Compares gangs & cults, examining the risky-shift phenomenon, the group-think effect, the concept of collective moral neutralization, & the dependency-critical thinking effect. Project GANGECON ...survey & other data are analyzed to examine the effect that violence from within the gang has on its members. Other concepts include the coerced-motivation phenomenon & the how the cult & gang conversion processes are almost identical. The matter of reconciling free will & mind control in the gang is considered. 6 Tables, 2 Figures, 44 References. Adapted from the source document.
Abstract
We perform the first simultaneous Bayesian parameter inference and optimal reconstruction of the gravitational lensing of the cosmic microwave background (CMB), using 100 deg
2
of ...polarization observations from the SPTpol receiver on the South Pole Telescope. These data reach noise levels as low as 5.8
μ
K arcmin in polarization, which are low enough that the typically used quadratic estimator (QE) technique for analyzing CMB lensing is significantly suboptimal. Conversely, the Bayesian procedure extracts all lensing information from the data and is optimal at any noise level. We infer the amplitude of the gravitational lensing potential to be
A
ϕ
=
0.949
±
0.122
using the Bayesian pipeline, consistent with our QE pipeline result, but with 17% smaller error bars. The Bayesian analysis also provides a simple way to account for systematic uncertainties, performing a similar job as frequentist “bias hardening” or linear bias correction, and reducing the systematic uncertainty on
A
ϕ
due to polarization calibration from almost half of the statistical error to effectively zero. Finally, we jointly constrain
A
ϕ
along with
A
L
, the amplitude of lensing-like effects on the CMB power spectra, demonstrating that the Bayesian method can be used to easily infer parameters both from an optimal lensing reconstruction and from the delensed CMB, while exactly accounting for the correlation between the two. These results demonstrate the feasibility of the Bayesian approach on real data, and pave the way for future analysis of deep CMB polarization measurements with SPT-3G, Simons Observatory, and CMB-S4, where improvements relative to the QE can reach 1.5 times tighter constraints on
A
ϕ
and seven times lower effective lensing reconstruction noise.
Gravitational lensing of the cosmic microwave background generates a curl pattern in the observed polarization. This "B-mode" signal provides a measure of the projected mass distribution over the ...entire observable Universe and also acts as a contaminant for the measurement of primordial gravity-wave signals. In this Letter we present the first detection of gravitational lensing B modes, using first-season data from the polarization-sensitive receiver on the South Pole Telescope (SPTpol). We construct a template for the lensing B-mode signal by combining E-mode polarization measured by SPTpol with estimates of the lensing potential from a Herschel-SPIRE map of the cosmic infrared background. We compare this template to the B modes measured directly by SPTpol, finding a nonzero correlation at 7.7σ significance. The correlation has an amplitude and scale dependence consistent with theoretical expectations, is robust with respect to analysis choices, and constitutes the first measurement of a powerful cosmological observable.
We present measurements of the E-mode polarization angular auto-power spectrum (EE) and temperature-E-mode cross-power spectrum (TE) of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) using 150 GHz data from ...three seasons of SPTpol observations. We report the power spectra over the spherical harmonic multipole range and detect nine acoustic peaks in the EE spectrum with high signal-to-noise ratio. These measurements are the most sensitive to date of the EE and TE power spectra at and , respectively. The observations cover 500 , a fivefold increase in area compared to previous SPTpol analyses, which increases our sensitivity to the photon diffusion damping tail of the CMB power spectra enabling tighter constraints on ΛCDM model extensions. After masking all sources with unpolarized flux mJy, we place a 95% confidence upper limit on residual polarized point-source power of at , suggesting that the EE damping tail dominates foregrounds to at least with modest source masking. We find that the SPTpol data set is in mild tension with the ΛCDM model ( ), and different data splits prefer parameter values that differ at the level. When fitting SPTpol data at , we find cosmological parameter constraints consistent with those for Planck temperature. Including SPTpol data at results in a preference for a higher value of the expansion rate ( ) and a lower value for present-day density fluctuations ( ).
We study the consistency of 150 GHz data from the South Pole Telescope (SPT) and 143 GHz data from the Planck satellite over the patch of sky covered by the SPT-SZ survey. We first visually compare ...the maps and find that the residuals appear consistent with noise after accounting for differences in angular resolution and filtering. We then calculate (1) the cross-spectrum between two independent halves of SPT data, (2) the cross-spectrum between two independent halves of Planck data, and (3) the cross-spectrum between SPT and Planck data. We find that the three cross-spectra are well fit (PTE = 0.30) by the null hypothesis in which both experiments have measured the same sky map up to a single free calibration parameter-i.e., we find no evidence for systematic errors in either data set. As a by-product, we improve the precision of the SPT calibration by nearly an order of magnitude, from 2.6% to 0.3% in power. Finally, we compare all three cross-spectra to the full-sky Planck power spectrum and find marginal evidence for differences between the power spectra from the SPT-SZ footprint and the full sky. We model these differences as a power law in spherical harmonic multipole number. The best-fit value of this tilt is consistent among the three cross-spectra in the SPT-SZ footprint, implying that the source of this tilt is a sample variance fluctuation in the SPT-SZ region relative to the full sky. The consistency of cosmological parameters derived from these data sets is discussed in a companion paper.
