In the context of resistances to the historical 'blows' to 'human self-love' enumerated by Sigmund Freud (Copernicus decentering the Earth; Darwin removing the barrier between humans and animals; his ...own efforts in showing how the unconscious subverts the supposed mastery of the conscious ego), Jacques Lacan's early formulations and probings on the topic of subjectivity in his second seminar include, in a not uncharacteristic, but yet somewhat bizarre, digression, an envisionment of 'science fiction' involving the extinction of the entire human population and a recording device which continues to operate following the event. Specifically, Lacan questions what consequences this has for our understandings of consciousness (including subsequent philosophical objections); what status the recording instrument would possess; and what a repopulating society would make of the recorded materials once they had learnt to access and interpret them. In exploring this scenario, along with what Lacan describes as his 'materialist definition of the phenomenon of consciousness', we will begin to appreciate how the notion of the human becomes a psychical assemblage pieced together to experience a fragile unity. Relatedly, the human species will historically be seen to have carried with it, and continually reinforced, certain fundamental prejudices: cosmological, biological and psychological. What the 'limit' example of extinction will make clear is the extent to which the material world affects the human 'prerogatives' of self-preservation and self-interest. What is called for is the overcoming of historical preconceptions along with the forms of domination they are invariably coupled with. Recent discussions of extraterrestrial colonization will be seen then to be mere compensatory narratives which ultimately obfuscate the very real and urgent--need to rethink our misguided sense of 'control'. Does the ultimately destructive (and in some respects irreversible) course engaged in vis-a-vis Earth's natural environment due to this form of universalized narcissism--necessarily need to be countered with the prospect of humankind's own obliteration in order for change to occur? KEYWORDS: Lacan; Freud; Consciousness; Extinction
In this paper, the electrical properties of a double-gate dual-active-layer (DG-DAL) thin-film transistor (TFT) are investigated. To increase the ON-current and pixel intensity, and control the ...voltage stress bias, the conventional gate oxide material (silicon dioxide, SiO
2
) is replaced with a tri-high-
k
gate dielectric layer, hafnium dioxide (HfO
2
)/lanthanum oxide (La
2
O
3
)/hafnium dioxide (HfO
2
)—(HLH). Further, the performance of the proposed DG-DAL structure is compared with the single-active-layer (SAL) and dual-active-layer (DAL) TFTs. The amorphous indium-gallium zinc-oxide (a-IGZO) is considered as active layer for SAL channel region, and on the other hand, a-IGZO and indium-tin-oxide (ITO) are considered as active layers for DAL TFT and DG-DAL TFT channel regions. The parameters such as OFF-current, ON-current,
I
ON
/
I
OFF
ratio, threshold voltage, mobility, average subthreshold swing, etc. are evaluated for the considered structures. It is observed that the DG-DAL TFT with HLH dielectric offers high ON-current of 3.85 × 10
–3
A/μm, very low OFF-current of 2.53 × 10
–17
A/μm, very high
I
ON
/
I
OFF
ratio of 1.51 × 10
14
, threshold voltage of 0.642 V, high mobility of 35 cm
2
v
–1
s
–1
and average subthreshold swing of 127.84 mV/dec. A commercial TCAD simulation tool ATLAS from Silvaco
TM
is used to investigate all the parameters for considered structures.
Participatory forest management is credited for supporting social learning processes and fostering capacity of forest users for collaboration and collective actions. Despite more than a decade of ...practice, the empirical evidence substantiating the contribution of participatory management for the capacity development of forest users is scarce. This study assesses a participatory forest management program in Madhupur Sal forest, Bangladesh, by comparing the capacity of de-facto groups of participants and nonparticipants and identifies factors that influence the capacity development. Data were collected using a mixed method approach which combines both qualitative and quantitative methods of data collection. Results indicate that participants differed from nonparticipants significantly in terms of various capacity dimensions related to collective actions. Extension services, credit support, trust within society, information and communication influence the level of capacities in tribal population to adapt and respond to changes. The initiatives to manage natural resources are likely to be more successful if the forest management program initiators consider several factors that influence the capacity development of resource users.
In this article, we introduce a dataset of curated learning paths (LPs) to support search as learning. LPs were obtained through an online survey delivered to experts in different domains. Data were ...then analyzed and described in terms of a set of variables. The resulting dataset comprised 83 LPs, each containing three web pages, for an overall collection consisting of 249 documents. The dataset is intended to provide information scientists, education researchers, and industry professionals, who provide information services in educational contexts, a valuable resource to (i) investigate patterns in the order of LPs, (ii) improve ranking models and/or re-ranking methods, (iii) explain the structure of the recommended LPs, and (iv) investigate alternative approaches to display search results based on the features of LPs.
High dietary salt intake was reported to increase blood pressure by numerous studies, but no study has investigated the effect of dietary salt intake on blood pressure variability (BPV). This study ...aimed to determine if daily salt intake is related to ambulatory BPV. The study included 136 primary hypertensive patients (92 male, 44 female) with a mean age of 50.7±11.1 years. All the patients underwent 24-h ambulatory blood pressure monitoring to determine both the 24-h systolic and 24-h diastolic BPV. 24-h urine sodium was measured. The correlation between BPV and 24-h urinary sodium was investigated. Logarithmic transformation of 24-h urinary sodium log(24-h urinary sodium) was positively correlated with the mean 24-h systolic ARV, and nighttime systolic ARV (r=0.371 and p=0.001, r=0.329 and p=0.028, respectively). Similarly, log(24-h urinary sodium) was positively correlated with mean 24-h diastolic ARV and nighttime diastolic ARV (r=0.381 and p=0.001, r=0.320 and p=0.020 respectively). Log(24-h urinary sodium) was an independent predictor of BPV based on multivariate regression analysis. Dietary salt intake might play a role in the pathogenesis of ambulatory BPV.
