In the aftermath of the events of 9/11, the U.S. executive branch has repeatedly maintained that its need for action to secure the nation requires a revised interpretation of individual liberties. This study will explore the tensions between the positive ideographs and in response to the negative ideograph in a contemporary United States court ruling. Using Burke’s pentad, and cluster analysis, as well as Brummett’s notion of strategic silence, the study examines how the FISCR substantially changed the interrelationship between the two ideographs. The study concludes that the FISCR situated strengthening national security as the purpose of the case it ruled on, which privileged national security over privacy. Throughout the expansion of security,> the court used silence to justify its decision. This analysis both adds to our understanding of the synchronic relationship between ideographs, and examines how the courts utilize such interplays to reconstitute community.

In this paper, I argue that there are some video games which are art. I begin my paper by laying out several objections as to why video games could not be art. After laying out these objections, I present the theory of art I find most persuasive, Berys Gaut’s cluster concept of art. Because of the nature of Gaut’s cluster concept, I argue that video games, as a medium of expression, do not need to be defended as a whole. Rather, like all other media of expression, only certain works are worthy of the title art. I then introduce and defend several games as art. After, I return to the initial objections against video games and respond in light of my defended cases. I conclude that video games, as a medium of expression, are still growing, but every day there are more examples of video games as art.

The structure and function of coastal marshes results from a complex interaction of biotic and abiotic processes that continually influence the characteristics of marsh vegetation. A great deal of research has focused on how tidal processes influence vegetation dynamics along the Atlantic coast, but few studies have investigated the influence of similar processes in the marshes along the Gulf of Mexico. This study aims to identify the characteristic vegetation assemblages of the coastal marshes bordering the East Bay of Galveston Bay, Texas, and identify if elevation, inundation frequency and burning frequency are important to their structure. To identify characteristic vegetation assemblages, hierarchical cluster analysis was used. The cluster analysis resulted in seven statistically different vegetation assemblages that were used in diversity analysis and classification and regression analysis (CART) as dependent variables. Diversity measures were calculated at both the plot and assemblage scale using Shannon's diversity index and species richness. The resulting diversity measures were used as predictor variables in the CART analysis as well as regression analysis. Hydrologic modeling was accomplished using Mike 21, a flow and wave simulation model, along with a geographic information system (GIS), to model hourly inundation frequency at each of the sampled plots. The inundation frequency was then used as a predictor variable in the CART analysis and regression analysis. This study found that the main factor contributing to species richness was elevation. Vegetation assemblages at high elevations generally had high diversity, and assemblages at low elevations had lower diversity. Elevation and inundation frequency are inversely related, and the strong correlation between species richness and elevation also assumes that inundation frequency is important in structuring the marsh. Burn frequencies had no influence on diversity in general, but more frequent burning did result in monospecific stands of Spartina patens at Anahuac NWR.

