A different kind of war? : September 11 and the United States' Afghan War

McInnes, C., 'A different kind of war? 11 September and the United States' Afghan war'. Review of International Studies, 29 (2), 165-184. RAE2008

Modele strategii w konfliktach asymetrycznych na przykładzie działań zbrojnych w Iraku w latach 2003-2011

Wydział Nauk Politycznych i Dziennikarstwa

Exploring an agent as an economic insider threat solution

The insider threat is a security problem that is well-known and has a long history, yet it still remains an invisible enemy. Insiders know the security processes and have accesses that allow them to easily cover their tracks. In recent years the idea of monitoring separately for these threats has come into its own. However, the tools currently in use have disadvantages and one of the most effective techniques of human review is costly. This paper explores the development of an intelligent agent that uses already in-place computing material for inference as an inexpensive monitoring tool for insider threats. Design Science Research (DSR) is a methodology used to explore and develop an IT artifact, such as for this intelligent agent research. This methodology allows for a structure that can guide a deep search method for problems that may not be possible to solve or could add to a phenomenological instantiation.

LISA SERGIO: HOW MUSSOLINI'S "GOLDEN VOICE" OF PROPAGANDA CREATED AN AMERICAN MASS COMMUNICATION CAREER

In 1937 Lisa Sergio, "The Golden Voice" of fascist broadcasting from Rome, fled Italy for the United States. Though her mother was American, Sergio was classified as an enemy alien once the United States entered World War II. Yet Sergio became a U.S. citizen in 1944 and built a successful career in radio, working first at NBC and then WQXR in New York City in the days when women's voices were not thought to be appropriate for news or "serious" programming. When she was blacklisted as a communist in the early 1950s, Sergio compensated for the loss of radio employment by becoming principally an author and lecturer in Washington, D.C., until her death in 1989. This dissertation, based on her personal papers, is the first study of Sergio's American mass communication career. It points out the personal, political and social obstacles she faced as a woman in her 52-year career as a commentator on varied aspects of world affairs, religion and feminism. This study includes an examination of the FBI investigations of Sergio and the anti-communist campaigns conducted against her. It concludes that Sergio's success as a public communicator was predicated on both her unusual talents and her ability to transform her public image to reflect ideal American values of womanhood in shifting political climates.

Paul Karl Feyerabend Las proyecciones de la proliferación teórica en la relación ciencia-metafísica

La doctrina de la Proliferación teórica de Paul Karl Feyerabend ha sido interpretada por sus especialistas como un intento de salvaguardar el ideal del progreso científico. Aunque tales estudios hacen justicia, en parte, a la intencionalidad de nuestro filósofo no explicitan la crítica fundamental que implica para Feyerabend el pluralismo teórico. La proliferación teórica constituye en sí misma una reductio ad absurdum de los distintos intentos del positivismo lógico y del racionalismo crítico por definir la ciencia a expensas de lo metafísico. Este artículo presenta la proliferación teórica como una reivindicación del papel positivo que ocupa la metafísica en el quehacer científico. Se consigna la defensa que hace Feyerabend de la metafísica en cuanto que ésta constituye la posibilidad de superar el conservadurismo conceptual, aumentar de contenido empírico de la ciencia y recuperar el valor descriptivo de las teorías científicas.

Parasitism may enhance rather than reduce the predatory impact of an invader

Invasive species can have profound impacts on communities and it is increasingly recognized that such effects may be mediated by parasitism. The 'enemy release' hypothesis posits that invaders may be successful and have high impacts owing to escape from parasitism. Alternatively, we hypothesize that parasites may increase host feeding rates and hence parasitized invaders may have increased community impacts. Here, we investigate the influence of parasitism on the predatory impact of the invasive freshwater amphipod Gammarus pulex. Up to 70 per cent of individuals are infected with the acanthoce- phalan parasite Echinorhynchus truttae, but parasitized individuals were no different in body condition to those unparasitized. Parasitized individuals consumed significantly more prey (Asellus aquaticus; Isopoda) than did unparasitized individuals. Both parasitized and unparasitized individuals displayed Type-II functional responses (FRs), with the FR for parasitized individuals rising more steeply, with a higher asymptote, compared with unparasi- tized individuals. While the parasite reduced the fitness of individual females, we predict a minor effect on population recruitment because of low parasite prevalence in the peak reproductive period. The parasite thus has a large per capita effect on predatory rate but a low population fitness effect, and thus may enhance rather than reduce the impact of this invader.

