Academic literature on the topic 'Continuous partial attention'

Recently a number of authors have considered general procedures for coupling stochastic systems. If the individual components of a system, when considered in isolation, are found to possess the simplifying feature of either reversibility, quasireversibility or partial balance they can be coupled in such a way that the equilibrium analysis of the system is considerably simpler than one might expect in advance. In particular the system usually exhibits a product-form equilibrium distribution and this is often insensitive to the precise specification of the individual components. It is true, however, that certain kinds of components lose their simplifying feature if the specification of the coupling procedure changes. From a practical point of view it is important, therefore, to determine if, and then under what conditions, the revelant feature is preserved.In this paper we obtain conditions under which partial balance in a component is preserved and these often amount to the requirement that there exists a quantity which is unaffected by the internal workings of the component in question. We give particular attention to the components of a stratified clustering process as these most often suffer from loss of partial balance.

Recently a number of authors have considered general procedures for coupling stochastic systems. If the individual components of a system, when considered in isolation, are found to possess the simplifying feature of either reversibility, quasireversibility or partial balance they can be coupled in such a way that the equilibrium analysis of the system is considerably simpler than one might expect in advance. In particular the system usually exhibits a product-form equilibrium distribution and this is often insensitive to the precise specification of the individual components. It is true, however, that certain kinds of components lose their simplifying feature if the specification of the coupling procedure changes. From a practical point of view it is important, therefore, to determine if, and then under what conditions, the revelant feature is preserved. In this paper we obtain conditions under which partial balance in a component is preserved and these often amount to the requirement that there exists a quantity which is unaffected by the internal workings of the component in question. We give particular attention to the components of a stratified clustering process as these most often suffer from loss of partial balance.

Reading is an essential skill that improves with practice, not just when we are learning to read but as adults. College students may be out of the habit of reading except for required texts. Deep reading skills may be eroded by habits of interrupted and partial attention. This article explores ways to promote reading among college students through the implementation of best practices from retail and marketing.

"Real continuous submodular functions, as a generalization of the corresponding discrete notion to the continuous domain, gained considerable attention recently. The analog notion for entropy functions requires additional properties: a real function defined on the non-negative orthant of $\R^n$ is entropy-like (EL) if it is submodular, takes zero at zero, non-decreasing, and has the Diminishing Returns property. Motivated by problems concerning the Shannon complexity of multipartite secret sharing, a special case of the following general optimization problem is considered: find the minimal cost of those EL functions which satisfy certain constraints. In our special case the cost of an EL function is the maximal value of the $n$ partial derivatives at zero. Another possibility could be the supremum of the function range. The constraints are specified by a smooth bounded surface $S$ cutting off a downward closed subset. An EL function is feasible if at the internal points of $S$ the left and right partial derivatives of the function differ by at least one. A general lower bound for the minimal cost is given in terms of the normals of the surface $S$. The bound is tight when $S$ is linear. In the two-dimensional case the same bound is tight for convex or concave $S$. It is shown that the optimal EL function is not necessarily unique. The paper concludes with several open problems."

Traditional computational fluid dynamics (CFD) techniques deduce the dynamic variations in flow fields by using finite elements or finite differences to solve partial differential equations. CFD usually involves several tens of thousands of grid nodes, which entail long computation times and significant computational resources. Fluid data are usually irregular data, and there will be turbulence in the flow field where the physical quantities between adjacent grid nodes are extremely nonequilibrium. We use a graph attention neural network to build a fluid simulation model (GAFM). GAFM assigns weights to adjacent node-pairs through a graph attention mechanism. In this way, it is not only possible to directly calculate the fluid data but also to adjust for nonequilibrium in vortices, especially turbulent flows. The GAFM deductively predicts the dynamic variations in flow fields by using spatiotemporally continuous sample data. A validation of the proposed GAFM against the two-dimensional (2D) flow around a cylinder confirms its high prediction accuracy. In addition, the GAFM achieves faster computation speeds than traditional CFD solvers by two to three orders of magnitude. The GAFM provides a new idea for the rapid optimization and design of fluid mechanics models and the real-time control of intelligent fluid mechanisms.

Thin coating flows inside a rotating circular cylinder are investigated when the axis of rotation is perpendicular to the direction of gravity. Attention is restricted to flows of power-law fluids having negligible inertia. Four distinct steady-state liquid-film profiles are found to be possible. Two of the cases correspond to a continuous coating, i.e. films that cover the entire inner surface of the cylinder. The other two cases involve partial films covering a limited portion of the cylinder surface. Of the two continuous films, one is the expected configuration involving a coating that gradually changes in thickness as one moves around the cylinder, the film being thicker on the ascending portion of the cylinder and thinner on the descending portion. The second continuous-film configuration has regions on the rising side of cylinder where a rapid change in depth is possible. This case also has the potential to have recirculating zones where a portion of the fluid is trapped in either one or two eddies at fixed locations on the rising side of the cylinder. Of the two partial films, one corresponds to a weakly deformed puddle at the bottom of the cylinder and is the appropriate solution at small rotation rates. The second partial film is a film which coats a portion of the ascending side of the cylinder, the extent of which depends on the film volume.

Background: In this work the behaviour of continuous steel-concrete composite beams with different shear connection distributions obtained from two design methods, i.e. Eurocode 4 and a proposed alternative approach, is analysed. Objective: For this purpose a finite element model specifically developed for the nonlinear analysis of steel-concrete composite beams is adopted. This finite element model includes material nonlinearity of slab concrete, reinforcement steel, beam steel as well as slab-beam nonlinear partial interaction due to the deformable shear connection. The inclusion of the partial interaction in the composite beam model provides information on the slab-beam interface slip and shear force and enables to model the failure of the shear connectors. Results and Conclusion: In this way it is possible to analyse and quantify the effect of shear connector distributions on the global and local response of continuous steel-concrete composite beams, both under service load levels and at collapse. Particular attention is focused on the ductility requirements on the shear connectors when varying the connection design approach and distribution.

