Non-disruptive Disruptions: Cleantech and the New Green Spirit of Capitalism

Author(s):  
Jesse Goldstein

After overviewing the history of cleantech, Chapter One introduces the core contradiction investigated throughout the text: while the professionals I met were excited about “disruptive” technologies that might radically transform society, when it came to actually finding (and funding) commercially viable projects, disruption quickly gave way to incremental gains in already established markets. Building off of Boltanski and Chiappello’s New Spirit of Capitalism, I argue that planetary improvement represents a new, green spirit of capitalism that mobilizes a seemingly radical, anti-systemic critique of capitalism in order to provide moral legitimacy for proposals to create a better, greener version of the modern industrial economy. As a term, planetary improvement references the discourse of agricultural improvement that helped legitimize enclosure and colonial land grabs in the first centuries of capitalism’s ascent. Agricultural improvement targeted ‘inefficient’ forms of agricultural production – from those practiced by European commoners to a wide range of indigenous agricultural practices throughout the colonized world. In a similar way, planetary improvement recasts ‘dirty’ or ‘wasteful’ forms of industrial production and consumer-driven lifestyles as a terrain of potential improvement. Instead of inefficient commoners or inefficient laborers, here it is capital itself that is guilty of being wasteful.

2021 ◽  
Vol 118 (51) ◽  
pp. e2104429118
Author(s):  
Alexander T. Neu ◽  
Eric E. Allen ◽  
Kaustuv Roy

The term “core microbiome” has become widely used in microbial ecology over the last decade. Broadly, the core microbiome refers to any set of microbial taxa, or the genomic and functional attributes associated with those taxa, that are characteristic of a host or environment of interest. Most commonly, core microbiomes are measured as the microbial taxa shared among two or more samples from a particular host or environment. Despite the popularity of this term and its growing use, there is little consensus about how a core microbiome should be quantified in practice. Here, we present a brief history of the core microbiome concept and use a representative sample of the literature to review the different metrics commonly used for quantifying the core. Empirical analyses have used a wide range of metrics for quantifying the core microbiome, including arbitrary occurrence and abundance cutoff values, with the focal taxonomic level of the core ranging from phyla to amplicon sequence variants. However, many of these metrics are susceptible to sampling and other biases. Developing a standardized set of metrics for quantifying the core that accounts for such biases is necessary for testing specific hypotheses about the functional and ecological roles of core microbiomes.


Author(s):  
Andrew P Jephcoat ◽  
M. Ali Bouhifd ◽  
Don Porcelli

The present state of the Earth evolved from energetic events that were determined early in the history of the Solar System. A key process in reconciling this state and the observable mantle composition with models of the original formation relies on understanding the planetary processing that has taken place over the past 4.5 Ga. Planetary size plays a key role and ultimately determines the pressure and temperature conditions at which the materials of the early solar nebular segregated. We summarize recent developments with the laser-heated diamond anvil cell that have made possible extension of the conventional pressure limit for partitioning experiments as well as the study of volatile trace elements. In particular, we discuss liquid–liquid, metal–silicate (M–Sil) partitioning results for several elements in a synthetic chondritic mixture, spanning a wide range of atomic number—helium to iodine. We examine the role of the core as a possible host of both siderophile and trace elements and the implications that early segregation processes at deep magma ocean conditions have for current mantle signatures, both compositional and isotopic. The results provide some of the first experimental evidence that the core is the obvious replacement for the long-sought, deep mantle reservoir. If so, they also indicate the need to understand the detailed nature and scale of core–mantle exchange processes, from atomic to macroscopic, throughout the age of the Earth to the present day.


Author(s):  
Terry Benest

The United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) has built and operated a wide range of nuclear facilities since the late 1940s. UKAEA’s present mission is to restore the environment of these facilities in a safe and secure manner. This restoration includes the decommissioning of a number of redundant research and power reactors. The Windscale Advanced Gas-cooled Reactor (WAGR) operated at an output of 33 MW (e) from 1963–1981 and comprised a carbon dioxide cooled, graphite moderated reactor using uranium dioxide fuel in stainless steel cans. WAGR was the prototype reactor used to develop technologies for the family of full-scale commercial AGRs that followed. Following shutdown, UKAEA decided to continue their research activities into the decommissioning phase to develop dismantling techniques and establish waste routes. The initial phases of the project involved the construction of the waste handling route and the design and construction of a remote dismantling machine and an interim ILW store. The reactor core and pressure vessel is now being dismantled in a programme of 10 campaigns. This paper will summarise the history of the reactor, the operation of the waste-processing route, the installed dismantling equipment and the successful completion of the first seven campaigns. The rapid completion of Campaign 6, “the reactor core and restraint structures”, will be described in detail. The paper will also describe work to develop remotely operated oxy-propane cutting equipment to dismantle the core support structures and the pressure vessel and due to be used in 2003/2004. Special attention will be given in this paper to the recent rapid progress in the remote dismantling campaigns and the low radiation doses incurred by operators.


2019 ◽  

The collection of papers Philosophy as a Life Journey was published in honour of Jan Zouhar, a distinguished professor, an expert in the history of Czech philosophy and an organizer of university life. The volume begins with an interview in which Professor Zouhar outlines his philosophical creed. The core of the collection comprises six personal contributions (Laudationes) and sixteen original scientific works that focus on a wide range of issues related to philosophy, history, literature, language, ethnography and culture. The final part of the volume (Appendices) contains a brief curriculum vitae of Professor Zouhar and a selection of his works and photographs followed by a list of volume contributors.