Millimeter-wave stealth radio for special operations forces

For Special Operations Forces, an important attribute of any future radio will be the ability to conceal transmissions from the enemy while transmitting large amounts of data for situational awareness and communications. These requirements will mean that military wireless systems designers will need to consider operating frequencies in the mm-wave bands: The high data rates that are achievable at these frequencies and the propagation characteristics at this wavelength will provide many benefits for the implementation of 'stealth radio'. This article discusses some of the recent advances in RF front-end technology, alongside physical layer transmission schemes that could be employed for millimeter-wave soldier-mounted radio. The operation of a hypothetical millimeter-wave soldier-to-soldier communications system that makes use of smart antenna technology is also described.

The relationship between agricultural intensification and biological control: experimental tests across Europe

Agricultural intensification can affect biodiversity and related ecosystem services such as biological control, but large-scale experimental evidence is missing. We examined aphid pest populations in cereal fields under experimentally reduced densities of (1) ground-dwelling predators (-G), (2) vegetation-dwelling predators and parasitoids (-V), (3) a combination of (1) and (2) (-G-V),compared with open-fields (control), in contrasting landscapes with low vs. high levels of agricultural intensification (AI), and in five European regions. Aphid populations were 28%, 97%, and 199% higher in -G, -V, and -G -V treatments, respectively, compared to the open fields, indicating synergistic effects of both natural-enemy groups. Enhanced parasitoid : host and predator : prey ratios were related to reduced aphid population density and population growth. The relative importance of parasitoids and vegetation-dwelling predators greatly differed among European regions, and agricultural intensification affected biological control and aphid density only in some regions. This shows a changing role of species group identity in diverse enemy communities and a need to consider region-specific landscape management.

Romanticism and Blackwood's Magazine:'An Unprecedented Phenomenon'

Romanticism and Blackwood's Magazine is inspired by the ongoing critical fascination with Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, and the burgeoning recognition of its centrality to the Romantic age. Though the magazine itself was published continuously for well over a century and a half, this volume concentrates specifically on those years when William Blackwood was at the helm, beginning with his founding of the magazine in 1817 and closing with his death in 1834. These were the years when, as Samuel Taylor Coleridge put it in 1832, Blackwood's reigned as 'an unprecedented Phenomenon in the world of letters.' The magazine placed itself at the centre of the emerging mass media, commented decisively on all the major political and cultural issues that shaped the Romantic movement, and published some of the leading writers of the day, including Coleridge, Thomas De Quincey, John Galt, Felicia Hemans, James Hogg, Walter Scott, and Mary Shelley.

'This much-needed volume reminds us not only why Blackwood's was the most influential periodical publication of the time, but also how its writers, writings, and critical agendas continue to shape so many of the scholarly concerns of Romantic studies in the twenty-first century.' - Charles Mahoney, Associate Professor, University of Connecticut, USA

List of Illustrations
Acknowledgements
Abbreviations
Notes on Contributors
'A character so various, and yet so indisputably its own': A Passage to Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine; R.Morrison & D.S.Roberts
PART I: BLACKWOOD'S AND THE PERIODICAL PRESS
Beginning Blackwood's: The Right Mix of Dulce and Ùtile; P.Flynn
John Gibson Lockhart and Blackwood's: Shaping the Romantic Periodical Press; T.Richardson
From Gluttony to Justified Sinning: Confessional Writing in Blackwood's and the London Magazine; D.Higgins
Camaraderie and Conflict: De Quincey and Wilson on Enemy Lines; R.Morrison
Selling Blackwood's Magazine, 1817-1834; D.Finkelstein
PART II: BLACKWOOD'S CULTURE AND CRITICISM
Blackwood's 'Personalities'; T.Mole
Communal Reception, Mary Shelley, and the 'Blackwood's School' of Criticism; N.Mason
Blackwoodian Allusion and the Culture of Miscellaneity; D.Stewart
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine in the Scientific Culture of Early Nineteenth-Century Edinburgh; W.Christie
The Art and Science of Politics in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, c. 1817-1841; D.Kelly
Prosing Poetry: Blackwood's and Generic Transposition, 1820-1840; J.Camlot
PART III: BLACKWOOD'S FICTIONS
Blackwood's and the Boundaries of the Short Story; T.Killick
The Edinburgh of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine and James Hogg's Fiction; G.Hughes
'The Taste for Violence in Blackwood's Magazine'; M.Schoenfield
PART IV: BLACKWOOD'S AT HOME
John Wilson and Regency Authorship; R.Cronin
John Wilson and Sport; J.Strachan
William Maginn and the Blackwood's 'Preface' of 1826; D.E.Latané, Jr.
All Work and All Play: Felicia Hemans's Edinburgh Noctes; N.Sweet
PART V: BLACKWOOD'S ABROAD
Imagining India in Early Blackwood's; D.S.Roberts
Tales of the Colonies: Blackwood's, Provincialism, and British Interests Abroad; A.Jarrells
Selected Bibliography
Index