This book is a text in microeconomics that is both challenging and “user-friendly.” The work is designed for the first-year graduate microeconomic theory course and is accessible to advanced undergraduates as well. Placing unusual emphasis on modern noncooperative game theory, it provides the student and instructor with a unified treatment of modern microeconomic theory — one that stresses the behavior of the individual actor (consumer or firm) in various institutional settings. The author has taken special pains to explore the fundamental assumptions of the theories and techniques studied, pointing out both strengths and weaknesses. The book begins with an exposition of the standard models of choice and the market, with extra attention paid to choice under uncertainty and dynamic choice. General and partial equilibrium approaches are blended, so that the student sees these approaches as points along a continuum. The work then turns to more modern developments. Readers are introduced to noncooperative game theory and shown how to model games and determine solution concepts. Models with incomplete information, the folk theorem and reputation, and bilateral bargaining are covered in depth, followed by exploration of information economics. A closing discussion concerns firms as organizations and gives readers a taste of transaction-cost economics.

Party competition for votes in free and fair elections involves complex interactions by multiple actors in political landscapes that are continuously evolving, yet classical theoretical approaches to the subject leave many important questions unanswered. This book offers the first comprehensive treatment of party competition using the computational techniques of agent-based modeling. This exciting new technology enables researchers to model competition between several different political parties for the support of voters with widely varying preferences on many different issues. The book models party competition as a true dynamic process in which political parties rise and fall, a process where different politicians attack the same political problem in very different ways, and where today's political actors, lacking perfect information about the potential consequences of their choices, must constantly adapt their behavior to yesterday's political outcomes. This book shows how agent-based modeling can be used to accurately reflect how political systems really work. It demonstrates that politicians who are satisfied with relatively modest vote shares often do better at winning votes than rivals who search ceaselessly for higher shares of the vote. It reveals that politicians who pay close attention to their personal preferences when setting party policy often have more success than opponents who focus solely on the preferences of voters, that some politicians have idiosyncratic “valence” advantages that enhance their electability—and much more.

The International Conference on Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Equality and Diversity in Sports (ICMPEDS) is organized by GESPORT with the support of the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union from the 14th to the 16th of July 2021. The conference is an excellent forum for academics, researchers, practitioners, athletes, man- agers and professionals of federations, associations and sport organizations, and those other- wise involved in sport to share and exchange ideas in different areas of sport related equality worldwide. We will keep you informed by email and post the latest information on this matter on the GESPORT website and social media. Sport and its management continues to be a field where men and masculinity strongly prevail. This conference aims to investigate the complexities attached to the following questions: What does gender openness mean in the context of sport in the 21st century? What persists as gen- der closure in the same context? What are the gender cultures that signify sport continuing to be defined by regimes that resort to a dominant masculinity embodied in a strong and athletic male body? Moreover, and albeit some exceptions, athletes, practitioners, decision and policy makers, and sports spectators are predominantly men. In this sense, gender discrimination and segregation are present in multiple aspects of sport. Some illustrations include: a) male athletes have high salaries, more career opportunities, and get more recognition by society than female athletes; b) management and leadership positions in sports organizations are mainly occupied by men, including in sports traditionally considered as feminine and which have become feminised (e.g. gymnastics and dance); c) masculinised sports and its male athletes have much more attention and recognition from the media than female athletes; d) sports journalism continues to be predominantly produced and managed by men; e) some sports spectatorships cultures are marked by rituals and interactions that resort to masculine tribalism, often leading to aggressive and violent behaviours. Gender discrimination in sport is somehow socially normalised and accepted through a dis- course that essentialises the embodied sexual differences between genders. This gender dis- course legitimises the exclusion of women in some sports modalities and traps female bodies in sociocultural constructions as less able to exercise and engage in sport, or as the second and weaker version of the ideal masculine body. However, there are signs that the context of sport may be changing. The European Union and some national governments have made an effort to promote gender equality and diversity by fostering the adoption of gender equality codes/policies in different modalities and in in- ternational and local sports organizations. These new policies aim to increase female partic- ipation and recognition in sport, their access to leadership positions and involvement in the decision-making in sport structures. Additionally, the number of women practising non-com- petitive sport and as sports spectators have started growing, leading to new representations of sport and challenging the role of women in such a context. Finally, different body constructions and the emergence of alternative embodied femininities and masculinities are also challeng- ing how athletes of both genders experience their bodies and sports practice. Yet, research is scarce about the impact of these changes/challenges in the sports context. This conference will focus on mapping gender relations in sport and its management by taking into account the different modalities, contexts, institutional policies, organizational structures and actors (e.g. athletes, spectators, media professionals, sport decision makers and man- agers). It will treat sport and its management as one avenue where gender segregation and inequality occurs, but also adopt such as a space that presents an opportunity for change and does so as a widely applicable topic whose traits and culture are reflected in organizations and work more broadly. In this sense, the conference is interested in theoretical and empirical research work that may explore, but are not limited to the following issues: • Women representativeness in sports modalities and in sport organizational structures in different countries; • Women and management accounting in sport organizations; • The gender regimes that (re)produce different sports policies, modalities, and institu- tions in sport; • The stories of resistance/conformity of women that already occupy different roles in sport contexts; • The challenges and impact of conventional and new body representations in sports institutions and including athletes of both genders; • The discourses of masculinities in sport and its effect on women and men athletes; • The emergence of nationalism and populist discourses in political and governments states and their impact on the (re)shaping of masculinity and femininity constructions in sport; • The gendered transformations of the spectators’ gaze in what concerns different sports modalities; • The effects of new groups of sports spectators on gender relations in sport; • The discourses in media and its participation in the sports gender (in)equality; • The impact of new technologies, and new practices of training/coaching in the body- work and identities of athletes of both genders.