El crecimiento de los clusters de computadores, y en concreto de sistemas multicluster incrementa los potenciales puntos de fallos, exigiendo la utilización de esquemas de tolerancia a fallos que proporcionen la capacidad de terminar el procesamiento. El objetivo general planteado a sistemas de tolerancia a fallos es que el trabajo total se ejecute correctamente, aún cuando falle algún elemento del sistema, perdiendo el mínimo trabajo realizado posible, teniendo en cuenta que las prestaciones disminuyen debido al overhead necesario introducido para tolerar fallos y a la perdida de una parte del sistema. Esta Tesis presenta un modelo de tolerancia a fallos en clusters de computadores geográficamente distribuidos, utilizando Replicación de Datos denominado FTDR (Fault Tolerant Data Replication). Está basado en la replicación inicial de los procesos y una replicación de datos dinámica durante la ejecución, con el objetivo de preservar los resultados críticos. Está orientado a aplicaciones con un modelo de ejecución Master/Worker y ejecutado de forma transparente al usuario. El sistema de tolerancia a fallos diseñado, es configurable y cumple el requisito de escalabilidad. Se ha diseñado un modelo funcional, e implementado un Middleware. Se propone una metodología para incorporarlo en el diseño de aplicaciones paralelas. El modelo está basado en detectar fallos en cualquiera de los elementos funcionales del sistema (nodos de cómputo y redes de interconexión) y tolerar estos fallos a partir de la replicación de programas y datos realizada, garantizando la finalización del trabajo, y preservando la mayor parte del cómputo realizado antes del fallo, para ello es necesario, cuando se produce un fallo, recuperar la consistencia del sistema y reconfigurar el multicluster de una forma transparente al usuario. El Middleware desarrollado para la incorporación de la tolerancia a fallos en el entorno multicluster consigue un sistema más fiable, sin incorporar recursos hardware extra, de forma que partiendo de los elementos no fiables del cluster, permite proteger el cómputo realizado por la aplicación frente a fallos, de tal manera que si un ordenador falla otro se encarga de terminar su trabajo y el cómputo ya realizado está protegido por la Replicación de Datos. Este Middleware se puede configurar para soportar más de un fallo simultáneo, seleccionar un esquema centralizado o distribuido, también se pueden configurar parámetros relativos a aspectos que influyen en el overhead introducido, frente a la pérdida de más o menos computo realizado. Para validar el sistema se ha diseñado un sistema de inyección de fallos. Aunque añadir la funcionalidad de tolerancia a fallos, implica una pérdida de prestaciones, se ha comprobado experimentalmente, que utilizando este sistema, el overhead introducido sin fallos, es inferior al 3% y en caso de fallo, después de un tiempo de ejecución, es mejor el tiempo de ejecución (runtime) tolerando el fallo que relanzar la aplicación. / The growth of the clusters computers and in special multi-cluster systems increases the potential failures points, demanding the utilization of fault tolerance schemes that provide the capacity of finishing the processing. The general goal proposed for fault tolerance systems is that the total work executes correctly, still when it fails with some elements of the system, losing the minimum possible performed work, having in mind that performance decreases due to the necessary overhead introduced to tolerate failures and to the loss of a part of the system. This Thesis presents a fault tolerance model in clusters computers geographically distributed, using Data Replication denominated FTDR (Fault Tolerant Data Replication). It is based on initial process replication and a dynamic data replication during the execution, with the goal of preserving the critical results. It is guided to the applications with an execution model Master/Worker and executed in a transparent way to the user. The design of fault tolerance system is configurable and accomplishes scalability requisites. A functional model has been drawn, and a Middleware has been implemented. A methodology to incorporate it in the parallels applications design is proposed. The model is based on failures detection for any of the functional elements of the system (nodes of compute and network interconnection) and to tolerate these failures starting from programs replication and data, guaranteeing the conclusion of work, and preserving most of the compute performed before the fault, for that it is necessary, when a failure takes place, to recover the consistency of the system and recon figurate the multicluster in a transparent way to the user. The Middleware developed to incorporate fault tolerance in the multicluster environment gets a more reliable system, without incorporating extra hardware resources, so that starting from the non reliable elements of cluster, it allows to protect the computation performed by the application in front of failures, that is if a computer fails another takes care of finishing its work and compute yet performed is protected by Data Replication. This Middleware can be configured to tolerate more than one simultaneous failure, select a centralized or distributed scheme; relative parameters for aspects that influence in the introduced overhead can also be configured, adapting to the loss of more or less performed compute. To validate the system we drew a failure injection system. Despite adding the fault tolerance functionality implies a loss of installments, it is experimentally proved, that using this system, the overhead introduced without failures, is lower than 3% and in case of failure, after an execution time, the runtime is better tolerating the failure than relaunching the application.

A growing interest in the strengths of several interactions that play important structural roles in biochemical systems has been building over the past couple decades. The binding energies and entropies of formation of the clusters of several protonated amino acids and nucleic acid bases with methanol have been measured using High Pressure Mass Spectrometry. The results generally show that binding energy decreases when the proton affinity difference between the alcohol and amino acid is increased. The structures and energies of various alcohol stabilized conformers of these protonated biomolecules were computed using ab initio calculations at the MP2(Full)/6‐311++g(2d,2p) level of theory. The enthalpies of formation of the lowest energy conformers of the proton‐bound clusters between the alcohols and amino acids or peptides match very closely with the experimental values, indicating that protonation and subsequent methanol attachment occurs primarily at the terminal amine functionality. The methanol stabilized protonated nucleic acid bases have energies that match closely with a more entropically favourable conformation of the cluster, hence yielding less negative enthalpy changes experimentally. The effect of alcohol size on binding energy was also monitored through measurements of enthalpies and entropies of formation for the clusters of protonated diglycine with several alcohols. The binding energy between protonated diglycine and benzene was also measured, yielding a measurable cation‐π interaction of over 20 kcal mol‐1, a comparable value to typical strong hydrogen bonds.

