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<p>Recent advances in technology have allowed researchers to collect high-dimensional biological data simultaneously. In genomic studies, for instance, measurements from tens of thousands of genes are taken from individuals across several experimental groups. In time course microarray experiments, gene expression is measured at several time points for each individual across the whole genome resulting in massive amount of data. In such experiments, researchers are faced with two types of high-dimensionality. The first is global high-dimensionality, which is common to all genomic experiments. The global high-dimensionality arises because inference is being done on tens of thousands of genes resulting in multiplicity. This challenge is often dealt with statistical methods for multiple comparison, such as the Bonferroni correction or false discovery rate (FDR). We refer to the second type of high-dimensionality as gene specific high-dimensionality, which arises in time course microarry experiments due to the fact that, in such experiments, sample size is often smaller than the number of time points ($n</p> <p>In this thesis, we use the growth curve model (GCM), which is a generalized multivariate analysis of variance (GMANOVA) model, and propose a moderated test statistic for testing a special case of the general linear hypothesis, which is specially useful for identifying genes that are expressed. We use the trace test for the GCM and modify it so that it can be used in high-dimensional situations. We consider two types of moderation: the Moore-Penrose generalized inverse and Stein's shrinkage estimator of $ S $. We performed extensive simulations to show performance of the moderated test, and compared the results with original trace test. We calculated empirical level and power of the test under many scenarios. Although the focus is on hypothesis testing, we also provided moderated maximum likelihood estimator for the parameter matrix and assessed its performance by investigating bias and mean squared error of the estimator and compared the results with those of the maximum likelihood estimators. Since the parameters are matrices, we consider distance measures in both power and level comparisons as well as when investigating bias and mean squared error. We also illustrated our approach using time course microarray data taken from a study on Lung Cancer. We were able to filter out 1053 genes as non-noise genes from a pool of 22,277 genes which is approximately 5\% of the total number of genes. This is in sync with results from most biological experiments where around 5\% genes are found to be differentially expressed.</p> / Master of Science (MSc)

In November 2006, award-winning novelist, Bebe Moore Campbell died at the age of 56 after a short battle with brain cancer. Although the author was widely-known and acclaimed for her first novel, Your Blues Ain't Like Mine (1992) there had been no serious study of her life, nor her literary and activist work. This dissertation examines Campbell's activism in two periods: as a student at the University of Pittsburgh during the 1960s Black Student Movement, and later as a mental health advocate near the end of her life in 2006. It also analyzes Campbell's first and final novels, Your Blues Ain't Like Mine and 72 Hour Hold (2005) and the direct relationship between her novels and her activist work. Oral history interview, primary source document analysis, and textual analysis of the two novels, were employed to examine and reconstruct Campbell's activist activities, approaches, intentions and impact in both her work as a student activist at the University of Pittsburgh and her work as a mental health advocate and spokesperson for the National Alliance for Mental Illness. A key idea considered is the impact of her early activism and consciousness on her later activism, writing, and advocacy. I describe the subject's activism within the Black Action Society from 1967-1971 and her negotiation of the black nationalist ideologies espoused during the 1960s. Campbell's first novel Your Blues Ain't Like Mine and is correlated to her emerging political consciousness (specific to race and gender) and the concern for racial violence during the Black Liberation period. The examination of recurrent themes in Your Blues reveals a direct relationship to Campbell's activism at the University of Pittsburgh. I also document Campbell's later involvement in the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), her role as a national spokesperson, and the local activism that sparked the birth of the NAMI Urban-Los Angeles chapter, serving black and Latino communities (1999-2006). Campbell's final novel, 72 Hour Hold, is examined closely for its socio-political commentary and emphasis on mental health disparities, coping with mental illness, and advocacy in black communities. Campbell utilized recurring signature themes within each novel to theorize and connect popular audiences with African American historical memory and current sociopolitical