Nationalism: Past as Prologue began as a single volume being compiled by Ad Akande, a scholar from South Africa, who proposed it to me as co-author about two years ago. The original idea was to examine how the damaging roots of nationalism have been corroding political systems around the world, and creating dangerous obstacles for necessary international cooperation. Since I (Bruce E. Johansen) has written profusely about climate change (global warming, a.k.a. infrared forcing), I suggested a concerted effort in that direction. This is a worldwide existential threat that affects every living thing on Earth. It often compounds upon itself, so delays in reducing emissions of fossil fuels are shortening the amount of time remaining to eliminate the use of fossil fuels to preserve a livable planet. Nationalism often impedes solutions to this problem (among many others), as nations place their singular needs above the common good. Our initial proposal got around, and abstracts on many subjects arrived. Within a few weeks, we had enough good material for a 100,000-word book. The book then fattened to two moderate volumes and then to four two very hefty tomes. We tried several different titles as good submissions swelled. We also discovered that our best contributors were experts in their fields, which ranged the world. We settled on three stand-alone books:” 1/ nationalism and racial justice. Our first volume grew as the growth of Black Lives Matter following the brutal killing of George Floyd ignited protests over police brutality and other issues during 2020, following the police assassination of Floyd in Minneapolis. It is estimated that more people took part in protests of police brutality during the summer of 2020 than any other series of marches in United States history. This includes upheavals during the 1960s over racial issues and against the war in Southeast Asia (notably Vietnam). We choose a volume on racism because it is one of nationalism’s main motive forces. This volume provides a worldwide array of work on nationalism’s growth in various countries, usually by authors residing in them, or in the United States with ethnic ties to the nation being examined, often recent immigrants to the United States from them. Our roster of contributors comprises a small United Nations of insightful, well-written research and commentary from Indonesia, New Zealand, Australia, China, India, South Africa, France, Portugal, Estonia, Hungary, Russia, Poland, Kazakhstan, Georgia, and the United States. Volume 2 (this one) describes and analyzes nationalism, by country, around the world, except for the United States; and 3/material directly related to President Donald Trump, and the United States. The first volume is under consideration at the Texas A & M University Press. The other two are under contract to Nova Science Publishers (which includes social sciences). These three volumes may be used individually or as a set. Environmental material is taken up in appropriate places in each of the three books. * * * * * What became the United States of America has been strongly nationalist since the English of present-day Massachusetts and Jamestown first hit North America’s eastern shores. The country propelled itself across North America with the self-serving ideology of “manifest destiny” for four centuries before Donald Trump came along. Anyone who believes that a Trumpian affection for deportation of “illegals” is a new thing ought to take a look at immigration and deportation statistics in Adam Goodman’s The Deportation Machine: America’s Long History of Deporting Immigrants (Princeton University Press, 2020). Between 1920 and 2018, the United States deported 56.3 million people, compared with 51.7 million who were granted legal immigration status during the same dates. Nearly nine of ten deportees were Mexican (Nolan, 2020, 83). This kind of nationalism, has become an assassin of democracy as well as an impediment to solving global problems. Paul Krugman wrote in the New York Times (2019:A-25): that “In their 2018 book, How Democracies Die, the political scientists Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt documented how this process has played out in many countries, from Vladimir Putin’s Russia, to Recep Erdogan’s Turkey, to Viktor Orban’s Hungary. Add to these India’s Narendra Modi, China’s Xi Jinping, and the United States’ Donald Trump, among others. Bit by bit, the guardrails of democracy have been torn down, as institutions meant to serve the public became tools of ruling parties and self-serving ideologies, weaponized to punish and intimidate opposition parties’ opponents. On paper, these countries are still democracies; in practice, they have become one-party regimes….And it’s happening here [the United States] as we speak. If you are not worried about the future of American democracy, you aren’t paying attention” (Krugmam, 2019, A-25). We are reminded continuously that the late Carl Sagan, one of our most insightful scientific public intellectuals, had an interesting theory about highly developed civilizations. Given the number of stars and planets that must exist in the vast reaches of the universe, he said, there must be other highly developed and organized forms of life. Distance may keep us from making physical contact, but Sagan said that another reason we may never be on speaking terms with another intelligent race is (judging from our own example) could be their penchant for destroying themselves in relatively short order after reaching technological complexity. This book’s chapters, introduction, and conclusion examine the worldwide rise of partisan nationalism and the damage it has wrought on the worldwide pursuit of solutions for issues requiring worldwide scope, such scientific co-operation public health and others, mixing analysis of both. We use both historical description and analysis. This analysis concludes with a description of why we must avoid the isolating nature of nationalism that isolates people and encourages separation if we are to deal with issues of world-wide concern, and to maintain a sustainable, survivable Earth, placing the dominant political movement of our time against the Earth’s existential crises. Our contributors, all experts in their fields, each have assumed responsibility for a country, or two if they are related. This work entwines themes of worldwide concern with the political growth of nationalism because leaders with such a worldview are disinclined to co-operate internationally at a time when nations must find ways to solve common problems, such as the climate crisis. Inability to cooperate at this stage may doom everyone, eventually, to an overheated, stormy future plagued by droughts and deluges portending shortages of food and other essential commodities, meanwhile destroying large coastal urban areas because of rising sea levels. Future historians may look back at our time and wonder why as well as how our world succumbed to isolating nationalism at a time when time was so short for cooperative intervention which is crucial for survival of a sustainable earth. Pride in language and culture is salubrious to individuals’ sense of history and identity. Excess nationalism that prevents international co-operation on harmful worldwide maladies is quite another. As Pope Francis has pointed out: For all of our connectivity due to expansion of social media, ability to communicate can breed contempt as well as mutual trust. “For all our hyper-connectivity,” said Francis, “We witnessed a fragmentation that made it more difficult to resolve problems that affect us all” (Horowitz, 2020, A-12). The pope’s encyclical, titled “Brothers All,” also said: “The forces of myopic, extremist, resentful, and aggressive nationalism are on the rise.” The pope’s document also advocates support for migrants, as well as resistance to nationalist and tribal populism. Francis broadened his critique to the role of market capitalism, as well as nationalism has failed the peoples of the world when they need co-operation and solidarity in the face of the world-wide corona virus pandemic. Humankind needs to unite into “a new sense of the human family [Fratelli Tutti, “Brothers All”], that rejects war at all costs” (Pope, 2020, 6-A). Our journey takes us first to Russia, with the able eye and honed expertise of Richard D. Anderson, Jr. who teaches as UCLA and publishes on the subject of his chapter: “Putin, Russian identity, and Russia’s conduct at home and abroad.” Readers should find Dr. Anderson’s analysis fascinating because Vladimir Putin, the singular leader of Russian foreign and domestic policy these days (and perhaps for the rest of his life, given how malleable Russia’s Constitution has become) may be a short man physically, but has high ambitions. One of these involves restoring the old Russian (and Soviet) empire, which would involve re-subjugating a number of nations that broke off as the old order dissolved about 30 years ago. President (shall we say czar?) Putin also has international ambitions, notably by destabilizing the United States, where election meddling has become a specialty. The sight of Putin and U.S. president Donald Trump, two very rich men (Putin $70-$200 billion; Trump $2.5 billion), nuzzling in friendship would probably set Thomas Jefferson and Vladimir Lenin spinning in their graves. The road of history can take some unanticipated twists and turns. Consider Poland, from which we have an expert native analysis in chapter 2, Bartosz Hlebowicz, who is a Polish anthropologist and journalist. His piece is titled “Lawless and Unjust: How to Quickly Make Your Own Country a Puppet State Run by a Group of Hoodlums – the Hopeless Case of Poland (2015–2020).” When I visited Poland to teach and lecture twice between 2006 and 2008, most people seemed to be walking on air induced by freedom to conduct their own affairs to an unusual degree for a state usually squeezed between nationalists in Germany and Russia. What did the Poles then do in a couple of decades? Read Hlebowicz’ chapter and decide. It certainly isn’t soft-bellied liberalism. In Chapter 3, with Bruce E. Johansen, we visit China’s western provinces, the lands of Tibet as well as the Uighurs and other Muslims in the Xinjiang region, who would most assuredly resent being characterized as being possessed by the Chinese of the Han to the east. As a student of Native American history, I had never before thought of the Tibetans and Uighurs as Native peoples struggling against the Independence-minded peoples of a land that is called an adjunct of China on most of our maps. The random act of sitting next to a young woman on an Air India flight out of Hyderabad, bound for New Delhi taught me