The history of theory

Do you see now why it feels so good to be a critical mind? Why critique, this most ambiguous pharmakon, has become such a potent euphoric drug? You are always right! When naïve believers are clinging forcefully to their objects ... you can turn all of those attachments into so many fetishes and humiliate all the believers by showing that it is nothing but their own projection, that you, yes you alone, can see. But as soon as naïve believers are thus inflated by some belief in their own importance, in their own projective capacity, you strike them by a second uppercut and humiliate them again, this time by showing that, whatever they think, their behavior is entirely determined by the action of powerful causalities coming from objective reality they don't see, but that you, yes you, the never sleeping critic, alone can see. Isn't this fabulous? Isn't it really worth going to graduate school to study critique?

RatSLAM: A hippocampal model for simultaneous localisation and mapping

The work presents a new approach to the problem of simultaneous localization and mapping - SLAM - inspired by computational models of the hippocampus of rodents. The rodent hippocampus has been extensively studied with respect to navigation tasks, and displays many of the properties of a desirable SLAM solution. RatSLAM is an implementation of a hippocampal model that can perform SLAM in real time on a real robot. It uses a competitive attractor network to integrate odometric information with landmark sensing to form a consistent representation of the environment. Experimental results show that RatSLAM can operate with ambiguous landmark information and recover from both minor and major path integration errors.

A modified particle filter for simultaneous robot localization and landmark tracking in an indoor environment

This paper presents the implementation of a modified particle filter for vision-based simultaneous localization and mapping of an autonomous robot in a structured indoor environment. Through this method, artificial landmarks such as multi-coloured cylinders can be tracked with a camera mounted on the robot, and the position of the robot can be estimated at the same time. Experimental results in simulation and in real environments show that this approach has advantages over the extended Kalman filter with ambiguous data association and various levels of odometric noise.

Calculation of target locations for web resources

A location-based search engine must be able to find and assign proper locations to Web resources. Host, content and metadata location information are not sufficient to describe the location of resources as they are ambiguous or unavailable for many documents. We introduce target location as the location of users of Web resources. Target location is content-independent and can be applied to all types of Web resources. A novel method is introduced which uses log files and IN to track the visitors of websites. The experiments show that target location can be calculated for almost all documents on the Web at country level and to the majority of them in state and city levels. It can be assigned to Web resources as a new definition and dimension of location. It can be used separately or with other relevant locations to define the geography of Web resources. This compensates insufficient geographical information on Web resources and would facilitate the design and development of location-based search engines.

Formalising progress properties of non-blocking programs

A non-blocking program is one that uses non-blocking primitives, such as load-linked/store-conditional and compare-and-swap, for synchronisation instead of locks so that no process is ever blocked. According to their progress properties, non-blocking programs may be classified as wait-free, lock-free or obstruction-free. However, a precise description of these properties does not exist and it is not unusual to find a definition that is ambiguous or even incorrect. We present a formal definition of the progress properties so that any confusion is removed. The formalisation also allows one to prove the widely believed presumption that wait-freedom is a special case of lock-freedom, which in turn is a special case of obstruction-freedom.

Formal verification of type flaw attacks in security protocols

Security protocols are often modelled at a high level of abstraction, potentially overlooking implementation-dependent vulnerabilities. Here we use the Z specification language's rich set of data structures to formally model potentially ambiguous messages that may be exploited in a 'type flaw' attack. We then show how to formally verify whether or not such an attack is actually possible in a particular protocol using Z's schema calculus.

Hippocampal models for simultaneous localisation and mapping on an autonomous robot

To navigate successfully in a novel environment a robot needs to be able to Simultaneously Localize And Map (SLAM) its surroundings. The most successful solutions to this problem so far have involved probabilistic algorithms, but there has been much promising work involving systems based on the workings of part of the rodent brain known as the hippocampus. In this paper we present a biologically plausible system called RatSLAM that uses competitive attractor networks to carry out SLAM in a probabilistic manner. The system can effectively perform parameter self-calibration and SLAM in onedimension. Tests in two dimensional environments revealed the inability of the RatSLAM system to maintain multiple pose hypotheses in the face of ambiguous visual input. These results support recent rat experimentation that suggest current competitive attractor models are not a complete solution to the hippocampal modelling problem.