2019 ◽  
Vol 62 (12) ◽  
pp. 4335-4350 ◽  
Author(s):  
Seth E. Tichenor ◽  
J. Scott Yaruss

Purpose This study explored group experiences and individual differences in the behaviors, thoughts, and feelings perceived by adults who stutter. Respondents' goals when speaking and prior participation in self-help/support groups were used to predict individual differences in reported behaviors, thoughts, and feelings. Method In this study, 502 adults who stutter completed a survey examining their behaviors, thoughts, and feelings in and around moments of stuttering. Data were analyzed to determine distributions of group and individual experiences. Results Speakers reported experiencing a wide range of both overt behaviors (e.g., repetitions) and covert behaviors (e.g., remaining silent, choosing not to speak). Having the goal of not stuttering when speaking was significantly associated with more covert behaviors and more negative cognitive and affective states, whereas a history of self-help/support group participation was significantly associated with a decreased probability of these behaviors and states. Conclusion Data from this survey suggest that participating in self-help/support groups and having a goal of communicating freely (as opposed to trying not to stutter) are associated with less negative life outcomes due to stuttering. Results further indicate that the behaviors, thoughts, and experiences most commonly reported by speakers may not be those that are most readily observed by listeners.


2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 117-128 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erin Sullivan ◽  
Marie Louise Herzfeld-Schild

This introduction surveys the rise of the history of emotions as a field and the role of the arts in such developments. Reflecting on the foundational role of the arts in the early emotion-oriented histories of Johan Huizinga and Jacob Burkhardt, as well as the concerns about methodological impressionism that have sometimes arisen in response to such studies, the introduction considers how intensive engagements with the arts can open up new insights into past emotions while still being historically and theoretically rigorous. Drawing on a wide range of emotionally charged art works from different times and places—including the novels of Carson McCullers and Harriet Beecher-Stowe, the private poetry of neo-Confucian Chinese civil servants, the photojournalism of twentieth-century war correspondents, and music from Igor Stravinsky to the Beatles—the introduction proposes five ways in which art in all its forms contributes to emotional life and consequently to emotional histories: first, by incubating deep emotional experiences that contribute to formations of identity; second, by acting as a place for the expression of private or deviant emotions; third, by functioning as a barometer of wider cultural and attitudinal change; fourth, by serving as an engine of momentous historical change; and fifth, by working as a tool for emotional connection across communities, both within specific time periods but also across them. The introduction finishes by outlining how the special issue's five articles and review section address each of these categories, while also illustrating new methodological possibilities for the field.


2020 ◽  
Vol 48 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 13-26
Author(s):  
Brandon W. Hawk

Literature written in England between about 500 and 1100 CE attests to a wide range of traditions, although it is clear that Christian sources were the most influential. Biblical apocrypha feature prominently across this corpus of literature, as early English authors clearly relied on a range of extra-biblical texts and traditions related to works under the umbrella of what have been called “Old Testament Pseudepigrapha” and “New Testament/Christian Apocrypha." While scholars of pseudepigrapha and apocrypha have long trained their eyes upon literature from the first few centuries of early Judaism and early Christianity, the medieval period has much to offer. This article presents a survey of significant developments and key threads in the history of scholarship on apocrypha in early medieval England. My purpose is not to offer a comprehensive bibliography, but to highlight major studies that have focused on the transmission of specific apocrypha, contributed to knowledge about medieval uses of apocrypha, and shaped the field from the nineteenth century up to the present. Bringing together major publications on the subject presents a striking picture of the state of the field as well as future directions.


2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 49-54
Author(s):  
Dildora Alinazarova ◽  

In this article, based on an analysis of a wide range of sources, discusses the emergence and development of periodicals and printing house in Namangan. The activities of Ibrat- as the founder of the first printing house in Namangan are considered. In addition, it describes the functioning and development of "Matbaai Ishokia" in the past and present


2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 295-297
Author(s):  
Sergej A. Borisov

For more than twenty years, the Institute of Slavic Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences celebrates the Day of Slavic Writing and Culture with a traditional scholarly conference.”. Since 2014, it has been held in the young scholars’ format. In 2019, participants from Moscow, St. Petersburg, Kazan, Togliatti, Tyumen, Yekaterinburg, and Rostov-on-Don, as well as Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Romania continued this tradition. A wide range of problems related to the history of the Slavic peoples from the Middle Ages to the present time in the national, regional and international context were discussed again. Participants talked about the typology of Slavic languages and dialects, linguo-geography, socio- and ethnolinguistics, analyzed formation, development, current state, and prospects of Slavic literatures, etc.


Author(s):  
O. Y. Balalaieva ◽  

The purpose of the article is to study the dynamics of electronic dictionaries development abroad and in Ukraine using methods of analysis of scientific sources, comparison, generalization and systematization. Electronic dictionaries have been found to be a relatively new phenomenon in the lexicographic market, evolving from machine-readable dictionaries, exact copies of paper editions to complex digital lexicographic systems with a powerful arsenal of functions over the decades. The stages of development of autonomous and online dictionaries are described. Electronic dictionaries due to the advanced search capabilities, speed, simplicity, ease of use, accessibility and compactness have gained popularity among a wide range of users. Today they are used in many spheres of human activity – scientific, educational, professional, everyday communication. However, the analysis of the current level of development of Ukrainian electronic resources indicates a shortage of electronic dictionaries both common and terminological vocabulary. The lack of electronic dictionaries is due to a number of objective problems, both practical and theoretical, that is why research in the field of domestic computer lexicography is a promising area of further research.


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