Borges and the art of forgetting Ohri, N.; Gill, A.; Saini, M.
European psychiatry,
04/2021, Letnik:
64, Številka:
S1
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
Introduction
In 2005 Elizabeth Parker and fellow researchers described the first case of Hyperthymestic Syndrome, a woman going by initials AJ. Thereafter, a handful more of such cases have emerged. ...Older descriptions of extraordinary memory in medical literature mainly considered semantic and working memories. Jorge Luis Borges in his 1930s short story ‘Funes, his Memory’ writes about his, presumably fictitious, encounter with a man named Ireno Funes who possessed an extraordinary memory and a knack for keeping track of briefest of passing moment. Among many qualities that Funes and AJ share are their extraordinary memories, obsession for keeping track of time, and their problems with abstraction. After describing his extraordinary memory, Borges says of Funes, ‘I suspect nevertheless, that he was not very good at thinking. To think is to ignore (or forget) differences, to generalize, to abstract.’ Similarly, AJ has been described to have impaired abstraction, hypothesis formation and conceptual shifting. Moreover, both Funes and AJ see their capability as a burden rather than a gift. “My memory, sir, is like a garbage heap.” Says Funes.
Objectives
A brief exploration of Jorge Luis Borges’ works in the context of autobiographical memory.
Methods
The comparisons between Borges’ description of his character’s autobiographical memory and findings of modern research techniques will be done qualitatively.
Results
Effort is made to undersatnd Borges philosophy in context of mordern memory research.
Conclusions
An in depth look into Borges’ philosohies linking perception of time, coding of memory, abstration and language can inform further line of research regarding autobiographical memory.
Disclosure
No significant relationships.
In 2013, American Meteorological Society Committees on AI (artificial intelligence) Applications organized a short-term solar energy prediction competition aiming at predicting total daily solar ...energy received at 98 solar farms based on the outputs of various weather patterns of a numerical weather prediction model. In this paper, a methodology to solve this problem has been explained and the performance of ordinary LSR (least-square regression), regularized LSR and ANN (artificial neural network) models has been compared. In order to improve the generalization capability of the models, more experiments like variable segmentation, subspace feature sampling and ensembling of models have been conducted. It is observed that model accuracy can be improved by proper selection of input data segments. Further improvements can be obtained by ensemble of forecasts of different models. It is observed that the performance of an ensemble of ANN and LSR models is the best among all the proposed models in this work. As far as the competition is concerned, Gradient Boosting Regression Tree has turned out to be the best algorithm. The proposed ensemble of ANN and LSR model is able to show a relative improvement of 7.63% and 39.99% as compared to benchmark Spline Interpolation and Gaussian Mixture Model respectively.
•A case study on AMS (American Meteorological Society) 2013–14 Solar Energy Prediction Contest.•Solar energy prediction based on NWP (numerical weather prediction) weather data.•Ordinary LSR (least-square regression) suffers from over-fitting.•Data segmentation improves the forecasting performance.•An ensemble of models outperforms the benchmarks.
Pipkin type 3 fracture-dislocation constitutes a rare subgroup of fractures involving the femoral neck and head fracture. The management is difficult and controversial, including osteosynthesis using ...Herbert or cancellous screws and hip replacement surgery. In this case report, a 26-year-old male suffered a road traffic accident leading to a hip fracture. Radiographs and computed tomography scan of the hip depicted three large fragments of the femur head, dislocated posteriorly along with the neck of femur fracture. Considering the needs of the patient, fracture morphology, and unpredictable results of the osteosynthesis, the patient was treated primarily with uncemented total hip replacement. The complexity of the fracture leads to more chances of malreduction and avascular necrosis of the femur head. The patient had an uneventful intra and postoperative period. At the 3-year follow-up, the patient was walking unaided, pain-free, and performing all the activities of daily living satisfactorily.
