scholarly journals The measurement of species selection on evolving characters

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carl Simpson
Keyword(s):  
General Framework ◽  
Species Selection ◽  
Independent Evolution ◽  
Microevolutionary Change ◽  
The Way

AbstractMany processes can contribute to macroevolutionary change. This fact is the source of the wide variety of macroevolutionary change across time and taxa as well as the bane of pale-obiological research trying to understand how macroevolution works. Here, I present a general framework for understanding the variety of macroevolutionary phenomena. Based on Price’s theorem, this framework provides a simple quantitative means to understand (1) the macroevolutionary processes that are possible and (2) the way those processes interact with each other. The major qualitative features of macroevolution depend first on the number of processes that co-occur and then on the magnitudes and evolutionary directions of those processes. Species selection, the major macroevolutionary process, consists of patterns of differential rates of speciation and extinction. Its macroevolutionary efficacy depends on the presences of sufficient microevolutionary change. Conversely, microevolutionary change is limited in power by the independent evolution of species, and species selection acting across populations of species can amplify or suppress microevolution. Non-trends may result if species selection sufficiently neutralizes microevolution and may yield stable macroevolutionary patterns over many millions of years.

scholarly journals Pedogenic Threshold in Acidity Explains Context-Dependent Tree Species Effects on Soil Carbon

2021 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ellen Desie ◽  
Bart Muys ◽  
Boris Jansen ◽  
Lars Vesterdal ◽  
Karen Vancampenhout
Keyword(s):  
Organic Carbon ◽  
Soil Organic Carbon ◽  
Forest Soils ◽  
Tree Species ◽  
Litter Quality ◽  
Species Selection ◽  
Species Effects ◽  
Tree Species Effects ◽  
Soc Stocks ◽  
The Way

Despite the general agreement that maximizing carbon storage and its persistence in forest soils are top priorities in the context of climate change mitigation, our knowledge on how to steer soil organic carbon (SOC) through forest management remains limited. For some soils, tree species selection based on litter quality has been shown a powerful measure to boost SOC stocks and stability, whereas on other locations similar efforts result in insignificant or even opposite effects. A better understanding of which mechanisms underpin such context-dependency is needed in order to focus and prioritize management efforts for carbon sequestration. Here we discuss the key role of acid buffering mechanisms in belowground ecosystem functioning and how threshold behavior in soil pH mediates tree species effects on carbon cycling. For most forests around the world, the threshold between the exchange buffer and the aluminum buffer around a pH-H2O of 4.5 is of particular relevance. When a shift between these buffer domains occurs, it triggers changes in multiple compartments in the soil, ultimately altering the way carbon is incorporated and transformed. Moreover, the impact of such a shift can be amplified by feedback loops between tree species, soil biota and cation exchange capacity (CEC). Hence, taking into account non-linearities related to acidity will allow more accurate predictions on the size and direction of the effect of litter quality changes on the way soil organic carbon is stored in forest soils. Consequently, this will allow developing more efficient, context-explicit management strategies to optimize SOC stocks and their stability.

Understanding Knowledge Sharing in an Organization

2020 ◽  
pp. 358-381
Author(s):  
Michael Twum-Darko ◽  
Lee-Anne Lesley Harker
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Sharing ◽  
Network Theory ◽  
General Framework ◽  
Actor Network Theory ◽  
Actor Network ◽  
Normative Approach ◽  
The Way

This paper set out to propose the actor-network theory (ANT) as a lens through which to understand and interpret the sociotechnical knowledge sharing challenges in organisations. The methodology for this study was developed within the context of ANT by adopting its ideals and principles. The findings demonstrate that using the concept of the Moments of Translation as a lens to study this phenomenon is indeed a novel way of investigating the reason why there is still difficulty with sharing and managing knowledge. This perspective is proposed to transform the way that knowledge sharing factors are perceived. By utilising a normative approach, this research looked at how knowledge sharing as an ideal can be achieved when taking into account the existing constraints within an organisation. A general framework is proposed to guide the formation of a network of aligned interest for knowledge sharing.

scholarly journals Construction Grammar and the corpus-based analysis of discourses

2019 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 291-323
Author(s):  
Nicholas Groom
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Model ◽  
General Framework ◽  
Construction Grammar ◽  
Linguistic Theory ◽  
Research Traditions ◽  
Detailed Case ◽  
Cognitive Linguistic ◽  
Academic Discourses ◽  
The Way