issues. Drawing from social movement theories, I contend that Campbell's activism, writing, and intellectual development reflect the process of frame alignment. That is, through writing and other activist practices she effectively amplifies, extends, and transforms sociopolitical concerns specific to African American communities, effectively engaging a broad range of readers and constituents. By elucidating Campbell's formal and informal leadership roles within two social movement organizations and her deliberate use of writing as an activist tool, I conclude that in both activist periods Campbell's effective use of resources, personal charisma, and mobilizing strategies aided in grassroots/local and institutional change. This biographical and critical study of the sociopolitical activism of Bebe Moore Campbell establishes the necessity for scholarly examination of African American women writers marketed to popular audiences and expands the study of African American women's contemporary activism, health activism, and black student activism. / African American Studies

La discusión sobre el fundacionalismo —posición teórica según la cual el conocimiento se apoya sobre una base de creencias autofundamentadas a partir de las cuales se infieren otras creencias— ha animado significativamente los debates de la epistemología durante varios siglos. Así por ejemplo, mientras el racionalismo moderno coloca el fundamento del saber en las ideas innatas de la razón, el empirismo señala que este se encuentra en la experiencia. En pleno siglo XX Russell intenta reconstruir la arquitectura lógica del mundo partiendo de los datos elementales de los sentidos. En 1994 la publicación del libro Moore and Wittgenstein on certainty de Avrum Stroll sorprendió a los estudiosos de Wittgenstein proponiendo una lectura fundacionalista bastante peculiar de su obra tardía. Dicha lectura ha inspirado, entre otros, a Daniel D. Hutto y Danièle Moyal-Sharrock

[EN] Matrix Analysis and its applications are an important area of Applied Mathematics and are the basis of many industrial applications and for engineering in general. This work can be classified as being part of Matrix Analysis. Some partial orders and pre-orders defined in terms of generalized inverses on different sets of complex matrices are studied. In the first part of this thesis the star partial order on the class of EP matrices is studied. In this work some results obtained by Merikoski and Liu are extended to the class of EP matrices. Successors and predecessors of an EP matrix are characterized, and necessary and sufficient conditions are established for they to belong to the same class. New demonstrations of some known results using the canonical form of the EP matrices are presented. In this way a result which provides decompositions for two EP matrices comparable by the star partial order, is obtained and proved. N. Castro-González, J. Vélez-Cerrada, D. S. Djordjevic, J. J. Koliha, and Y. Wei are some authors who studied spectral projectors, denoted by $A^\pi$, corresponding to the eigenvalue zero of a matrix A. For a fixed matrix A, they characterized all matrices for which their spectral projectors coincides with $A^\pi$. In this work, we restrict our attention to the class of EP matrices and spectral projectors corresponding to the eigenvalue zero are characterized. Furthermore, the projectors mentioned above are linked to star and group partial orders. The Moore-Penrose inverse appears when the approximate (in norm 2) least squares solution of an inconsistent system of linear equations is found. When norms induced by Hermitian and positive definite matrices are employed, it is necessary to use the weighted Moore-Penrose inverse. This inverse has been studied by several authors such as Y. Wei, G. Wang, S. Qiao, H. Wu. among others. In many real situations, the problem to solve is modeled by matrices having a particular structure as, for example, they are symmetric, Hermitian, normal, EP, tridiagonal, etc. In this document, the class of EP(M;N) matrices is considered, that is, EP matrices weighted with respect to two Hermitian and positive definite matrices M and N, and in that set the weighted star partial order with respect to M and N is defined. First, the square matrices that belong to this class are studied and analyzed and then for the case M = N details are provided characterizing predecessors and successors of an EP(M;M) matrix. Extending the results given by N. Matzakos y D. Pappas for weighted EP matrices, two algorithms are designed to calculate the weighted Moore-Penrose inverse of a EP(M;M) matrix. The Drazin inverse is another generalized inverse considered in this memory. A nonzero weight matrix W is considered to transform a rectangular matrix A into two square matrices, AW and WA. Then, three new pre-orders on the set of rectangular complex matrices are defined. Matrices related by these pre-orders are characterized, finding in each case a representation for them. In particular, adjacent matrices are characterized. It is also studied the class of matrices with