AMBIGUIDADE COMO INVENTIVIDADE: UM ESTUDO SOBRE O SINCRETISMO RELIGIOSO NA FRONTEIRA ENTRE A ANTROPOLOGIA E A TEOLOGIA

Essa tese é um estudo sobre o problema do sincretismo religioso, quando pensado no diálogo entre a antropologia e a teologia. Para tanto, a pesquisa faz um exercício hermenêutico de ressignificação do conceito, a partir das diversas teorias sobre o sincretismo e seus usos antropológicos e teológicos, buscando subsídios no pensamento de Michel de Certeau e Paul Tillich para tal ressignificação. Assim, a perspectiva certeauniana de uma reflexão heterológica da cultura e a noção de demônico na teologia e filosofia do sentido de Tillich fundamentam a percepção do sincretismo como uma teoria da mediação entre religião e cultura. Isso significa que o sincretismo opera uma relação dialética com o seu pólo denominado, nessa tese, de diacretismo , tornando a dinâmica cultural e religiosa um espaço inventivo, posto que manifesta aspectos ambíguos de criações de sentido positivas (experiência de aproximação sincrética) e criações de sentido distorcidas (experiência de fragmentação diacrética ), essência da relação com o sagrado, vivida culturalmente. A cultura, entendida como espaço para a vivência do religioso, exprime-se em uma profunda relação entre táticas e estratégias, denotando a ambigüidade anteriormente afirmada, quando reconhece que os atores sociais em interação, mesmo que marcados por lugares próprios estrategicamente estabelecidos, enquanto lugares de poder, não inibem a formação de ações táticas que subervertem inventivamente esses mesmos lugares, dando a devida dinâmica cultural. A tese analisa, também, como estudo de caso, as implicações dessa compreensão de sincretismo para a interpretação da experiência religiosa de grupos de indígenas Guarani e Kaiowá, na Terra Indígena de Dourados /MS, na fronteira entre tradição e tradução operada pelos indígenas, a partir do Projeto da Igreja Indígena Presbiteriana (IIP), ressignificando sua alteridade religiosa na interface com os múltiplos cristianismos presentes nas aldeias, afirmando a possibilidade de um teko retã ( jeito de ser plural, múltiplo ) religioso, a partir das relações sincréticas e diacréticas propostas.

A HISTÓRIA DE UM SILÊNCIO: UM ESTUDO DE CASO SOBRE QUESTÕES DA NEGRITUDE EM UMA COMUNIDADE BATISTA DA PERIFERIA DA CIDADE DE SÃO PAULO

O objetivo deste trabalho foi analisar práticas microbianas , singulares e plurais, relativas ao tema da negritude, no cotidiano da comunidade batista Maranata, como estudo de caso de um grupo religioso no distrito Grajaú, periferia da cidade de São Paulo. Fazendo uso da História Oral, produzimos nossas fontes de analise documental dando voz a um grupo de pessoas dessa comunidade evangélica, que se auto declararam pretas e pardas. Detectamos em seu discurso a percepção que têm em relação à temática da negritude brasileira, sobre as políticas de ações afirmativas, sobre a presença do preconceito e discriminação racial na atual sociedade, bem como a posição da comunidade diante dessa temática. A pergunta pelo papel da mentalidade religiosa no enfrentamento desta problemática foi o foco orientador destes diferentes eixos de observação. Por ser um tema muito delicado e pouco discutido entre os evangélicos, percebemos que a comunidade não se sentiu muito à vontade para discuti-lo. O discurso de nossos interlocutores, que aparentemente se mostrava ambíguo e por vezes incoerente, pois ora admitia-se o preconceito racial, e ora ele era negado, foi uma forma encontrada por estes consumidores para encobrir os mecanismos de descriminação e exclusão que também percebem existir dentro de sua comunidade de fé e para, desse modo, sentirem-se aceitos na comunidade, criando assim táticas de sobrevivência e espaços de pertencimento em meio às estratégias impostas pela denominação religiosa.(AU)

