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Plural Logic is an extension of First-Order Logic with plural terms and quantifiers. When its plural terms are interpreted as denoting more than one object at once, Plural Logic is usually taken to be ontologically innocent: plural quantifiers do not require a domain of their own, but range plurally over the first-order domain of quantification. Given that Plural Logic is equi-interpretable with Monadic Second-Order Logic, it gives us its expressive power at the low ontological cost of a first-order language. This makes it a valuable tool in various areas of philosophy. Some authors believe that Plural Logic can be extended into an even more expressive logic, Higher-Level Plural Logic, by adding higher-level plural terms and quantifiers to it. The basic idea is that second-level plurals stand to plurals like plurals stand to singulars (analogously for higher levels). Allegedly, Higher-Level Plural Logic enjoys the expressive power of type theory while, again, committing us only to the austere ontology of a first-order language. Were this really the case, Higher-Level Plural Logic would be a very useful tool, extending and strengthening some of the applications of Plural Logic. However, while the notions of plural reference and quantification enjoy widespread acceptance today, their higher-level counterparts have been received with scepticism. The main objection raised against them is that higher-level plural reference is unintelligible. This has been argued, among others, on the grounds that there are no higher-level plurals in natural language and that, if there were any, they could be eliminated. In this thesis, after introducing the debate on plurals in Chapters 1 and 2, I turn to defending the legitimacy of the notion of higher-level plural reference. To this end, in Chapter 3, I present and elucidate the notion. Next, in Chapter 4, I show that some natural languages clearly contain these expressions and that they do so in an ineliminable manner. Finally, in Chapters 5 and 6, I develop a semantics for higher-level plurals that employs only devices previously well-understood by English speakers. To finish, in Chapter 7, I describe an application of Higher-level Plural Logic: a strengthening of the neo-Fregean programme. After describing my proposal, I turn to the issue of the logical status of this formalism and defend an optimistic take on the matter.

Let \(\char{cmmi10}{0x54}\) : \(\char{cmmi10}{0x58}\) → \(\char{cmmi10}{0x58}\) be a function from a countably infinite set \(\char{cmmi10}{0x58}\) to itself. We consider the following problem: can we put a structure on \(\char{cmmi10}{0x58}\) with respect to which \(\char{cmmi10}{0x54}\) has some meaning? In this thesis, the following questions are addressed: when can we endow \(\char{cmmi10}{0x58}\) with a topology such that \(\char{cmmi10}{0x58}\) is homeomorphic to the rationals \(\char{msbm10}{0x51}\) and with respect to which \(\char{cmmi10}{0x54}\) is continuous? We characterize such functions on the rational world. The other question is: can we put an order on \(\char{cmmi10}{0x58}\) with respect to which \(\char{cmmi10}{0x58}\) is order-isomorphic to the rationals \(\char{msbm10}{0x51}\), naturals \(\char{msbm10}{0x4e}\) or integers \(\char{msbm10}{0x5a}\) with their usual orders and with respect to which \(\char{cmmi10}{0x54}\) is order-preserving (or order-reversing)? We give characterization of such bijections, injections and surjections on the rational world and of arbitrary maps on the naturals and integers in terms of the orbit structure of the map concerned.

Early astronomical records of comets, supernovae, novae, sunspots and aurorae from Far Eastern dynastic histories together with records from Babylonians cuneiform tablets are compiled and analysed. The present investigation gives new insight into the three following topics in current astronomy and astrophysics.(1) Halley's Comet Past orbits of Halley's Comet since 240 BC are studied in detail using mainly early Chinese observations. The date of perihelion passages are deduced for each return. The only gap in the Chinese records, for the return of 164 BC, is now filled by the discovery of two records on Babylonian tablets. This discovery improves the date of perihelion, which is established as within one week of Nov 16 in 164 BC. We are now confident that every return of Halley's Comet from 240 BC onwards has been recorded.(2) Supernovae and Novae A catalogue of historical supernovae and novae is compiled. Descriptions regarding the position of the eight well known supemovae SN 185, 386, 393, 1006, 1054, 1181, 1572 and 1604 are re-evaluated in term of recent studies. The spurious supernova SN 1408 is discussed in detail and found that there is insufficient evidence supporting a supernova interpretation. The positions of 26 well recorded historical novae are discussed in depth and their coordinates are deduced. (3) Solar Variability Catalogues of naked-eye sunspots and aurorae are compiled from Far Eastern sources. Analysis of these records suggests an average period of about 10 years for the basic solar cycle. Observational factors such as variation with the phases of the Moon are also discussed. A comparison of these data with other proxy indicators like (^14)C and (^10)Beshows a similar trend in the behaviour of the Sun over the last two thousand years.

