization, (2) intimidation,(3) coercion, (4) criminalization, (5) panoptic surveillance, (6) plenary security measures, and (7) unabashed US interference in the domestic affairs of select states. Such interference has produced destabilizing tensions and conflicts that have, in turn, produced resistance, revolutions, proliferation, cults of personality, and militarization. This is the case because the US ASA rests on the notion that the international system of states is an extension, instrument of US power, rather than a system and/or society of states comprised of functionally sovereign entities. To analyze the US ASA, this study utilizes: (1) official government statements, legal doctrines, treaties, and policies pertaining to US foreign policy; (2) militarization rationales, budgets, and expenditures; and (3) case studies of rogue states. The data used in this study are drawn from information that is publicly available (academic journals, think-tank publications, government publications, and information provided by international organizations). The data supports the contention that global security is effectuated via a discrete set of hegemonic/imperialistic US values and interests, finding empirical expression in legal acts (USA Patriot ACT 2001) and the concept of rogue states. Rogue states, therefore, provide test cases to clarify the breadth, depth, and consequentialness of the US ASA in world affairs vis-à-vis the relationship between US security and global security.

Modeling, simulation, and characterization of space debris in low-Earth orbit

Every space launch increases the overall amount of space debris. Satellites have limited awareness of nearby objects that might pose a collision hazard. Astrometric, radiometric, and thermal models for the study of space debris in low-Earth orbit have been developed. This modeled approach proposes analysis methods that provide increased Local Area Awareness for satellites in low-Earth and geostationary orbit. Local Area Awareness is defined as the ability to detect, characterize, and extract useful information regarding resident space objects as they move through the space environment surrounding a spacecraft. The study of space debris is of critical importance to all space-faring nations. Characterization efforts are proposed using long-wave infrared sensors for space-based observations of debris objects in low-Earth orbit. Long-wave infrared sensors are commercially available and do not require solar illumination to be observed, as their received signal is temperature dependent. The characterization of debris objects through means of passive imaging techniques allows for further studies into the origination, specifications, and future trajectory of debris objects. Conclusions are made regarding the aforementioned thermal analysis as a function of debris orbit, geometry, orientation with respect to time, and material properties. Development of a thermal model permits the characterization of debris objects based upon their received long-wave infrared signals. Information regarding the material type, size, and tumble-rate of the observed debris objects are extracted. This investigation proposes the utilization of long-wave infrared radiometric models of typical debris to develop techniques for the detection and characterization of debris objects via signal analysis of unresolved imagery. Knowledge regarding the orbital type and semi-major axis of the observed debris object are extracted via astrometric analysis. This knowledge may aid in the constraint of the admissible region for the initial orbit determination process. The resultant orbital information is then fused with the radiometric characterization analysis enabling further characterization efforts of the observed debris object. This fused analysis, yielding orbital, material, and thermal properties, significantly increases a satellite's Local Area Awareness via an intimate understanding of the debris environment surrounding the spacecraft.

Automatons, Robots, and Capitalism in a Very Wrong Twenty-First Century: A Review Essay on Neill Blomkamp’s Chappie

Contrary to prevailing opinions, Neill Blomkamp’s recent feature film Chappie is not a movie about robots or artificial intelligence. It is not Robocop. It is not Short Circuit. It is also not District 9 or Elysium. Chappie is a movie about humanity’s dialectically creative and destructive potential. It is a movie about how it is that humans come to behave how they do through their social and material circumstances, as well as the barbaric results when the two are mixed under the thoroughly undemocratic conditions of neoliberal capitalism.

An evaluation of a curriculum response to the State of Florida mandate for computer literacy at a large comprehensive high school in Dade County, Florida

Minimum Student Performance Standards in Computer Literacy and Science were passed by the Florida Legislature through the Educational Reform Act of 1983. This act mandated that all Florida high school graduates receive training in computer literacy. Schools and school systems were charged with the task of determining the best methods to deliver this instruction to their students. The scope of this study is to evaluate one school's response to the state of Florida's computer literacy mandate. The study was conducted at Miami Palmetto Senior High School, located in Dade County, Florida. The administration of Miami Palmetto Senior High School chose to develop and implement a new program to comply with the state mandate - integrating computer literacy into the existing biology curriculum. The study evaluated the curriculum to determine if computer literacy could be integrated successfully and meet both the biology and computer literacy objectives. The findings in this study showed that there were no significant differences between biology scores of the students taking the integrated curriculum and those taking a traditional curriculum of biology. Student in the integrated curriculum not only met the biology objectives as well as those in the traditional curriculum, they also successfully completed the intended objectives for computer literacy. Two sets of objectives were successfully completed in the integrated classes in the same amount of time used to complete one set of objectives in the traditional biology classes. Therefore, integrated curriculum was the more efficient means of meeting the intended objectives of both biology and computer literacy.