O DEUS ROSIANO: ANÁLISE TEOLÓGICO-LITERÁRIA DAS IMAGENS AMBÍ-GUAS DE DEUS EM GRANDE SERTÃO: VEREDAS

Tudo é e não é . Analisar algumas imagens ambíguas de Deus em Grande Sertão: Veredas foi o objetivo desta dissertação. Para tanto, essa análise é uma tentativa interdisciplinar de leitura e interpretação, em que Teologia e Literatura são interlocutoras. A partir do romance rosiano, sob à luz hermenêutica da crítica literária e da reflexão teológica, tentamos indicar que a escritura de João Guimarães Rosa apresenta Deus de modo ambíguo. Essa assertiva é possível, pois se percebeu na provisoriedade humana, poetizada pelo escritor e personificada por Riobaldo, o traço sine qua non do modo de ver mundos misturados . Ao rememorar e renarrar as estórias sua vida, Riobaldo abre espaço ao Mistério. Nonada . Em cada travessia, o protagonista-narrador reflete acerca de Deus , por meio da fala poética cujas imagens diversas sugerem um Deus muito contrariado . Sem enquadramentos teológicos e/ou filosóficos definitivos, Rosa provoca-nos ao mostrar-nos que o Deus que roda tudo revela-se e evade-se no sertão-universo. Lugar físico-mítico. É no sertão que intentamos seguir os rastros de Deus segundo a íris riobaldiana. Olhar de constante movimento entre o obscuro e o revelado, entre o é e não é.(AU)

A facial expression for anxiety

Anxiety and fear are often confounded in discussions of human emotions. However, studies of rodent defensive reactions under naturalistic conditions suggest anxiety is functionally distinct from fear. Unambiguous threats, such as predators, elicit flight from rodents (if an escape-route is available), whereas ambiguous threats (e.g., the odor of a predator) elicit risk assessment behavior, which is associated with anxiety as it is preferentially modulated by anti-anxiety drugs. However, without human evidence, it would be premature to assume that rodent-based psychological models are valid for humans. We tested the human validity of the risk assessment explanation for anxiety by presenting 8 volunteers with emotive scenarios and asking them to pose facial expressions. Photographs and videos of these expressions were shown to 40 participants who matched them to the scenarios and labeled each expression. Scenarios describing ambiguous threats were preferentially matched to the facial expression posed in response to the same scenario type. This expression consisted of two plausible environmental-scanning behaviors (eye darts and head swivels) and was labeled as anxiety, not fear. The facial expression elicited by unambiguous threat scenarios was labeled as fear. The emotion labels generated were then presented to another 18 participants who matched them back to photographs of the facial expressions. This back-matching of labels to faces also linked anxiety to the environmental-scanning face rather than fear face. Results therefore suggest that anxiety produces a distinct facial expression and that it has adaptive value in situations that are ambiguously threatening, supporting a functional, risk-assessing explanation for human anxiety.

Constructing communism in the Romanian People's Republic. Orthodoxy and state, 1948 - 49

This article analyses the ambiguous and contradictory relationship between the Orthodox Church and the communist regime during the first two years of the Romanian People's Republic. The installation of communism and the process of Stalinisation led to an unprecedented control of the church. The church was actively employed in propaganda and the regime imposed its own people in the hierarchy. On the one hand, Romanian communists followed the Soviet model regarding the place of the church in the communist state while, on the other hand, the church hierarchy adapted to the new political system by creating a theory of 'social apostolate'. Lacking popular support, the communists used the church as an instrument through which they could acquire the political support of the masses. The church thus enjoyed a favoured position in society mainly because the communists employed it in their ideological expansionism and confrontation with the West.