En numerosos estudios se ha señalado que el consumo elevado de sal aumenta la presión arterial; no obstante, no se ha investigado el efecto de la ingesta alimenticia de sal sobre la variabilidad de la presión arterial (VPA). El objetivo de este estudio fue determinar si el consumo diario de sal está relacionado con la VPA ambulatoria. En el estudio se incluyeron 136 pacientes hipertensos esenciales (92 hombres y 44 mujeres) con una edad media de 50,7±11,1años. Todos los pacientes se sometieron a una monitorización ambulatoria de la presión arterial de 24h para determinar la VPA sistólica y diastólica de 24h. Se midió la natriuria de 24h y se estudió la correlación de la misma con la VPA. La transformación logarítmica de la natriuria de 24h (log natriuria 24h) se relacionó con certeza con el índice Average Real Variability (ARV) sistólico de 24h y el ARV sistólico nocturno medios (r=0,371 y p=0,001, r=0,329 y p=0,028, respectivamente). De forma parecida, el log natriuria 24h se relacionó con seguridad con el ARV diastólico de 24h y el ARV diastólico nocturno medios (r=0,381 y p=0,001, r=0,320 y p=0,020, respectivamente). El log natriuria 24h fue una variable independiente de la VPA, según el análisis de regresión multivariante. Es posible que el consumo de sal intervenga en la patogénesis de la VPA ambulatoria.
Background and Aim: Endometriosis is a chronic and common disease in the world in which living endometrium stroma and glands are found outside the uterus. The presence of this tissue in different ...parts of the body causes various symptoms that have an adverse effect on women's quality of life, fertility rate, and productivity. The aim of this study was to determine the relationship between lifestyle and endometriosis in infertile women referred to the selected hospital of Tehran University of Medical Sciences. Materials and Methods: The nature of this study is descriptive-comparative. The convenient sampling method is used among all infertile women undergoing laparoscopy, in group 1 (with endometriosis diagnosis) and group 2 (without endometriosis). The sample size is estimated to be 125 in each group according to the Cochran formula and with the alpha coefficient of 0.05. Data analysis was done using SPSS software version 20. Results: There was a direct and significant relationship between the probability of developing endometriosis and age, education level, and regularity of menstruation variables so that with the increase in each of the above variables, the probability of the disease increases. There was a significant and inverse association between the incidence of endometriosis and the body mass index (BMI) variable, which means that with the increase in this variable, the risk of endometriosis in individuals is reduced. Conclusion: This study suggests that high age, low BMI, menstrual cycle regularity, and education have a strong relationship with endometriosis in infertile women, and there was no relationship between lifestyle and the incidence of endometriosis among them.
How to differentiate thyroid cancer nodules from a large number of benign nodules is always a challenging subject for clinicians. This paper proposes a novel Sal-deel network model to achieve the ...classification and diagnosis of thyroid cancer, which can simulate visual attention mechanism. The Sal-deep network introduces saliency map as an additional information on the deep residual network, which selectively enhances the feature extracted from different regions according to the mask map. Sal-deep network can work effectively for the benchmark networks with different data sets and different structures, and it is a universal network model. Sal-deep network increases the complexity of the network, but improves the efficiency of the network. A large number of qualitative and quantitative experiments show that our improved network is superior to other existing deep models in terms of classification accuracy rate and Recall, which is suitable for clinical application.
The global prevalence of people living with dementia is expected to increase exponentially and yet evidence suggests gaps in dementia-specific knowledge amongst practitioners. Evidence-based learning ...approaches can support educators and learners who are transitioning into new educational paradigms resulting from technological advances. Technology-enabled learning is increasingly being used in health care education and may be a feasible approach to dementia education.
This protocol aims to describe the methodological and analytical approaches for undertaking a systematic review of the current evidence based on technology-enabled approaches to dementia education for health and social care practitioners. The design and methodology were informed by guidelines from the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis Protocols.
The evidence generated from a systematic review of the current evidence is intended to inform the design and implementation of technology-enabled dementia education programmes and to advance the current academic literature at a time of unprecedented demographic and technological transition.
PROSPERO, CRD42018115378.
IbMYB1, a transcription factor (TF) for R2R3-type MYB TFs, is a key regulator of anthocyanin biosynthesis during storage of sweet potatoes. Anthocyanins provide important antioxidants of nutritional ...value to humans, and also protect plants from oxidative stress. This study aimed to increase transgenic potatoes’ (Solanum tuberosum cv. LongShu No.3) tolerance to environmental stress and enhance their nutritional value. Transgenic potato plants expressing IbMYB1 genes under the control of an oxidative stress-inducible peroxidase (SWPA2) promoter (referred to as SM plants) were successfully generated through Agrobacterium-mediated transformation. Two representative transgenic SM5 and SM12 lines were evaluated for enhanced tolerance to salinity, UV-B rays, and drought conditions. Following treatment of 100 mM NaCl, seedlings of SM5 and SM12 lines showed less root damage and more shoot growth than control lines expressing only an empty vector. Transgenic potato plants in pots treated with 400 mM NaCl showed high amounts of secondary metabolites, including phenols, anthocyanins, and flavonoids, compared with control plants. After treatment of 400 mM NaCl, transgenic potato plants also showed high DDPH radical scavenging activity and high PS II photochemical efficiency compared with the control line. Furthermore, following treatment of NaCl, UV-B, and drought stress, the expression levels of IbMYB1 and several structural genes in the flavonoid biosynthesis such as CHS, DFR, and ANS in transgenic plants were found to be correlated with plant phenotype. The results suggest that enhanced IbMYB1 expression affects secondary metabolism, which leads to improved tolerance ability in transgenic potatoes.
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