that the Tibetans had something to share with the Lakota, the Iroquois, and hundreds of other Native American states and nations in North America. Active resistance to Chinese rule lasted into the mid-nineteenth century, and continues today in a subversive manner, even in song, as I learned in 2018 when I acted as a foreign adjudicator on a Ph.D. dissertation by a Tibetan student at the University of Madras (in what is now in a city called Chennai), in southwestern India on resistance in song during Tibet’s recent history. Tibet is one of very few places on Earth where a young dissident can get shot to death for singing a song that troubles China’s Quest for Lebensraum. The situation in Xinjiang region, where close to a million Muslims have been interned in “reeducation” camps surrounded with brick walls and barbed wire. They sing, too. Come with us and hear the music. Back to Europe now, in Chapter 4, to Portugal and Spain, we find a break in the general pattern of nationalism. Portugal has been more progressive governmentally than most. Spain varies from a liberal majority to military coups, a pattern which has been exported to Latin America. A situation such as this can make use of the term “populism” problematic, because general usage in our time usually ties the word into a right-wing connotative straightjacket. “Populism” can be used to describe progressive (left-wing) insurgencies as well. José Pinto, who is native to Portugal and also researches and writes in Spanish as well as English, in “Populism in Portugal and Spain: a Real Neighbourhood?” provides insight into these historical paradoxes. Hungary shares some historical inclinations with Poland (above). Both emerged from Soviet dominance in an air of developing freedom and multicultural diversity after the Berlin Wall fell and the Soviet Union collapsed. Then, gradually at first, right wing-forces began to tighten up, stripping structures supporting popular freedom, from the courts, mass media, and other institutions. In Chapter 5, Bernard Tamas, in “From Youth Movement to Right-Liberal Wing Authoritarianism: The Rise of Fidesz and the Decline of Hungarian Democracy” puts the renewed growth of political and social repression into a context of worldwide nationalism. Tamas, an associate professor of political science at Valdosta State University, has been a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University and a Fulbright scholar at the Central European University in Budapest, Hungary. His books include From Dissident to Party Politics: The Struggle for Democracy in Post-Communist Hungary (2007). Bear in mind that not everyone shares Orbán’s vision of what will make this nation great, again. On graffiti-covered walls in Budapest, Runes (traditional Hungarian script) has been found that read “Orbán is a motherfucker” (Mikanowski, 2019, 58). Also in Europe, in Chapter 6, Professor Ronan Le Coadic, of the University of Rennes, Rennes, France, in “Is There a Revival of French Nationalism?” Stating this title in the form of a question is quite appropriate because France’s nationalistic shift has built and ebbed several times during the last few decades. For a time after 2000, it came close to assuming the role of a substantial minority, only to ebb after that. In 2017, the candidate of the National Front reached the second round of the French presidential election. This was the second time this nationalist party reached the second round of the presidential election in the history of the Fifth Republic. In 2002, however, Jean-Marie Le Pen had only obtained 17.79% of the votes, while fifteen years later his daughter, Marine Le Pen, almost doubled her father's record, reaching 33.90% of the votes cast. Moreover, in the 2019 European elections, re-named Rassemblement National obtained the largest number of votes of all French political formations and can therefore boast of being "the leading party in France.” The brutality of oppressive nationalism may be expressed in personal relationships, such as child abuse. While Indonesia and Aotearoa [the Maoris’ name for New Zealand] hold very different ranks in the United Nations Human Development Programme assessments, where Indonesia is classified as a medium development country and Aotearoa New Zealand as a very high development country. In Chapter 7, “Domestic Violence Against Women in Indonesia and Aotearoa New Zealand: Making Sense of Differences and Similarities” co-authors, in Chapter 8, Mandy Morgan and Dr. Elli N. Hayati, from New Zealand and Indonesia respectively, found that despite their socio-economic differences, one in three women in each country experience physical or sexual intimate partner violence over their lifetime. In this chapter ther authors aim to deepen understandings of domestic violence through discussion of the socio-economic and demographic characteristics of theit countries to address domestic violence alongside studies of women’s attitudes to gender norms and experiences of intimate partner violence. One of the most surprising and upsetting scholarly journeys that a North American student may take involves Adolf Hitler’s comments on oppression of American Indians and Blacks as he imagined the construction of the Nazi state, a genesis of nationalism that is all but unknown in the United States of America, traced in this volume (Chapter 8) by co-editor Johansen. Beginning in Mein Kampf, during the 1920s, Hitler explicitly used the westward expansion of the United States across North America as a model and justification for Nazi conquest and anticipated colonization by Germans of what the Nazis called the “wild East” – the Slavic nations of Poland, the Baltic states, Ukraine, and Russia, most of which were under control of the Soviet Union. The Volga River (in Russia) was styled by Hitler as the Germans’ Mississippi, and covered wagons were readied for the German “manifest destiny” of imprisoning, eradicating, and replacing peoples the Nazis deemed inferior, all with direct references to events in North America during the previous century. At the same time, with no sense of contradiction, the Nazis partook of a long-standing German romanticism of Native Americans. One of Goebbels’ less propitious schemes was to confer honorary Aryan status on Native American tribes, in the hope that they would rise up against their oppressors. U.S. racial attitudes were “evidence [to the Nazis] that America was evolving in the right direction, despite its specious rhetoric about equality.” Ming Xie, originally from Beijing, in the People’s Republic of China, in Chapter 9, “News Coverage and Public Perceptions of the Social Credit System in China,” writes that The State Council of China in 2014 announced “that a nationwide social credit system would be established” in China. “Under this system, individuals, private companies, social organizations, and governmental agencies are assigned a score which will be calculated based on their trustworthiness and daily actions such as transaction history, professional conduct, obedience to law, corruption, tax evasion, and academic plagiarism.” The “nationalism” in this case is that of the state over the individual. China has 1.4 billion people; this system takes their measure for the purpose of state control. Once fully operational, control will be more subtle. People who are subject to it, through modern technology (most often smart phones) will prompt many people to self-censor. Orwell, modernized, might write: “Your smart phone is watching you.” Ming Xie holds two Ph.Ds, one in Public Administration from University of Nebraska at Omaha and another in Cultural Anthropology from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing, where she also worked for more than 10 years at a national think tank in the same institution. While there she summarized news from non-Chinese sources for senior members of the Chinese Communist Party. Ming is presently an assistant professor at the Department of Political Science and Criminal Justice, West Texas A&M University. In Chapter 10, analyzing native peoples and nationhood, Barbara Alice Mann, Professor of Honours at the University of Toledo, in “Divide, et Impera: The Self-Genocide Game” details ways in which European-American invaders deprive the conquered of their sense of nationhood as part of a subjugation system that amounts to genocide, rubbing out their languages and cultures -- and ultimately forcing the native peoples to assimilate on their own, for survival in a culture that is foreign to them. Mann is one of Native American Studies’ most acute critics of conquests’ contradictions, and an author who retrieves Native history with a powerful sense of voice and purpose, having authored roughly a dozen books and numerous book chapters, among many other works, who has traveled around the world lecturing and publishing on many subjects. Nalanda Roy and S. Mae Pedron in Chapter 11, “Understanding the Face of Humanity: The Rohingya Genocide.” describe one of the largest forced migrations in the history of the human race, the removal of 700,000 to 800,000 Muslims from Buddhist Myanmar to Bangladesh, which itself is already one of the most crowded and impoverished nations on Earth. With about 150 million people packed into an area the size of Nebraska and Iowa (population less than a tenth that of Bangladesh, a country that is losing land steadily to rising sea levels and erosion of the Ganges river delta. The Rohingyas’ refugee camp has been squeezed onto a gigantic, eroding, muddy slope that contains nearly no vegetation. However, Bangladesh is majority Muslim, so while the Rohingya may starve, they won’t be shot to death by marauding armies. Both authors of this exquisite (and excruciating) account teach at Georgia Southern University in Savannah, Georgia, Roy as an associate professor of International Studies and Asian politics, and Pedron as a graduate student; Roy originally hails from very eastern India, close to both Myanmar and Bangladesh, so he has special insight into the context of one of the most brutal genocides of our time, or any other. This is our case describing the problems that nationalism has and will pose for the sustainability of the Earth as our little blue-and-green orb becomes more crowded over time. The old ways, in which national arguments often end in devastating wars, are obsolete, given that the Earth and all the people, plants, and other animals that it sustains are faced with the existential threat of a climate crisis that within two centuries, more or less, will flood large parts of coastal cities, and endanger many species of plants and animals. To survive, we must listen to the Earth, and observe her travails, because they are increasingly our own.