equal weighted Drazin projectors and they are related to the new pre-order. / [ES] El Análisis Matricial y sus aplicaciones constituyen un área importante de la Matemática Aplicada y son la base de muchas aplicaciones industriales y para la ingeniería en general. El presente trabajo se encuadra dentro del Análisis Matricial. Se estudian algunos órdenes parciales y pre-órdenes, definidos a partir de inversas generalizadas, sobre diferentes conjuntos de matrices complejas. En la primera parte de esta memoria se estudia el orden parcial estrella en la clase de matrices EP. En el presente trabajo se extienden algunos resultados obtenidos por Merikoski y Liu a la clase de matrices EP. Se caracterizan los sucesores y predecesores de una matriz EP dada y se establecen condiciones necesarias y suficientes para que éstos pertenezcan a la misma clase. Se presentan nuevas demostraciones de algunos resultados conocidos utilizando la forma canónica de las matrices EP. De esta manera se obtiene un teorema que proporciona descomposiciones para dos matrices EP comparables a través del orden parcial estrella. N. Castro-González, J. Vélez-Cerrada, D. S. Djordjevic, J. J. Koliha y Y. Wei son algunos de los autores que han estudiado los proyectores espectrales correspondientes al valor propio nulo de una matriz A, denotados por $A^\pi$. Para una matriz A fija, caracterizaron todas las matrices para las cuales dicho proyector coincide con $A^\pi$. En este trabajo se restringe el conjunto de estudio a la clase de matrices EP y se caracterizan los proyectores espectrales correspondientes al valor propio nulo. Más adelante, se relacionan los proyectores mencionados con los órdenes parciales estrella y grupo. La inversa de Moore-Penrose aparece cuando se busca la solución aproximada (en norma 2) por mínimos cuadrados de un sistema de ecuaciones lineales inconsistente. En los casos en que se utilizan normas inducidas por matrices hermíticas y definidas positivas, es necesario utilizar la inversa de Moore-Penrose ponderada por dichas matrices, inversa estudiada por varios autores como Y. Wei, G. Wang, S. Qiao, H. Wu, entre otros. En muchas situaciones reales, las matrices que modelizan el problema a resolver poseen una determinada estructura como, por ejemplo, el hecho de ser simétricas, hermíticas, normales, EP, tridiagonales, etc. En esta memoria se considera la clase de matrices EP(M;N), matrices EP ponderadas con respecto a dos matrices hermíticas definidas positivas M y N, y se define en ese conjunto el orden parcial estrella ponderado con respecto a M y N. Primero se estudian las matrices cuadradas que pertenecen a esta clase y luego se particulariza al caso en que M coincide con N, caracterizando los predecesores y sucesores de una matriz EP(M;M). Extendiendo los resultados de N. Matzakos y D. Pappas para matrices EP ponderadas, se diseñan dos algoritmos para calcular la inversa de Moore-Penrose ponderada de una matriz EP(M;M). La inversa de Drazin es otra de las inversas generalizadas con las que se trabaja en esta memoria. Se considera una matriz peso W no nula que transforma una matriz rectangular A en dos matrices cuadradas, AW y WA. Luego, se definen tres nuevos pre-órdenes en el conjunto de matrices rectangulares complejas. Se caracterizan las matrices que están relacionadas mediante cada uno de esos pre-órdenes, encontrando en cada caso representaciones para ellas. En particular, se caracterizan las matrices adyacentes y se estudia la clase de las matrices que tienen proyectores de Drazin ponderados iguales. / [CA] L'Anàlisi Matricial i les seues aplicacions constitueixen una àrea important de la Matemàtica Aplicada i són la base de moltes aplicacions industrials i per a la enginyeria en general. Aquest treball s'enquadra doncs dins de l'Anàlisi Matricial. S'estudien alguns ordres parcials i pre-ordres, definits a partir d'inverses generalitzades, sobre diferents conjunts de matrius complexes. A la primera part d'aquesta memòria s'estudia l'ordre parcial estrella en la classe de matrius EP. En aquest treball s'estenen alguns dels resultats obtinguts per Merikoski i Liu per a la classe de matrius EP. Es caracteritzen els successors i predecessors d'una matriu EP donada i s'estableixen condicions necessàries i suficients per a que aquests pertanyin a la mateixa classe. Es presenten noves demostracions d'alguns resultats coneguts fent servir la forma canònica de les matrius EP. D'aquesta manera s'obté i es verifica un teorema que proporciona descomposicions per a dos matrius EP comparables a través de l'ordre parcial estrella. N. Castro-González, J. Vélez-Cerrada, D. S. Djordjevic, J. J. Koliha i Y. Wei són alguns dels autors que han estudiat els projectors espectrals, denotats per $A^\pi$, corresponents al valor propi nul d'una matriu A. Per a una matriu A fixa, van caracteritzar totes les matrius per a les quals aquest projector coincideix amb $A^\pi$. En aquest treball es restringeix el conjunt d'estudi a la classe de matrius EP i es caracteritzen els projectors espectrals corresponents al valor propi nul. Més endavant es relacionen