Under the sign of consumption

The series of enunciations exposed in this work attempts to establish a conceptualization of consumption in relation to the communication and reception processes of symbolic goods. In addition, it will attempt to account for some possible derivations of the problem in question. The article explores different definitions penned by diverse authors seeking to set out the essential aspects concerning the object of study Thus, consumption becomes a space within which the appropriation of material and symbolic goods, social differentiation and symbolic class distinctions, integration, communication, amongst other things, take place. Despite the fact that none can sufficiently explain all the peculiarities related to consumption practices, all offer enriching insights that help us understand the concept we are dealing with. This is why the purpose of the present formulation is to reflect from another perspective, stressing the particularisms. And, in this way, to begin to lift the veil that conceals the forces of the social matrix

Under the sign of consumption

The series of enunciations exposed in this work attempts to establish a conceptualization of consumption in relation to the communication and reception processes of symbolic goods. In addition, it will attempt to account for some possible derivations of the problem in question. The article explores different definitions penned by diverse authors seeking to set out the essential aspects concerning the object of study Thus, consumption becomes a space within which the appropriation of material and symbolic goods, social differentiation and symbolic class distinctions, integration, communication, amongst other things, take place. Despite the fact that none can sufficiently explain all the peculiarities related to consumption practices, all offer enriching insights that help us understand the concept we are dealing with. This is why the purpose of the present formulation is to reflect from another perspective, stressing the particularisms. And, in this way, to begin to lift the veil that conceals the forces of the social matrix

Under the sign of consumption

The series of enunciations exposed in this work attempts to establish a conceptualization of consumption in relation to the communication and reception processes of symbolic goods. In addition, it will attempt to account for some possible derivations of the problem in question. The article explores different definitions penned by diverse authors seeking to set out the essential aspects concerning the object of study Thus, consumption becomes a space within which the appropriation of material and symbolic goods, social differentiation and symbolic class distinctions, integration, communication, amongst other things, take place. Despite the fact that none can sufficiently explain all the peculiarities related to consumption practices, all offer enriching insights that help us understand the concept we are dealing with. This is why the purpose of the present formulation is to reflect from another perspective, stressing the particularisms. And, in this way, to begin to lift the veil that conceals the forces of the social matrix

A Critical Review of Opinion Polls relating to Iranian Voting Intentions: Problems of Research Methodology as applied to Complex Societies

After the 10th Iranian Presidential election on June 12, 2009, several public opinion polls taken in Iran attracted the attention of policy-makers and journalists around the world because of the political crisis that followed. In this paper I first review critically the polls conducted by the WPO (WorldPublicOpinion.org), PIPA (Program on International Policy Attitudes) at the University of Maryland. I also review an essay by Steven Kull, which is based on the aforementioned poll results and which in my opinion leads to false conclusions concerning Iran’s political prospects. I also discuss “An Analysis of Multiple Polls of the Iranian Public,” published by WPO-PIPA on February 3 2010. The present paper arrives at the overall conclusion that it is impossible to obtain an accurate image of political opinions in societies as complicated as that of Iran by concentrating on only one technique of research and analysis, especially when the political and social situation in the society concerned is in a state of constant flux.

Stoichiometry in Context: Inquiry-Guided Problems of Chemistry for Encouraging Critical Thinking in Engineering Students

This paper focuses on examples of educational tools concerning the learning of chemistry for engineering students through different daily life cases. These tools were developed during the past few years for enhancing the active role of students. They refer to cases about mineral water, medicaments, dentifrices and informative panels about solar power, where an adequate quantitative treatment through stoichiometry calculations allows the interpretation of data and values announced by manufacturers. These cases were developed in the context of an inquiry-guided instruction model. By bringing tangible chemistry examples into the classroom we provide an opportunity for engineering students to apply this science to familiar products in hopes that they will appreciate chemistry more, will be motivated to study concepts in greater detail, and will connect the relevance of chemistry to everyday life.

The Proper Generalized Decomposition With Application In Problems Of Dynamics

In this paper we address the new reduction method called Proper Generalized Decomposition (PGD) which is a discretization technique based on the use of separated representation of the unknown fields, specially well suited for solving multidimensional parametric equations. In this case, it is applied to the solution of dynamics problems. We will focus on the dynamic analysis of an one-dimensional rod with a unit harmonic load of frequency (ω) applied at a point of interest. In what follows, we will present the application of the methodology PGD to the problem in order to approximate the displacement field as the sum of the separated functions. We will consider as new variables of the problem, parameters models associated with the characteristic of the materials, in addition to the frequency. Finally, the quality of the results will be assessed based on an example.

Life-like forms in meteorites and the problems of environmental control on the morphology of fossil and recent protobionta / consulting editor, Bartholomew Nagy ; conference chairman, J. Joseph Lynch ; authors, E. Anders [et al.]

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A Mea Culpa for The Felix Culpa? A Greater Goods Response to the Problems of Evil and Hell

In this paper I want to develop a particular kind of greater-good response to the problems of evil and hell, one which hence can serve as a backup plan should the free will defense not satisfy. Ultimately, this response will appear to belong to several traditions in theodicy. Like all greater-goods views, this one relies on explaining the existence of evil in terms of the greater goods that come out of it. Among these goods are the greater goods of Incarnation and Atonement, their respective goodness consisting in large part in the higher-order divine good of glorifying God through the display of divine virtue.

Mental health problems of homeless children and families: longitudinal study

Objective: To establish the mental health needs of homeless children and families before and after rehousing.

The old problems of glass and the glass transition, and the many new twists.

In this paper I review the ways in which the glassy state is obtained both in nature and in materials science and highlight a "new twist"--the recent recognition of polymorphism within the glassy state. The formation of glass by continuous cooling (viscous slowdown) is then examined, the strong/fragile liquids classification is reviewed, and a new twist-the possibility that the slowdown is a result of an avoided critical point-is noted. The three canonical characteristics of relaxing liquids are correlated through the fragility. As a further new twist, the conversion of strong liquids to fragile liquids by pressure-induced coordination number increases is demonstrated. It is then shown that, for comparable systems, it is possible to have the same conversion accomplished via a first-order transition within the liquid state during quenching. This occurs in the systems in which "polyamorphism" (polymorphism in the glassy state) is observed, and the whole phenomenology is accounted for by Poole's bond-modified van der Waals model. The sudden loss of some liquid degrees of freedom through such weak first-order transitions is then related to the polyamorphic transition between native and denatured hydrated proteins, since the latter are also glass-forming systems--water-plasticized, hydrogen bond-cross-linked chain polymers (and single molecule glass formers). The circle is closed with a final new twist by noting that a short time scale phenomenon much studied by protein physicists-namely, the onset of a sharp change in d/dT ( is the Debye-Waller factor)--is general for glass-forming liquids, including computer-simulated strong and fragile ionic liquids, and is closely correlated with the experimental glass transition temperature. The latter thus originates in strong anharmonicity in certain components of the vibrational density of states, which permits the system to access the multiple minima of its configuration space. The connection between the anharmonicity in these modes, vibrational localization, the Kauzmann temperature, and the fragility of the liquid is proposed as the key problem in glass science.