At the core of this chapter lies Zhu Xi’s idea of “reverential attention”—what Zhu means, why it is so important, and how he taught his students to practice it. More generally, Confucians tell us that we should focus on things over which we have some significant control. We have at best indirect and partial control over the results of our actions; but we can work on how we are poised to react to the situations we encounter. If we can get ourselves to attend—perhaps by expending psychic resources, as in English the term “pay attention” implies—then we should notice and give due weight to relevant factors and be more likely to respond appropriately. A central point of reverential attention is how it enables us to actively attend without paying a continuous psychic cost.

The complexity of the Internet has increased the requirement of learner's self-cognition, self-control and self-responsibility when using Internet to learn. Thus, responsibility of e-learner to decide on the validity, reliability and meaningfulness of the information steadily increased. This situation has caused internet related issues such as problematic Internet use, Internet addiction, cognitive overload, disorientation, continuous partial attention and information pollution on the Internet. The purpose of this study is to provide practical strategies for e-learners' Internet related current issues. This study presented in three steps. At the first step, problematic Internet use and addiction, cognitive overload, disorientation, continuous partial attention and Internet information pollution was discussed as Internet related current issues of e-learners. At the second step, increase of Internet literacy, Internet search strategies, using computational knowledge engines, and benefit from Semantic Web presented as practical strategies for e-learners. At the end of study related conclusions provided.