els projectors mencionats amb els ordres parcials estrella i grup. La inversa de Moore-Penrose apareix quan es busca la solució aproximada (en norma 2) per mínims quadrats d'un sistema d'equacions lineals inconsistent. En els casos en que s'utilitzen normes induïdes per matrius hermítiques i definides positives, és necessari utilitzar la inversa de Moore-Penrose ponderada per aquestes matrius, inversa estudiada per varis autors com Y. Wei, G. Wang, S. Qiao, H. Wu, entre altres. En moltes situacions reals, les matrius que modelitzen el problema a resoldre posseeixen una determinada estructura com, per exemple, el fet de ser simètriques, hermítiques, normals, EP, tridiagonals, etc. En aquesta memòria es considera la classe de matrius EP(M;N), matrius EP ponderades respecte dos matrius hermítiques definides positives M i N, i es defineix en aquest conjunt l'ordre parcial estrella ponderat respecte M i N. Primer s'estudien i analitzen les matrius quadrades que pertanyen a aquesta classe i després es particularitza per al cas en que M coincideix amb N, caracteritzant els predecessors i successors d'una matriu EP(M;M). Estenent les resultats de N. Matzakos i D. Pappas per a matrius EP ponderades, es dissenyen dos algoritmes per calcular la inversa de Moore-Penrose ponderada d'una matriu EP(M;M). La inversa de Drazin és una altra de les inverses generalitzades amb les que es treballa en aquesta memòria. Es considera una matriu pes W no nul.la que transforma una matriu rectangular A en dues matrius quadrades, AW i WA. Després, es defineixen tres nous pre-ordres en el conjunt de matrius rectangulars complexes. Es caracteritzen les matrius que estan relacionades mitjançant cada un d'aquests pre-ordres, trobant en cada cas representacions per a elles. En particular, es caracteritzen les matrius adjacents i s'estudia la classe de les matrius que tenen projectors de Drazin ponderats iguals. / Hernández, AE. (2016). Órdenes parciales y pre-órdenes definidos a partir de matrices inversas generalizadas [Tesis doctoral]. Universitat Politècnica de València. https://doi.org/10.4995/Thesis/10251/64070

This thesis explores Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' 1986-87 comic book series Watchmen according to its network structure, paying particular attention to page layout and the establishment of or deviation from the nine-panel "waffle iron" grid. This reading aims to better understand the comic book form, connecting the work of comics theorist Theirry Groensteen to certain elements of actor-network theory and Ian Bogost's notion of the ontograph--a map of being that emphasizes the interobjectivity of networked nodes. This thesis explores the ontographic nature of the comic book form more generally before tracing the meta-textual ontograph in Watchmen. The thesis then examines the network within the single panel, the multi-panel page layout, and the collaborative network of artist and author. Finally, this thesis explores how Watchmen as an ontograph exploits the affordances of the comic book form in order to construct creative temporalities.

With evidence ranging from visual representations by scanning tunneling microscopes to the fluid and dynamic language of poetry, my research shows that we are shifting from a culture primarily based on ‘sight’ to one that is involved with ‘touch,’ metaphorically and literally speaking. Recent developments in theory and technology, especially quantum physics and post-structuralism, have redefined representation to encompass the necessary reflex of the representer. To be sure, my research has also found feminist and postcolonial criticisms to echo this theory: both have sought to challenge representations due to the objectivity normally attributed to the representer, the Cartesian logic of which quantum theory has destabilized. Thus, by reading poetry with a quantum theoretical lens, specifically the works of Gertrude Stein, Marianne Moore, Anne Carson, and Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, I show how ‘touch’ plays into our language, consequently affecting how we think through language. / Master of Arts / This is an essay on language – how we read language, where we go with language, and how language affects the way we think. Because poetry is an activity that first realizes the limits of language and then attempts to go beyond those limits, reading and writing poetically teaches us to use language to think in a different manner, what I propose to be by <i>touch</i>: a quantum manner. With respect to the field of Linguistics, I want to clarify that I am not saying our thoughts are wholly limited and determined by our language – the space of our minds are quite far-reaching, and it is quite possible to think whatever we want. What I am saying, however, is that language <i>habituates</i> how we think, and poetry reveals these habits in an attempt to break from them. Marilynne Robinson calls these habits our “little island of the articulable, which we tend to mistake for reality itself” (21). Thus I explore attempts at breaking linguistic, hence cognitive, habits with poetry through the writings of Anne Carson and Theresa Hak Kyung Cha. I use feminist, post-colonial, and post-structural theories to formulate a methodology that shows how we <i>touch</i> language and understanding through poetry, at the same time enacting this poetic through my own writing