Splines and vector splines

The thrust of this report concerns spline theory and some of the background to spline theory and follows the development in (Wahba, 1991). We also review methods for determining hyper-parameters, such as the smoothing parameter, by Generalised Cross Validation. Splines have an advantage over Gaussian Process based procedures in that we can readily impose atmospherically sensible smoothness constraints and maintain computational efficiency. Vector splines enable us to penalise gradients of vorticity and divergence in wind fields. Two similar techniques are summarised and improvements based on robust error functions and restricted numbers of basis functions given. A final, brief discussion of the application of vector splines to the problem of scatterometer data assimilation highlights the problems of ambiguous solutions.

Canadian province-building : the state as educator and entrepreneur in Alberta

This study provides an account and analysis of the development of systems of educational provision In capitalist democracies, especially in connection with the social origin and relative autonony of those systems. Using the case study of Athabasca University, a Canadian distance-education institution in the province of Alberta, the study is a critical work of historical sociology, in which the shifting social role of a system of educational provision during two transitions of a regional political economy is analyzed. Comparative observations are made in reference to other systems of educational provision and organizations, in particular the training department of a large Company based In the same region as the Unversity. The study explores the social origin and relative autonomy of systems of educational provision In relation to educational ideologies, which are themselves associated with social ideologies. Pierre Bourdieu's theoretical construction of "fields of power'' allows for a consideration of power as a relational phenomenon in the study. In other words, power is understood as being exercised in a way that simultaneously takes account of the power of other actors and groups. Fields of power also allow for an analysis of power as it is exercised at various levels of organizations and within society. The study is organized in two phases. First, an account is developed of the historical period in which the Unlversity and the Company were created, but especially the period of establishment for the Unlversity, 1970 - 75. Conclusions are offered concerning the causal associations between the historical antecedents that gave rise to the two organlzations. It is argued that both the University and the Company were established In part to enact the AIberta government's efforts to enhance Its powers within the Canadian federation (a process called province-building), The second phase is concerned with a more recent period of three years, 1993 - 95. By this time, province-building was not as significant a concern for policy-makers, and the organizational responses of the University and the Company reflected this shift. A divergence of practice is observed at the University and the Company, with actors at the Company encouraging the development of collectivist values for employees, while at the University no such overt strategy was followed, The study concludes that a consumerist model of education developed by the University in 1970 - 75 and expanded In 1993 - 95 contributed significantly to the institution's social origin and relative autonomy. The model was used as an Ideology in the earlier period and as a strategy In the later one, serving to forestall the institution's closure during both periods of crisis, though Ieading to ambiguous social outcomes. A consumerist model may on the one hand be progressive in that expanded access to educational opportunities is made possible. On the other hand, the consumerist model will tend increasingly to provide educational services to those social segments that already have access to educational opportunities.

Inward investment, industry concentration and the speed of adjustment

T his paper seeks to examine the relationship between foreign direct investment (FDI) and industry concentration. Previous work in the area is somewhat contradictory in terms of the effect that FDI may be expected to have on host-country market structure. In addition, work which seeks to use concentration as a determinant of FDI (or indeed entry in a more generic sense) is rather ambiguous. This paper seeks to resolve these issues, and argues that inward FDI is more likely to reduce concentration by increasing competition than it is to increase monopoly power. In addition, the paper will show that the role of concentration in explaining FDI is more complex than has previously been understood. This paper is constructed as follows: Section II discusses the hypothesized relationship between market concentration and FDI, while Sections III, IV and V develop the models employed and discuss the econometric issues. Finally Sections VI and VII discuss the results and present some conclusions.