Frank O’Hara’s work at the “Museum of Modern Art” is read as marking a moment when the subversive potential of distraction was refolded back into the logic of vocational modernity—ultimately becoming refigured as a new hyper-self-conscious mode of depoliticized productivity (O’Hara’s preoccupied persona on the page fell well within the remit of his cosmopolitan profession). The coda ends with a discussion of the ways in which “continuous partial attention” and the new “flexibility” might be resisted (particularly within the academy), and reflects on how the possibilities of a living sensuous activity might fall outside the divisive logic of market-driven productivity and be reaffirmed..

The importance of Cassava in the food systems of Ghanaians cannot be underestimated. As a main staple crop, Cassava contributes about 22% and 30% to the Agricultural Gross Domestic Product (AGDP) and daily calories intake respectively. Per capita consumption of 152 kg makes it the highest among all food crops. Due to Cassava’s importance, there have been lots of attention paid to it by the Government and Donor agencies towards its improvement. This has yielded substantial results in terms of the development of cassava varieties and good agronomic practices. This chapter reviewed cassava technologies development in Ghana, adoption of these technologies by smallholder farmers, and livelihood implications. Results generated showed that Research and Development since 1993 has developed, released, and disseminated 25 new cassava varieties to smallholder farmers. Average cassava yields have increased from about 14 t/ha in 2009 to 21 t/ha in 2018. Partial budget analysis showed that smallholder farmers’ profitability has increased over the years from GH₵644.32 (about US$ 111) in 2009 to GH₵5243.27 (about US$ 904) in 2018. Again, the crop is gradually gaining attention as an industrial crop for flour, starch, and alcohol production, a drive that would further improve on returns to farmers. It is a food security crop because it is robust, produces more per unit area, and versatile for multiple usages in household foods and derivatives. It is recommended that continuous policy consideration on cassava in national agricultural agenda setting is essential.

Information and computer security are gaining continuous attention in the context of modern organizations across all domains of human activities. Emphasizing on behavioral factors toward the applicability of security measures and practices is an area under research, aiming to look beyond the strict technical peculiarities and investigate human attitudes in regards to security consciousness and familiarity. The aim of this chapter is to shed light on those aspects in relation with healthcare, by empirically assessing the intention of undergraduate nursing students to apply security concepts and practices. A research theoretical framework is proposed based on an empirical synthesis of constructs adopted from well established theories as the Health Belief Model and the Protection Motivation Theory along with a variety of previous research works. The model is then empirically tested and validated against a sample of 149 undergraduate nursing students. Data analysis was performed using partial least squares. The research findings highlighted the significant effects of perceived benefits, general security orientation and self-efficacy to behavioral intention along with the positive effect of general controllability to self-efficacy of nursing students in applying security concepts and practices, whereas a series of other constructs did not prove to be significant. The study outcomes contribute to further observations related with behavioral security. Despite the fact that the current empirical study was conducted under a specific context and settings, implications are discussed, regarding the security readiness of nursing students prior their engagement to a real healthcare environment.

This chapter discusses the importance of production clusters and entrepreneurial firms continuously generating innovation if they are to sustain their long-term competitiveness in today’s global economy. The study of the complexity brought about by globalization has been investigated by the Global Value Chain (GVC) framework, which has improved the understanding of how clusters and firms compete globally. However, neither the cluster theory nor the GVC framework address firms’ innovation through an explicit dynamic perspective and dedicate only partial attention to the role of entrepreneurial ventures. This chapter draws on elements from the developing entrepreneurial ecosystems literature to complement the cluster-GVC perspective and offers a finer-grained approach to the study of innovation in the global economy.

This chapter provides an analysis of party system attention to European integration. The expectation based on the issue incentive model was that large, mainstream parties were not interested in, and largely able to avoid the issue becoming an important issue on the party system agenda despite pressure from EU-sceptic issue entrepreneurs. This expectation was, by and large, confirmed. European integration continues to play a rather limited role on the party system agenda. Even events like the European debt crisis, which can be used by issue entrepreneurs to push the issue on the party system agenda, may generate ‘punctuations’, but not a stable position of the issue as important on the party system agenda. The deepening and broadening of the European Union has only led to a limited increase in the party system attention. Furthermore, referendums only function as alternative venues of attention if they have dramatic results like Brexit.