This thesis is divided into two parts: Ordered spaces of Continuous Functions and the algebras associated with the topology of pointwise convergence of the associated construct, and Strictly completely regular bitopological spaces. The Motivation for part of the first part (Chapters 2, 3 and 4) comes from the recent study of function spaces for bitopological spaces in [44] and [45]. In these papers we see a clear generalisation of classical results in function spaces ( [14] and [55]) to bi-topological spaces. The well known definitions of the pointwise topology and the compact open topology in function spaces are generalized to bitopological spaces, and then familiar results such as Arens' theorem are generalised. We will use the same approach in chapters 2, 3 and 4 to formulate analogous definitions in the setting of ordered spaces. Well known results, including Arens' theorem, are also generalised to ordered spaces. In these chapters we will also compare function spaces in the category of topological spaces and continuous functions, the category of bi topological spaces and bicontinuous functions, and the category of ordered topological spaces and continuous order-preserving functions. This work has resulted in the publication of [30] and [31]. Continuing our study of Function Spaces, we oonsider in Chapters 5 and 6 some Categorical aspects of the construction, motivated by a series of papers which includes [39], [40], [41] and [50]. In these papers the Eilenberg-Moore Category of algebras of the monad induced by the Hom-functor on the categories of sets and categories of topological spaces are classified. Instead of looking at the whole product topology we will restrict ourselves to the pointwise topology and give examples of the EilenbergMoore Algebras arising from this restriction. We first start by way of motivation, with the discussion of the monad when the range space is the real line with the usual topology. We then restrict our range space to the two point Sierpinski space, with the aim of discovering a topological analogue of the well known characterization of Frames as the Eilenberg-Moore Category of algebras associated with the Hom-F\mctor of maps into the Sierpinski space [11]. In this case the order structure features prominently, resulting in the category Frames with a special property called "balanced" and Frame homomorphisms as the Eilenberg-Moore category of M-algebras. This has resulted in [34]. The Motivation for the second part comes from [20] and [15]. In [20], J. D. Lawson introduced the notion of strict complete regularity in ordered spaces. A detailed study of this notion was done by H-P. A. Kiinzi in [15]. We shall introduce an analogous notion for bitopological spaces, and then shall also compare the two notions in the categories of bi topological spaces and bicontinuous functions, and of ordered topological spaces and continuous order-preserving functions via the natural functors considered in the previous chapters. We further study the Stone-Cech bicompactification and Stone-Cech ordered compactification in the two categories. This has resulted in [32] and [33] / Mathematical Sciences / D. Phil. (Mathematics)

Seriemediet inkorporerar lingvistiska och ikoniska tecken för att uttrycka etiska, moraliska, sociala och politiska budskap, vilka kan slätas över av en underhållande och tilltalande form. Detta gör mediet lämpligt för en retorisk analys. Ett omdiskuterat ämne inom seriemediet är dess gestaltning av kvinnor, å ena sidan i form av stereotypa könsroller och underrepresentation av verkligt intressanta kvinnliga karaktärer, å andra sidan sexualiserande porträtteringar, våld och övergrepp. Denna uppsats undersöker hur våld mot kvinnor gestaltas i mötet mellan olika typer av bilder och texter i ett och samma serieförfattarskap. Undersökningen genomförs med hjälp av Roland Barthes ”Rhétorique de l’image” (1964) och teorin om the male gaze som Laura Mulvey diskuterar i artikeln ”Visual pleasure and narrative cinema” (1975). Analysen inspireras av en komparativ metod beskriven av Lennart Hellspong i Metoder för brukstextanalys (2001). Uppsatsen granskar utdrag ur Watchmen, Batman: The Killing Joke och The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen av Alan Moore, en av vår tids mest ansedda författare inom seriemediet, också känd för att porträttera våld mot kvinnliga karaktärer.  Uppsatsens påvisade en ambivalens i porträtterandet av våld mot kvinnor i utdragen ur Alan Moores graphic novels, samt behovet av att problematisera såväl Alan Moores serier som Laura Mulveys the male gaze, men också möjligheten att använda hennes och Barthes teorier inom retorikdiskursens och seriemediets ramar för att granska hur samspelet mellan bild och text kan uttrycka olika typer av budskap och attityder.