ROBERT MORRISON is Queen's National Scholar at Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada. His book, The English Opium-Eater: A Biography of Thomas De Quincey was a finalist for the James Tait Black Prize. He has edited writings by Jane Austen, Leigh Hunt, Thomas De Quincey, and John Polidori.
DANIEL SANJIV ROBERTS is Reader in English at Queen's University Belfast, UK. His publications include a monograph, Revisionary Gleam: De Quincey, Coleridge, and the High Romantic Argument (2000), and major critical editions of Thomas De Quincey's Autobiographic Sketches and Robert Southey's The Curse of Kehama; the latter was cited as a Distinguished Scholarly Edition by the MLA. He is currently working on an edition of Charles Johnstone's novel The History of Arsaces, Prince of Betlis for the Early Irish Fiction series.

Advancing impact prediction and hypothesis testing in invasion ecology using a comparative functional response approach

Invasion ecology urgently requires predictive methodologies that can forecast the ecological impacts of existing, emerging and potential invasive species. We argue that many ecologically damaging invaders are characterised by their more efficient use of resources. Consequently, comparison of the classical ‘functional response’ (relationship between resource use and availability) between invasive and trophically analogous native species may allow prediction of invader ecological impact. We review the utility of species trait comparisons and the history and context of the use of functional responses in invasion ecology, then present our framework for the use of comparative functional responses. We show that functional response analyses, by describing the resource use of species over a range of resource availabilities, avoids many pitfalls of ‘snapshot’ assessments of resource use. Our framework demonstrates how comparisons of invader and native functional responses, within and between Type II and III functional responses, allow testing of the likely population-level outcomes of invasions for affected species. Furthermore, we describe how recent studies support the predictive capacity of this method; for example, the invasive ‘bloody red shrimp’ Hemimysis anomala shows higher Type II functional responses than native mysids and this corroborates, and could have predicted, actual invader impacts in the field. The comparative functional response method can also be used to examine differences in the impact of two or more invaders, two or more populations of the same invader, and the abiotic (e.g. temperature) and biotic (e.g. parasitism) context-dependencies of invader impacts. Our framework may also address the previous lack of rigour in testing major hypotheses in invasion ecology, such as the ‘enemy release’ and ‘biotic resistance’ hypotheses, as our approach explicitly considers demographic consequences for impacted resources, such as native and invasive prey species. We also identify potential challenges in the application of comparative functional responses in invasion ecology. These include incorporation of numerical responses, multiple predator effects and trait-mediated indirect interactions, replacement versus non-replacement study designs and the inclusion of functional responses in risk assessment frameworks. In future, the generation of sufficient case studies for a meta-analysis could test the overall hypothesis that comparative functional responses can indeed predict invasive species impacts.