Aircraft maintenance routing (AMR) is one of the most studied problems in the airline industry and has gained much attention. The aim of this chapter is to solve a mathematical formulation of the daily AMR problem, which aims to minimize the routing cost while incorporating the risk of unscheduled maintenance. This predictive model requires the optimization algorithm to both assure the feasibility of the solution and to continuously track unscheduled maintenance events. To address these issues, the authors propose a hybrid solution approach with two main contributions: it examines the use of a binary version of particle swarm optimization (PSO) adapted to this constrained optimization problem, and it consists of using an adaptive mutation operator designed to deal with unscheduled maintenance.

Chapter 5 adopts the framework suggested by Partha Chatterjee for the study of popular culture wherein the critical focus is on disciplinary practices rather than underlying beliefs or concepts. Therefore, it continues the previous chapter’s reflections on affect and embodiment through an anthropology of film-making and film-screening practices. Drawing on biographies and memoirs of film-makers and actors as well as personal interviews it tracks the debates within the disciplinary field of cinema and brings into view the diversity of perceptions and changing production and performance practices when it comes to representing divinity and religiosity. It also pays special attention to the unique modes of publicity and tailor-made marketing strategies adopted for these religious genres.

Having been overlooked for a long time, the importance of literacy competence for successful participation in education is currently gaining attention and practical implementation in many countries. However, despite the linguistic diversity of the classrooms and the so-called multilingual turn in research, the fostering of literacy skills often continues to focus on the monolingual perspective of the majority language, thus overlooking vast multilingual potential. This approach is rooted at different levels of the educational systems. For teachers, who play a key role in promoting literacy development, this is partially due to respective monolingual orientation in teacher education and a lack of (systematic) implementation of applicable methods and examples. This chapter addresses this issue by presenting a synopsis of possible approaches of preparing teachers to foster multilingual literacy. Although all this is done using Germany as an example, the elements can be transferred to other contexts and formats of teacher training courses.

Abstract. Continuous extraction of sand is having a huge impact on the natural river beds which has resulted in lowering of water table and a decrease in the amount of sediment supply. Despite the quantity of sand used in our day-to-day activities, our dependence on sand is significantly increasing. The use of manufactured sand as a fine aggregate in concrete draws the attention of many investigators and researchers. The present investigation includes the study of soundness and EDAX .The test results depicted that for M-sand substituted concrete the loss of weight, when subjected to alternate cycles of freezing and thawing when tested with magnesium and sodium sulphate solution was found to be less when compared with natural sand. The important observation is that the inclusion of manufactured sand in concrete reduces the pores present in concrete resulting in matrix densification and makes the concrete impermeable and substantially reduces the rate of oxygen diffusion and reduces the corrosion process as well. This paper also focuses on the effect of manufactured sand as a fine aggregate in the elastic and bond characteristics of concrete.

Abstract With hydrocarbon targets becoming more inaccessible and further away from the marketplace, the need for operative fault monitoring process for continuous pipeline operation is attracting renewed attention. Dependable evacuation process is essential in managing the volatile hydrocarbon products demand-supply drivers. Pipeline remains the most robust method for full and/or partial transportation of fluids from source to the market/processing place and its reliability is integral to achieving this objective. This study examines the phenomena of a new leakage detection technique in subsea pipelines. The numerical modeling of transient pipe flow based on method of characteristics is initiated by closing the pipe downstream valve. The time history of pressure fluctuation measured as a downstream boundary condition showed that when compared with equal magnitude and spaced pressure signals of the leak free pipeline, damaged pipeline will have changing sinusoidal patterned pressure signals due to the presence of leaky nodes.

Natural convection in partially porous cavities driven by buoyancy force has been given the attention in this paper. Two-domain model with continuous or discontinuous interfacial conditions and One-equation model with heterogeneous interface region were analyzed. FEM with weak constraint condition was applied to solve the differential governing equations. The influence of stress jump conditions at fluid/porous interface on flow and heat transfer in two-domain model was compared with that of heterogeneous interface region in one-domain model. Numerical results showed that vertical velocity was different near the interface for continuous and discontinuous interfacial conditions. And variation of porosity and permeability in the interface region also lead to difference of vertical velocity. The influence on Nusselt number was slight.

Particle transport and deposition in a turbulent channel flow simulated by the Large Eddy simulations (LES) were studied. Particular attention was paid to the effect of subgrid scales (SGS) turbulence fluctuation on particle motion. Finite volume method was used for finding instantaneous filtered fluid velocity fields of LES of the continuous phase in the channel. Selective structure function model was used to account for the subgrid-scale Reynolds stresses. It was shown that the LES was capable of capturing the turbulence near wall coherent eddy structures. Particle motions were investigated using a Lagrangian particle tracking approach with inclusion of the Stokes drag, lift, Brownian and gravity forces. Effects of SGS of turbulence fluctuations on deposition rate of different size particles were studied. It was shown that the inclusion of the SGS turbulence fluctuations improves the model predictions for particle deposition rate especially for small particles.

Time-dependent simulations of a particle-laden swirl flow in a pipe expansion based on the Euler-Lagrange approach are presented. Two equation and Reynolds Stress Models were used in the calculation of turbulent quantities in the continuous phase. Additional attention was payed to the influence of particle dispersion. The instantaneous fluid velocities seen by the particles was reconstructed by different dispersion models. To come to a time dependant solution for the Euler-Lagrange approach, a quasi-unsteady approach is taken. This results in a calculational scheme where one Eulerian time-step is divided in a number of Lagrangian steps. Particle source term are sampled which represent the influence of the disperse phase on the flow field. which call for additional coupling within one Eulerian time step. The effect of inter-particle collisions on the movement of the disperse phase is accounted for using a stochastic inter-particle collision model. Special interest of this study was the formation of dust ropes which are observed in such flows.