In this paper, we propose a trust-based message propagation and evaluation framework to support the effective evaluation of information sent by peers and the immediate control of false information in a VANET. More specifically, our trust-based message propagation collects peers’ trust opinions about a message sent by a peer (message sender) during the propagation of the message. We improve on an existing cluster-based data routing mechanism by employing a secure and efficient identity-based aggregation scheme for the aggregation and propagation of the sender’s message and the trust opinions. These trust opinions weighted by the trustworthiness of the peers modeled using a combination of role-based and experience-based trust metrics are used by cluster leaders to compute a ma jority opinion about the sender’s message, in order to proactively detect false information. Malicious messages are dropped and controlled to a local minimum without further affecting other peers. Our trust-based message evaluation allows each peer to evaluate the trustworthiness of the message by also taking into account other peers’ trust opinions about the message and the peer-to-peer trust of these peers. The result of the evaluation derives an effective action decision for the peer. We evaluate our framework in simulations of real life traffic scenarios by employing real maps with vehicle entities following traffic rules and road limits. Some entities involved in the simulations are possibly malicious and may send false information to mislead others or spread spam messages to jam the network. Experimental results demonstrate that our framework significantly improves network scalability by reducing the utilization of wireless bandwidth caused by a large number of malicious messages. Our system is also demonstrated to be effective in mitigating against malicious messages and protecting peers from being affected. Thus, our framework is particularly valuable in the deployment of VANETs by achieving a high level of scalability and effectiveness.

Defining art has been one of philosophy of art’s biggest projects. However, no definition offered has achieved to account for all objects we consider art. In this paper, I argue that normative dualism, an unjustifiable Western prejudice for the mental, plays a big part in this failure. The division between fine art and utilitarian and “low” art has been perpetuated because the former is associated with the mental processes involved in its appreciation and, thus, considered more valuable. Theories of art also tend to exclude production (a physical process), concentrating mostly on the appreciation of art (a mental process). Ridding theory of the bias of normative dualism, by abolishing the division that sets fine art apart as more valuable and writing theory that takes art production into consideration, is the only way art theory will succeed in accurately describing art objects.

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A growing interest in the strengths of several interactions that play important structural roles in biochemical systems has been building over the past couple decades. The binding energies and entropies of formation of the clusters of several protonated amino acids and nucleic acid bases with methanol have been measured using High Pressure Mass Spectrometry. The results generally show that binding energy decreases when the proton affinity difference between the alcohol and amino acid is increased. The structures and energies of various alcohol stabilized conformers of these protonated biomolecules were computed using ab initio calculations at the MP2(Full)/6‐311++g(2d,2p) level of theory. The enthalpies of formation of the lowest energy conformers of the proton‐bound clusters between the alcohols and amino acids or peptides match very closely with the experimental values, indicating that protonation and subsequent methanol attachment occurs primarily at the terminal amine functionality. The methanol stabilized protonated nucleic acid bases have energies that match closely with a more entropically favourable conformation of the cluster, hence yielding less negative enthalpy changes experimentally. The effect of alcohol size on binding energy was also monitored through measurements of enthalpies and entropies of formation for the clusters of protonated diglycine with several alcohols. The binding energy between protonated diglycine and benzene was also measured, yielding a measurable cation‐π interaction of over 20 kcal mol‐1, a comparable value to typical strong hydrogen bonds.

In this paper, we propose a trust-based message propagation and evaluation framework to support the effective evaluation of information sent by peers and the immediate control of false information in a VANET. More specifically, our trust-based message propagation collects peers’ trust opinions about a message sent by a peer (message sender) during the propagation of the message. We improve on an existing cluster-based data routing mechanism by employing a secure and efficient identity-based aggregation scheme for the aggregation and propagation of the sender’s message and the trust opinions. These trust opinions weighted by the trustworthiness of the peers modeled using a combination of role-based and experience-based trust metrics are used by cluster leaders to compute a ma jority opinion about the sender’s message, in order to proactively detect false information. Malicious messages are dropped and controlled to a local minimum without further affecting other peers. Our trust-based message evaluation allows each peer to evaluate the trustworthiness of the message by also taking into account other peers’ trust opinions about the message and the peer-to-peer trust of these peers. The result of the evaluation derives an effective action decision for the peer. We evaluate our framework in simulations of real life traffic scenarios by employing real maps with vehicle entities following traffic rules and road limits. Some entities involved in the simulations are possibly malicious and may send false information to mislead others or spread spam messages to jam the network. Experimental results demonstrate that our framework significantly improves network scalability by reducing the utilization of wireless bandwidth caused by a large number of malicious messages. Our system is also demonstrated to be effective in mitigating against malicious messages and protecting peers from being affected. Thus, our framework is particularly valuable in the deployment of VANETs by achieving a high level of scalability and effectiveness.