Conceptualizing American power and security in a post-9/11 security context : conflict, resistance, and global security, 2001-present

In a post-Cold War, post-9/11 world, the advent of US global supremacy resulted in the installation, perpetuation, and dissemination of an Absolutist Security Agenda (hereinafter, ASA). The US ASA explicitly and aggressively articulates and equates US national security interests with the security of all states in the international system, and replaced the bipolar, Cold War framework that defined international affairs from 1945-1992. Since the collapse of the USSR and the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks, the US has unilaterally defined, implemented, and managed systemic security policy. The US ASA is indicative of a systemic category of knowledge (security) anchored in variegated conceptual and material components, such as morality, philosophy, and political rubrics. The US ASA is based on a logic that involves the following security components: 1., hyper militarization, 2., intimidation, 3., coercion, 4., criminalization, 5., panoptic surveillance, 6., plenary security measures, and 7., unabashed US interference in the domestic affairs of select states. Such interference has produced destabilizing tensions and conflicts that have, in turn, produced resistance, revolutions, proliferation, cults of personality, and militarization. This is the case because the US ASA rests on the notion that the international system of states is an extension, instrument of US power, rather than a system and/or society of states comprised of functionally sovereign entities. To analyze the US ASA, this study utilizes: 1., official government statements, legal doctrines, treaties, and policies pertaining to US foreign policy; 2., militarization rationales, budgets, and expenditures; and 3., case studies of rogue states. The data used in this study are drawn from information that is publicly available (academic journals, think-tank publications, government publications, and information provided by international organizations). The data supports the contention that global security is effectuated via a discrete set of hegemonic/imperialistic US values and interests, finding empirical expression in legal acts (USA Patriot ACT 2001) and the concept of rogue states. Rogue states, therefore, provide test cases to clarify the breadth, depth, and consequentialness of the US ASA in world affairs vis-a-vis the relationship between US security and global security.

Modeling, Simulation, and Characterization of Space Debris in low-Earth Orbit

Every space launch increases the overall amount of space debris. Satellites have limited awareness of nearby objects that might pose a collision hazard. Astrometric, radiometric, and thermal models for the study of space debris in low-Earth orbit have been developed. This modeled approach proposes analysis methods that provide increased Local Area Awareness for satellites in low-Earth and geostationary orbit. Local Area Awareness is defined as the ability to detect, characterize, and extract useful information regarding resident space objects as they move through the space environment surrounding a spacecraft. The study of space debris is of critical importance to all space-faring nations. Characterization efforts are proposed using long-wave infrared sensors for space-based observations of debris objects in low-Earth orbit. Long-wave infrared sensors are commercially available and do not require solar illumination to be observed, as their received signal is temperature dependent. The characterization of debris objects through means of passive imaging techniques allows for further studies into the origination, specifications, and future trajectory of debris objects. Conclusions are made regarding the aforementioned thermal analysis as a function of debris orbit, geometry, orientation with respect to time, and material properties. Development of a thermal model permits the characterization of debris objects based upon their received long-wave infrared signals. Information regarding the material type, size, and tumble-rate of the observed debris objects are extracted. This investigation proposes the utilization of long-wave infrared radiometric models of typical debris to develop techniques for the detection and characterization of debris objects via signal analysis of unresolved imagery. Knowledge regarding the orbital type and semi-major axis of the observed debris object are extracted via astrometric analysis. This knowledge may aid in the constraint of the admissible region for the initial orbit determination process. The resultant orbital information is then fused with the radiometric characterization analysis enabling further characterization efforts of the observed debris object. This fused analysis, yielding orbital, material, and thermal properties, significantly increases a satellite’s Local Area Awareness via an intimate understanding of the debris environment surrounding the spacecraft.