Abstract Construction grammar (CxG) initially arose as a usage-based alternative to nativist theoretical accounts of language, and remains to this day strongly associated with cognitive linguistic theory and research. In this paper, however, I argue that CxG can be seen as offering an equally viable general framework for socially-oriented linguists whose work focuses on the corpus-based analysis of discourses (CBADs). The paper begins with brief reviews of CxG and CBADs as distinctive research traditions, before going on to identify synergies (both potential and actual) between them. I then offer a more detailed case study example, focusing on a usage-based analysis of a newly identified construction, the WAY IN WHICH construction, as it occurs in corpora representing six different academic discourses. The paper concludes by rebutting some anticipated objections to the approach advocated here, and by proposing a new conceptual model for constructionist approaches to CBADs.

scholarly journals Time-Dependent Dephasing and Quantum Transport

Entropy ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (9) ◽  
pp. 1179
Author(s):  
Saulo V. Moreira ◽  
Breno Marques ◽  
Fernando L. Semião
Keyword(s):  
Quantum Transport ◽  
General Framework ◽  
Master Equations ◽  
Time Dependent ◽  
Energy Sources ◽  
Symmetric Configuration ◽  
Open Questions ◽  
Two Level Systems ◽  
The Way

The investigation of the phenomenon of dephasing assisted quantum transport, which happens when the presence of dephasing benefits the efficiency of this process, has been mainly focused on Markovian scenarios associated with constant and positive dephasing rates in their respective Lindblad master equations. What happens if we consider a more general framework, where time-dependent dephasing rates are allowed, thereby, permitting the possibility of non-Markovian scenarios? Does dephasing-assisted transport still manifest for non-Markovian dephasing? Here, we address these open questions in a setup of coupled two-level systems. Our results show that the manifestation of non-Markovian dephasing-assisted transport depends on the way in which the incoherent energy sources are locally coupled to the chain. This is illustrated with two different configurations, namely non-symmetric and symmetric. Specifically, we verify that non-Markovian dephasing-assisted transport manifested only in the non-symmetric configuration. This allows us to draw a parallel with the conditions in which time-independent Markovian dephasing-assisted transport manifests. Finally, we find similar results by considering a controllable and experimentally implementable system, which highlights the significance of our findings for quantum technologies.

scholarly journals Unrealiable selves in an unreliable World : the multiple projections of the hero in Kazuo Ishiguro's "The Unconsoled"

2000 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 159 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos Villar Flor
Keyword(s):  
General Framework ◽  
First Person ◽  
Parental Neglect ◽  
The Way

The Unconsoled (1995), Ishiguro's fourth novel, was received with some perplexity by critics who formerly praised the author's controlled "Jamesian" realism. However dissimilar this "Kafkaesque" novel may seem in comparison with the previous three, it can be regarded as a further step in the development of one of Ishiguro's major fictional interests: the way an unreliable first-person narrator introduces characters who might be understood as extensions or projections of himself. While Ishiguro's first three novels could be said to deploy unreliable narrators who try to revisit their past and overlook their mistakes by using self-deceiving rhetoric, a sort of oneiric unreliability constitutes the general framework of The Unconsoled. This article comments on the implications of such a fictional technique and analyses those characters that may work as projections of the narrator's persona, embodying his anxieties and traumas with special emphasis on those stemming from lack of communication and parental neglect.

The Constrained Vision of Evolutionary Ethics

2018 ◽  
pp. 35-70
Author(s):  
Neema Parvini
Keyword(s):  
Kin Selection ◽  
Group Selection ◽  
Charles Darwin ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Evolutionary Ethics ◽  
Species Selection ◽  
Evolutionary Theories ◽  
Jonathan Haidt ◽  
Selection Group ◽  
The Way

This chapter adapts Thomas Sowell’s concept of the constrained (or “tragic”) and unconstrained (or “utopian) visions of humanity in its consideration of evolutionary ethics as a lens through which to approach Shakespeare’s plays. The first half summarises and explains the two visions, while the second traces the development of evolutionary ethics from Adam Smith and Charles Darwin to the work of E.O. Wilson, David Sloan Wilson, and Jonathan Haidt. Along the way, it considers the so-called “Darwin Wars” over the competing evolutionary theories of kin selection, group selection and species selection. Ultimately, the study aligns itself with the constrained vision and supports the emergent view in evolutionary literature of “group selection” following the work of Wilson, Sloan Wilson, and Haidt.