To Hell with Herbert Read

Freee write manifestos by taking a pencil (or a laptop) to an historical text, usually belonging to the entwined traditions of the avant-garde and political activism. Sometimes, as Tristan Tzara advised, we choose the text according to its length, while other times, such as in this instance, we selected the text according to the conditions of the invitation that triggered the writing of the manifesto. Our manifesto ‘To Hell with Herbert Read’ was written originally as a contribution to a conference held in Manchester that took its title from Herbert Read’s book ‘To Hell with Culture’. ‘To Hell with Culture’ is a book that cuts itself off from the world whereas ‘To Hell with Herbert Read’ relocates Read’s book in a world of cultural, social, economic and political actualities that are part of common experience. Read rejects culture because he thinks it is a useless, wasteful, elitist, puffed-up, decorative supplement to the functional, factual, palpable, purposeful world of things. He is a positivist kind of modernist who presents himself as the opposite, an enemy of the status quo. He is an anarchist of a particularly bourgeois hue: he wants us all to have decent pots and pans, not the inferior ones that are supplied by market forces cheaply. Rather than taking his aim precisely to target the dominant forces of his day - the industrial capitalists and their financiers - he rejects the world and all its inhabitants. He not only despises elitist culture but popular culture too.

To Hell with Herbert Read

Freee write manifestos by taking a pencil (or a laptop) to an historical text, usually belonging to the entwined traditions of the avant-garde and political activism. Sometimes, as Tristan Tzara advised, we choose the text according to its length, while other times, such as in this instance, we selected the text according to the conditions of the invitation that triggered the writing of the manifesto. Our manifesto ‘To Hell with Herbert Read’ was written originally as a contribution to a conference held in Manchester that took its title from Herbert Read’s book ‘To Hell with Culture’. ‘To Hell with Culture’ is a book that cuts itself off from the world whereas ‘To Hell with Herbert Read’ relocates Read’s book in a world of cultural, social, economic and political actualities that are part of common experience. Read rejects culture because he thinks it is a useless, wasteful, elitist, puffed-up, decorative supplement to the functional, factual, palpable, purposeful world of things. He is a positivist kind of modernist who presents himself as the opposite, an enemy of the status quo. He is an anarchist of a particularly bourgeois hue: he wants us all to have decent pots and pans, not the inferior ones that are supplied by market forces cheaply. Rather than taking his aim precisely to target the dominant forces of his day - the industrial capitalists and their financiers - he rejects the world and all its inhabitants. He not only despises elitist culture but popular culture too.

Selecting Robust Strategies in RTS Games via Concurrent Plan Augmentation

Thesis (Master's)--University of Washington, 2015

“An Absurdly Quiet Spot”: The Spatial Justice of WW1 Fraternizations

Recent research on WW1 shows that incidents of fraternization across enemy lines took place regularly. However, fraternization remains a taboo in many contexts. The fact that the 2005 film Joyeux Noel by Christian Caron, which explicitly deals with the subject, encountered resistance from the authorities, is an indication of the kind of difficulty associated with the issue. I am drawing my inspiration from the way fraternizations are depicted in the film and in the literature in order to explore the concept of spatial justice. I define spatial justice as the question that emerges when a body desires to occupy the same space at the same time as another body. Defined like this, the question of spatial justice opens up in the dread of No Man’s Land and in particular the exchange of affects, objects and narratives that went on during fraternizations. I trace the movement of spatial justice as one of withdrawal from the asphyxiating atmosphere of the war and the propaganda machine. This withdrawal is not one of unpatriotic stance but of a courageous and difficult detachment from the supposed legality of the war that could only function on the basis of hate and demonization. While fraternizations did not end the war, they allowed for the possibility of spatial justice to emerge, as an opportunity to reorient the space and the bodies within.

Heroes on the home front : heroism and virtue in post-9/11 American cinema /

This thesis is intended to contribute to critical discussion of the American male hero in mainstream American war and action films post September 11, 2001 . The thesis investigates how these heroes' behaviour echoes a patriotic, conservative construction of the modern American as created through speeches given by George W. Bush in the wake of the events of September 11, 2001 . The thesis examines the hero in six primary sources: the war films We Were Soldiers, Behind Enemy Lines and The Great Raid and the action films Collateral Damage, Man on Fire and The Punisher. By analyzing the ideological subtext, political content, visual strategies and generic implications of the films, as well as the binary constructions of a selection of Bush speeches, and by reviewing historical representations of American male heroes on film produced in the wake of political events, the thesis concludes that the six films mobilize the USA's conservative viewpoint towards war and military action, and in concert with the speeches, contribute to an ongoing militarization of visual culture. Both systems echo a dangerous ideological fantasy of American history, life and patriotism.