Effects on postnatal development of Swiss albino mice exposed to nickel (Ni2+) ions as nickel chloride haxahydrate (NiCl2·6H2O) during the gestation periods were evaluated in this study. ...Administration of Ni to pregnant females by gavage (46.125, 92.25, and 184.5 mg Ni/kg body weight (b.w.)) at doses below median lethal dose during 0–5 (preimplantation period), 6–13 (organogenetic period), and 14–18 days (fetal period) postconception. The dams were allowed to deliver and raise their pups. Significant (p < 0.05) decrease in litter size was observed after 184.5 mg Ni/kg b.w. during the three gestation periods particularly from preimplantation period as compared to organogenetic and fetal periods in comparison with the control group. Exposure to 184.5 mg Ni/kg b.w. during fetal period revealed higher mortality as compared to organogenetic period. Exposure to 184.5 mg Ni/kg b.w. increased the eye, limb, and tail anomalies during organogenetic period. Gestation index from preimplantation period was low at all the doses. Live birth index decreased during preimplantation and organogenetic periods after 184.5 mg Ni/kg b.w. The viability and weanling of pups decreased during all periods after 92.25 and 184.5 mg Ni/kg b.w. doses. A dose-dependent highly significant (p < 0.01) decrease in the body weight of offspring from day 0 to 6 weeks of age at all the doses during different gestation periods were observed. Maximum body weight decrease was observed in offspring from organogenetic period. This study concludes that young ones are vulnerable during different gestational and lactation period which indicates that Ni ingested by mothers constitutes a great threat to the progeny.
The parameter selection is very important for successful modelling of input-output relationship in a function approximation model. In this study, support vector machine (SVM) has been used as a ...function approximation tool for a price series and genetic algorithm (GA) has been utilised for optimisation of the parameters of the SVM model. Instead of using single time series, separate time series for each trading interval has been employed to model each day's price profile, and SVM parameters of these separate series have been optimised using GA. The developed model has been applied to two large power systems from National electricity market of Australia. The forecasting performance of the proposed model has been compared with a heuristic technique, a linear regression model and the other reported works in the literature. Effect of price volatility on the performance of the models has also been analysed. Testing results show, that the proposed GA-SVM model has better forecasting ability than the other forecasting techniques.
To evaluate changes in ocular surface and central corneal sub-basal nerve fiber layer (SBNFL) after topical cyclosporin therapy in chronic glaucoma patients on long-term topical antiglaucoma therapy.
...A prospective comparative study of ocular surface evaluation of chronic glaucoma patients on long-term topical therapy treated concurrently with a topical cyclosporine 0.05% twice daily for 6 months and controls was done. The study parameters evaluated at recruitment and at the 6-month follow-up included details of topical antiglaucoma medications, visual acuity, intraocular pressure, ocular surface evaluation parameters (TBUT, Schirmers I, ocular surface staining scores and ocular surface disease (OSD) index score (OSDI)), central corneal sensation (Cochet Bonnett aesthesiometer), and central confocal microscopy to study the SBNFL density (SBNFLD).
Thirty-two eyes of 16 patients with chronic glaucoma and 30 eyes of 15 normal subjects as controls were studied. Mean TBUT, pre/post CsA treatment was 8.67±3.01/12.24±1.83 s (P=0.007). Mean conjunctival/corneal staining scores pre/post CsA treatment were 3.38±1.93/1.50±0.718 (P=0.00) /5.19±1.82/1.81±0.78 (P=0.098), respectively. Mean OSDI pre/post CsA treatment scores were 30.63±14.61/14.76±6.06 (P=0.007). Mean corneal sensations scores pre/post CsA treatment were 4.64±0.46/4.94±0.39 (P=0.002). Central corneal SBNFLD pre and post CsA treatment was 8811.35±2985.29/10335.13±4092.064 μm/mm(2) (P=0.0001).
Schirmer's test, ocular surface staining scores, OSDI, corneal sensations, and corneal SBNFLD showed a statistically significant improvement following a 6-month concurrent topical CsA therapy.
Indian coals are usually blended or beneficiated prior to being fed to utility boilers. These coals often satisfy the heat-value requirement of the boilers but may not be ideal from an ...ash-composition perspective. The ash compositions of beneficiated coals can significantly differ from that of the original coals thereby affecting the fusion characteristics. To have a better understanding of the variation of ash compositions due to coal cleaning, the present investigation focused on the study of ash composition in different size and density fractions of a high-ash non-coking coal. A run-of-mine coal (58.5% ash) was crushed to -75 mm and screened into six size fractions. The individual size fractions and the composite coal -75 +0.5 mm were subjected to density separation. The ash composition and ash fusion characteristics of size and density fractions were determined. The basic components of ash enriched in the lower density fractions while acidic oxides concentrated in the higher density fractions. Ash-fusion temperature and gross calorific value showed linearity with density. No such variations were observed for the size fractions. The results also indicated that cleans (20% ash) and middlings (42% ash) may be efficiently utilized for direct reduction of iron and pulverized coal power generation, respectively.