The Way to Mecca. Spanish State Sponsorship of Muslim Pilgrimage (1925-1972)

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. e013
Author(s):  
Jordi Moreras
Keyword(s):  
General Framework ◽  
Political Regime ◽  
Intensive Study ◽  
State Sponsorship ◽  
The Way

The sponsorship of pilgrimage to Mecca by European colonial powers in the 19th and 20th centuries contributed to transforming the hajj into the global phenomenon it is today. Spain also promoted Muslim pilgrimage from its zone of the Moroccan Protectorate, tentatively at first, and then more purposefully from 1937 onwards, continuing its sponsorship into the early 1970s, years after Morocco’s independence. Intensive study of administrative documentation from the Spanish Protectorate allows the reformulation of the sponsorship’s established chronology (from 1937 to 1956). It also shows the dual intent concealed behind its promotion: first, as propaganda aimed at the interior of the Moroccan territory being administered; and second, as a tool for the external promotion of a political regime in need of support to escape its international isolation. The pilgrimage’s sponsorship is seen as part of the general framework of managing Muslim rituals enacted by the Spanish government to deactivate their potential mobilising capacity.

Imprinting Powers: The Astrological Seal and its Doctrinal Meanings in the Latin West

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 49-72
Author(s):  
Nicolas Weill-Parot
Keyword(s):  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
General Framework ◽  
Thomas Aquinas ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Philosophical Thought ◽  
Albert The Great ◽  
Latin West ◽  
The Way

The article studies the issue of "astrological seals"—imprinted talismans deriving their powers from the stars—within the general framework of medieval theological and philosophical thought about seals. First, it looks at how astrological sigilla are described in treatises on magic, notably that of Theel, the Pseudo-Ptolemy's Centiloquium, the Liber formarum (ascribed to Hermes), and the work of the Spanish physician Estéfano. Second, it focuses on two comparisons put forward and rejected by theologians: William of Auvergne's analysis of the analogy between the astrological talisman and the royal seal, and an anonymous academic quaestio from the fifteenth century, dealing with the parallel between the sealing process and celestial influence. Third, it considers the way that Albert the Great took advantage of the distinctive features of seals, in order to explain the astrological seal within a purely naturalistic framework, and the opposing views of Thomas Aquinas. It concludes in the fifteenth century, when Galeotto Marzio brought a naturalistic explanation for the working of astrological seals to completion.

FORMAL REPRESENTATIONS OF DEPENDENCE AND GROUNDEDNESS

2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 105-140 ◽  
Author(s):  
EDOARDO RIVELLO
Keyword(s):  
General Framework ◽  
Functional Dependence ◽  
Theories Of Truth ◽  
Mathematical Notion ◽  
The Way ◽  
Formal Representations

AbstractWe study, in an abstract and general framework, formal representations of dependence and groundedness which occur in semantic theories of truth. Our goals are (a) to relate the different ways in which groundedness is defined according to the way dependence is represented and (b) to represent different notions of dependence as instances of a suitable generalisation of the mathematical notion of functional dependence.

scholarly journals The case for species selection

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carl Simpson
Keyword(s):  
Causal Structure ◽  
Species Selection ◽  
Hierarchical Systems ◽  
Evolutionary Transitions ◽  
Species Sorting ◽  
Extinction Rates ◽  
Microevolutionary Change ◽  
Mere Existence ◽  
Level Of Selection ◽  
Organismal Fitness

AbstractThe mere existence of speciation and extinction make macro-evolutionary processes possible. Speciation and extinction introduce discontinuities in the microevolutionary change within lineages by initiating, disrupting, and terminating the continuity of species lineages. Within a clade, speciation and extinction become potent means of macroevolution in and of themselves. This process, termed species selection, is a macroevolutionary analogue of natural selection, with species playing an analogous part akin to that played by organisms in microevolution. That said, it has proven difficult to think about levels of selection. The concept of species sorting was introduced to help our thinking on this issue by identifying two aspects inherent in hierarchical systems can confuse our attempts to understand them: uncertainty in the level that selection acts and uncertainty about if the pattern of selection is in fact caused at all. Thanks to insights from evolutionary transitions in individuality, we now know more about how to identify the level of selection and how to parse the causal structure in hierarchical evolutionary circumstances. We know that if the fitness of organisms causes the fitness of more inclusive species then they must covary. However, there is no evidence of such a covariance between fitnesses at these two levels. This covariance is just not observed; neither between cells and organisms nor between organisms and species. Rather, speciation and extinction rates appear to be completely divorced from organismal fitness. With this insight, the concept of species sorting shrinks so that it only covers the two processes of species selection and drift. I argue that we are better off focusing on understanding the processes of species selection and drift and that there is therefore no further need for the concept of species sorting.

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