Abstract In the analysis of complex phenomena of acoustic systems, the computational modeling requires special attention for a realistic representation of the physics. As a powerful tool, the finite element method has been widely used in the study of complex systems. In order to capture the important physical phenomena, p-finite elements and/or hp-finite elements are employed. The reproducing kernel particle methods (RKPM) are emerging as an effective alternative due to the elimination of a mesh, and the ability to analyze a specific frequency range. Additionally, a wavelet particle method based on the multiresolution analysis encountered in signal processing has been developed. The interpolation functions consist of spline functions with built-in window. A variation in the size of the window implies a geometrical refinement, and allows the filtering of the desired frequency range. Preliminary analysis of the wave equation shows the effectiveness of this approach. The frequency/wave number relationship of the continuum case can be closely simulated by using the reproducing kernel particle methods. A similar methodology is also developed for the Timoshenko beam.

Reactive precipitation in micro- and minichannels currently draws attention of both, chemists and engineers in the field of micro process engineering. Due to intensified mixing and improved heat and mass transfer, fast chemical and thermodynamical processes involved in precipitation can be controlled readily in micro or mini structures. Particularly microchannels are a promising technology for particulate processes allowing continuous operation along with little or no backmixing. However, the sensitivity of microscale channels to blocking and fouling requires careful design and appropriate peripheral equipment. This study presents experimental results of barium sulfate precipitation from barium chloride solution and sulfuric acid in both, T-shaped and injection micromixers. The measured particle size distributions (PSD) are characterized by their first and second moment, reflecting the correlation between fluidic mixing and precipitation: faster mixing results in smaller mean particle sizes (1st moment of the PSD). The homogeneity of the mixing process on the other hand should have impact onto the width of the distribution (2nd moment of the PSD) due to superposition of locally formed particles to the global size distribution. The experimental particle size distributions are compared with simulations based on reduced-order modeling of the diffusive mixing process, coupled with the population balance for particle nucleation and growth. While the simulated size distributions have mean diameters between 40 nm and 68 nm, experimental data are between 90 nm and 130 nm.

The main objective of this research is to collect statistical information concerning momentum phase coupling between the continuous phase and a single air bubble in turbulent flow in a horizontal pipe, and to develop data that can be used for the verification of numerical modeling efforts. In comparison with vertical pipe bubble flow, horizontal bubble flow has received less attention, especially from the experimental side. Thus, an experimental investigation of bubble behaviour in a horizontal square pipe was performed. Tracking of a single bubble released in water flow in a 56.8 mm × 56.8 mm square pipe was performed to provide a basis for characterizing the behaviour of the single bubble in turbulent pipe flow. A Shack Hartman Wavefront Sensor and a High Speed Video Camera were used to collect images at various points downstream from the bubble injection point, providing information on bubble size, velocity, and spatial location as a function of Reynolds number. Velocity profile information of the continuous phase was collected using Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) in order to perform a complete characterization of the flow. The data collected using PIV coupled with the analysis of the three-dimensional trajectory of a single bubble provides information about parameters such as a gas slippage velocity with the fluid phase and bubble distribution as a function of both Reynolds number and mean velocity profile.

Abstract CO2 absorption performance in gas-liquid system is affected by nanoparticles. The enhancement mechanisms involved have been extensively paid attention. The CO2 gas bubble behaviors and the characteristics of the nanoparticle motion have been clarified in the present study. The equivalent substitution method is used to regard the liquid with nanoparticles as a continuous term with changed physical properties, that is, nanofluid. Therefore, the volume-of-fluid (VOF) method is employed to well predict the gas bubble behaviors and mass transfer coefficient in nanofluid. It is found that the mass transfer coefficient in the gas-liquid system for CO2 absorption can be significantly enhanced by Al2O3 nanoparticles. With the increase of nanoparticles volume concentration, the surface renewal frequency increases dramatically. The discrete-particle-method (DPM) is adopted to track the motion of nanoparticles. In this way, the deformation of the bubbles and the motion of the nanoparticle are well captured. It is concluded that the enhanced mass transfer coefficient in gas-liquid-nanoparticle system is not only related to the Brownian motion of the particles, but also related to the nanoparticle deduced turbulence in the liquid field.

The academic performance of engineering students continues to receive attention in the literature. Despite that, there is a lack of studies in the literature investigating the simultaneous relationship between students' systems thinking (ST) skills, Five-Factor Model (FFM) personality traits, proactive personality scale, academic, demographic, family background factors, and their potential impact on academic performance. Three established instruments, namely, ST skills instrument with seven dimensions, FFM traits with five dimensions, and proactive personality with one dimension, along with a demographic survey, have been administrated for data collection. A cross-sectional web-based study applying Qualtrics has been developed to gather data from engineering students. To demonstrate the prediction power of the ST skills, FFM traits, proactive personality, academic, demographics, and family background factors on the academic performance of engineering students, two unsupervised learning algorithms applied. The study results identify that these unsupervised algorithms succeeded to cluster engineering students' performance regarding primary skills and characteristics. In other words, the variables used in this study are able to predict the academic performance of engineering students. This study also has provided significant implications and contributions to engineering education and education sustainable development bodies of knowledge. First, the study presents a better perception of engineering students' academic performance. The aim is to assist educators, teachers, mentors, college authorities, and other involved parties to discover students' individual differences for a more efficient education and guidance environment. Second, by a closer examination at the level of systemic thinking and its connection with FFM traits, proactive personality, academic, and demographic characteristics, understanding engineering students' skillset would be assisted better in the domain of sustainable education.