Considers the impact of the mass media on gang banging in the US. Use of mass communication by gangs is detailed, citing self- & commercially published books as examples of propaganda & issues ...promotion. Gang involvement with the Internet, radio, TV, & movies is delineated, & Frederick Thrasher's (1927) analysis of film & gang is briefly reviewed. In terms of violence, four questions must be addressed when assessing the mass media's role: Does the mass media (1) teach violence & crime, eg, vigilantism; (2) desensitize via the constant onslaught of violence; (3) promote negative values, eg, disrespect for the law; & (4) disseminate misinformation on & about gangs, eg, their omnipotence or gang truces? Analysis of several English-language gang films, 1970s-1990s, addresses these issues, criticizing Hollywood filmmaking. J. Lindroth
ABSTRACT The millimeter transient sky is largely unexplored, with measurements limited to follow-up of objects detected at other wavelengths. High-angular-resolution telescopes, designed for ...measurement of the cosmic microwave background (CMB), offer the possibility to discover new, unknown transient sources in this band-particularly the afterglows of unobserved gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). Here, we use the 10 m millimeter-wave South Pole Telescope, designed for the primary purpose of observing the CMB at arcminute and larger angular scales, to conduct a search for such objects. During the 2012-2013 season, the telescope was used to continuously observe a 100 deg2 patch of sky centered at R.A. 23h30m and decl. −55° using the polarization-sensitive SPTpol camera in two bands centered at 95 and 150 GHz. These 6000 hr of observations provided continuous monitoring for day- to month-scale millimeter-wave transient sources at the 10 mJy level. One candidate object was observed with properties broadly consistent with a GRB afterglow, but at a statistical significance too low (p = 0.01) to confirm detection.
We report a B-mode power spectrum measurement from the cosmic microwave background (CMB) polarization anisotropy observations made using the SPTpol instrument on the South Pole Telescope. This work ...uses 500 deg2 of SPTpol data, a five-fold increase over the last SPTpol B-mode release. As a result, the bandpower uncertainties have been reduced by more than a factor of two, and the measurement extends to lower multipoles: 52 < ℓ < 2301 . Data from both 95 and 150 GHz are used, allowing for three cross-spectra: 95 GHz × 95 GHz , 95 GHz × 150 GHz , and 150 GHz × 150 GHz . B -mode power is detected at very high significance; we find P ( B B < 0 ) = 5.8 × 10−71, corresponding to a 18.1σ detection of power. With a prior on the galactic dust from Planck, WMAP and BICEP2/Keck observations, the SPTpol B-mode data can be used to set an upper limit on the tensor-to-scalar ratio, r < 0.44 at 95% confidence (the expected 1σ constraint on r given the measurement uncertainties is 0.22). We find the measured B-mode power is consistent with the Planck best-fit Λ CDM model predictions. Scaling the predicted lensing B-mode power in this model by a factor Alens, the data prefer Alens = 1.17 ± 0.13 . These data are currently the most precise measurements of B-mode power at ℓ > 320.
Whereas the infant gut microbiome is the subject of intense study, relatively little is known regarding the nares microbiome in newborns and during early life. This study aimed to survey the typical ...composition and diversity of human anterior nare microflora for developing infants over time, and to explore how these correlate to their primary caregivers. Single nare swabs were collected at five time points over a one-year period for each subject from infant-caregiver pairs. Our study comprised of 50 infants (recruited at 2 weeks, post delivery) and their 50 primary caregivers. Applying the chaperonin-60 (cpn60) universal target (UT) amplicon as our molecular barcoding marker to census survey the microbial communities, we longitudinally surveyed infant nares microbiota at 5 time points over the course of the first year of life. The inter- and intra-subject diversity was catalogued and compared, both longitudinally and relative to their adult primary caregivers. Although within-subject variability over time and inter-subject variability were both observed, the assessment detected only one or two predominant genera for individual infant samples, belonging mainly to phyla Actinobacteria, Firmicutes, and Proteobacteria. Consistent with previously observed microbial population dynamics in other body sites, the diversity of nares microflora increased over the first year of life and infants showed differential operational taxonomic units (OTUs) relative to their matched primary caregiver. The collected evidence also support that both temporal and seasonal changes occur with respect to carriage of potentially pathogenic bacteria (PPBs), which may influence host predisposition to infection. This pilot study surveying paired infant/caregiver nare microbiomes provides novel longitudinal diversity information that is pertinent to better understanding nare microbiome development in infants.
We present a demonstration of delensing the observed cosmic microwave background (CMB) B-mode polarization anisotropy. This process of reducing the gravitational-lensing-generated B-mode component ...will become increasingly important for improving searches for the B modes produced by primordial gravitational waves. In this work, we delens B-mode maps constructed from multi-frequency SPTpol observations of a 90 deg2 patch of sky by subtracting a B-mode template constructed from two inputs: SPTpol E-mode maps and a lensing potential map estimated from the Herschel 500 m map of the cosmic infrared background. We find that our delensing procedure reduces the measured B-mode power spectrum by % in the multipole range this is shown to be consistent with expectations from simulations and to be robust against systematics. The null hypothesis of no delensing is rejected at . Furthermore, we build and use a suite of realistic simulations to study the general properties of the delensing process and find that the delensing efficiency achieved in this work is limited primarily by the noise in the lensing potential map. We demonstrate the importance of including realistic experimental non-idealities in the delensing forecasts used to inform instrument and survey-strategy planning of upcoming lower-noise experiments, such as CMB-S4.
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