Twenty-three released and elite genotypes of guar Cyamopsis tetragonoloba (L.) Taub. from different parts of India were subjected to morphological, biochemical and molecular characterization. The ...major objective was to study the extent of genetic variability amongst different genotypes of guar, their grouping and identification using combination of phenotypic, biochemical and molecular markers. Phenotypic characters revealed the presence of ample amount of variation in cotyledon size, root length, hypocotyl length, epicotyl length, pubescence, plant height, leaf margin, branching habit, growth habit, days to 50 % flowering, days to maturity, flower colour, pod size, number of pods per cluster and number of clusters per plant for all the 23 genotypes. Biochemical studies including peroxidase activity along with phenol, potassium hydroxide and gibberellic acid tests also produced significant variability among the genotypes. A total of 180 amplified bands were detected using 21 RAPD primers, out of which 178 were polymorphic. The genotypes revealed high genetic divergence with similarity indices ranged from 0.59 to 0.85. A clear relationship between genetic diversity and geographical location was not observed. Fingerprints generated in the present study, using morphological, biochemical and molecular markers, successfully categorize the different guar genotypes into various groups and also establish relatedness among them based on the genetic diversity. This work will help the breeders working in the country for crop improvement of guar in characterization, identification, determination of seed purity and parental selection.
The present lab-based investigation aimed at evaluating the canal disinfectants using photodynamic therapy (PDT) using different photosensitizers, conventional NaOCl, a mixture of doxycycline, citric ...acid, and a detergent (MTAD) and their impact on the bond strength of glass fiber post to radicular dentin.
Forty extracted human premolars were gathered and disinfected. The decoration was performed up to the cementoenamel junction. Using the crown down technique cleaning of the canal was done following rinse with distilled water. All canals were dried with paper points and obturated with gutta-percha. Post space was prepared using peso reamers and samples were randomly allocated into four groups following different disinfection regimes: Group 1 - Methylene blue photosensitizer (MBP) + MTAD; Group 2 - RBP (Rose Bengal photosensitizer) + MTAD; Group 3 - CP (curcumin photosensitizer) + MTAD and Group 4 - 2.25% NaOCl + MTAD (control). Following disinfection, the canals were dried and the post was placed and cemented within the canal. Samples were dissected at coronal, middle, and apical third and placed in a universal testing machine for push-out bond strength (PBS). Debonded surfaces were evaluated for failure modes. PBS was examined using a one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA). The means of PBS were compared using Tukey multiple comparison tests with a significance threshold of (p<0.05).
Group 3 canals disinfected with CP and MTAD had the highest PBS at two levels: cervical (9.57±1.21 MPa), middle (6.37±0.79 MPa), and group 2 canal space disinfected by RBP and MTAD had the maximum PBS in apical portion (5.35±0.42 MPa). No significant difference at all root levels between group 2 (RBP + MTAD) and group 3 (p>0.05). Canal irrigation with group 1 (MBP + MTAD) and group 4 control (2.25% NaOCl + MTAD) exhibited comparable PBS at all three levels of the root.
CP, MTAD, RBP and MTAD for canal disinfection and bonding of glass fiber post to radicular dentin demonstrated comparable bond values at all three root levels and can be recommended in clinical settings after further investigations.
Content
This study was attempted to identify subfertile bulls by quantifying the endogenous levels of osteopontin (OPN), total antioxidant capacity (TAC) and malondialdehyde (MDA) in seminal plasma ...of buffalo bulls. On the basis of conception rate, buffalo bulls were classified into two groups: high‐fertile (conception rate >50%) and subfertile bulls (conception rate <40%). A total of 100 ejaculates (10 ejaculates from each bull) were collected through artificial vagina method. The concentration of OPN, TAC and catalase (CAT) of high‐fertile bulls was found to be higher (p < .05) than that of subfertile bulls. Further, MDA level in seminal plasma was found to be lower (p < .05) in high‐fertile bulls compared with subfertile bulls. The fertility status had no effect on the superoxide dismutase (SOD) concentration in seminal plasma of both the groups. The levels of OPN (r = .678, p = 0.013) and TAC (r = .648, p = .042) were found to be positively correlated with bull fertility and the level of MDA (r = −.718, p = .019) was found to be negatively correlated with bull fertility. However, the fertility of bulls was not found to be significantly correlated with SOD, CAT and sperm motility. In conclusion, seminal OPN, TAC and MDA tended to be more realistic in identification of subfertile bulls from breeding herds.
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