Notre étude s'attache à reconnaitre en Thompson Clarke, le précurseur d'un contextualisme épistémique puissant qui rend compte de l'applicabilité conceptuelle et ce que prétendent signifier les philosophes. En effet, Clarke examine les définitions épistémologiques traditionnelles à propos de la nature des concepts, du philosopher, de l'ordinarité et du scepticisme. En étudiant la nature de l'épistémologie traditionnelle, il ambitionne de substituer à la méthode austinienne, sa propre méthode d'examen des présupposés concernant la nature de l'expérience et du langage. Il défend ainsi une philosophie de la connaissance programmatique qui nous interroge sur ce que nous faisons avec nos concepts en matière de connaissance. Elle peut être réalisée à partir de l'examen du legs du scepticisme, à savoir : un nouvel éclairage apporté à la nature et aux procédures du scénario sceptique montre manifestement que la prétendue objectivité attribuée à l'ordinarité n'est que superficielle ou relative. L'idée clarkienne de relative non-objectivité n'est en aucune mesure identifiable ou réductible à un relativisme ou à un subjectivisme épistémique. Selon Clarke, il n'existe pas de traits internes à l'expérience. Il suggère simplement que l'existence des objets nous est confirmée à partir de traits caractéristiques que nous discernons, reconnaissons et identifions comme tels. Ces traits qui caractérisent les objets nous permettent d'établir l'applicabilité des concepts. Or, l'ordinarité n'a pas proprement de traits qui la restreindraient à être de telle ou telle manière, comme le prétendent les philosophes et les sceptiques. Cette prétention relève d'un rêve d'une complétude intégrale de la concevabilité de la structure de l'ordinarité partagé implicitement par les épistémologues et leurs détracteurs, les sceptiques. Le rêve et la veille ne sont pas deux expériences au sein d'un genre qu'il suffirait d'identifier. Tout comme le rêve n'a pas de traits caractéristiques qui viendraient déterminer son application ou sa non-application, l'ordinarité n'a pas de traits en propre qui nous permettent fondamentalement de déterminer et de fixer, ni une limite à celle-ci, ni une frontière absolue entre le philosophique et le non philosophique. Pour ces raisons, selon Clarke, nous ne savons pas foncièrement, ni ce qu'est un concept, ni pourquoi les concepts et leurs applications, comme ceux de Plain et de Philosophical, sont susceptibles d'être sensible au contexte. / Our study focuses on the recognition that Thompson Clarke was the precursor of a powerful epistemic contextualism which gives an account of conceptual applicability and what philosophers claim to mean. Clarke examines the traditional epistemological definitions pertaining to the nature of concepts, of philosophizing, of ordinarity and of skepticism. By studying the nature of traditional epistemology, his ambition is to substitute his own method for examining presuppositions with regard to the nature of experience and of language for that of Austin. He thus defends a philosophy of programmed understanding which makes us look at what we do with our concepts regarding understanding. It can be achieved by an examination of the legacy of skepticism, i.e. a new light thrown on the nature and the procedures of the skeptic’s scenario manifestly show that the so-called objectivity attributed to ordinarity is only superficial or relative. The Clarkian idea of relative non-objectivity is in no way identifiable with, or merely reduced to, epistemic relativism or to epistemic subjectivism. According to Clarke, experience has no internal features. He simply suggests that the existence of objects is confirmed by characteristic features that we discern, recognize and identify as such. These features which characterize objects enable us to establish the applicability of the concepts. However, ordinarity does not strictly have features which would restrict it from being thus or thus as philosophers and skeptics claim. This claim belongs to a dream of a completedness of the conceivability of the structure of ordinarity shared implicitly by the epistemologists and their detractors, the skeptics. The states of dreaming and waking are not two experiences of a type which it suffices to identify. Just as the dream does not have characteristic features which will determine its application or its non-application, ordinarity does not have features of its own which fundamentally enable us to determine and to fix either a limit to it, or an absolute boundary between the philosophical and the non philosophical. For these reasons, according to Clarke, we don’t really know what a concept is, nor why concepts and their applications, such as those of the Plain and of the Philosophical, are likely to be context-sensitive.