This thesis argues that the scale of independently motivated geographical mobility within Italy during the 3rd-1st centuries BC was much greater than is usually thought, and that the impact of this type of movement on political developments was correspondingly more significant. The study of this private phenomenon, affecting the demographic face of Italy independently of Roman state control, also provides a new perspective on the wider process of transformation in this period, restoring as it does the element of individual choice. The thesis begins by distinguishing the type of independent mobility in which it is interested from other types of population movement in the same period, before providing a brief review of work on mobility in Roman Italy and other parts of the Mediterranean world. Chapter 2 examines the various types of evidence for the phenomenon: literary, epigraphical, and archaeological. Two central chapters exemplify the phenomenon - and its connection to economic change - using the full range of literary, epigraphical, and archaeological evidence to reveal patterns of mobility in two chosen areas: southern Latium, with the focus on the two important sites of Minturnae and Fregellae, and the region of the Po Valley. The final section examines the relationship between the picture of a high level of mobility, as revealed in the case studies, and the political context of Roman rule in Italy in the middle Republic. First, it is argued that the so-called ius migrandi never existed as a privilege of the Latins, but was instead a restriction placed on colonies to maintain their demographic stability. Second, it is suggested that the difficulty of preventing individual migration had seriously disruptive consequences, especially for communities suffering from emigration in the 2d century, which in turn contributed significantly to the strain on Rome's middle Republican framework of control in Italy.

This thesis, which is divided into five papers, explores biased decision making in naturalistic environments and its implications for the efficiency of financial markets and forecasts of competitive event outcomes. Betting markets offer a valuable real world decision making context, allowing analysis that is not possible using regular financial market data. The first paper surveys studies that have employed betting markets to investigate biased decision making and discusses why the extent of these biases is significantly less than in the laboratory. The second paper addresses unresolved issues relating to noise trading and herding in financial markets, by showing that noise trading is associated with increased market efficiency, that the extent of herding differs depending on the direction and timing of changes in market prices, and that this results in an economically significant inefficiency. The findings of this paper have important policy implications for wider financial markets: regulatory measures to protect investors from the destabilizing effects of noise appear to be self-defeating and herding is particularly prevalent when uninformed traders perceive that informed traders are participating in the market. The third and fourth papers address the favourite-longshot bias (FLB), where market prices under-/over-estimate high/low probability outcomes. These papers demonstrate that previous explanations of the bias are inconsistent with evidence of trading in UK betting markets by developing and testing the predictions of models that explain the bias in terms of competition between market makers and the demand preferences of bettors. Moreover, it is definitively shown that, when no market maker is involved, the bias is due to cognitive errors of traders rather than their preference for risk, because only prospect theory, and not risk-love, can explain a reduced FLB in events with strong favourites. The final chapter explores methodological concerns relating to estimates of forecast accuracy in models of discrete choice, and arrives at a much more rigorous understanding of the value of these estimates.

Myogenic differentiation of muscle cells in culture is characterized by changes in morphology and in pattern of gene expression. When the myoblasts in culture are induced to diffrentiate either by cell to cell contact or by serum-starvation, a vast array of muscle tissue-specific genes including α-actin, are activated and is accompanied by a concomitant down-regulation of non-muscle genes such as, β- and γ-actins, tubulins etc.. The coordinate activation of muscle-specific genes is suggested to be mediated by cis-acting regulatory sequences in the muscle gene-promoters and muscle-tissue-specific DNA-binding proteins belonging to the MyoD class of regulators. But the mechanism behind the repression of non-muscle gene expression during differentiation has not yet been well understood. To date, no consensus has been achieved on the mechanism governing the down-regulation of β- actin gene, and no information is available on the regulation of -y-actin gene during muscle differentiation. The results from the present study showed that during differentiation of BC^3H1 cells the β- and γ-actins genes were down-regulated to ≈25% of their initial levels in undifferentiated cells. Measurement of half-life during differentiation indicated that the half-lives of both β- and γ-actins decreased to ≈25% of their original levels in myoblasts. These results suggest that changes in mRNA stability play an important role in the down-regulation of non-muscle actin genes. Second messengers and oncogenes are known to block the differentiation program of muscle cells. In the present study cAMP and ElA were observed to inhibit the down-regulation of β- and γ-actin genes in BC^3H1 cells. In both cAMP-and E1A- treated cells the β- and γ-actin mRNAs were found to have a higher half-life than the untreated differentiated BC^3H1 cells. This observation also suggests that mRNA stability might play an important role in the regulation of β- and γ-actin gene expression. The muscle-specific α-actin is activated by cell-cell contact and serum-starvation. Results in the present study suggested that cAMP was able to inhibit the activation of α-actin expression mediated by serum-starvation while it had no significant effect on the signal mediated by cell-cell contact. It is hypothesized that the two signals mediating a-actin activation might follow different intracellular signalling pathways. The effects of cAMP and E1A on the expression of muscle-specific and non-muscle actins could be a direct primary event or might be an indirect secondary event, mediated by other intracellular factors such as myogenin. The results showed that cAMP did not block the transcription of the myogenin while secondary evidences suggested that cAMP might negatively-regulate myogenin at a point downstream of transcription. E1A was observed to block the expression of myogenin gene suggesting that E1A might be mediating its effect through myogenin. Because the muscle-specific(α) and non-muscle(β- and γ-) isoforms were expressed both in the presence and in the absence of myogenin, myogenin's role in the regulation of actin genes is unclear. / Thesis / Master of Science (MS)

The BC Liberal New Era was an intense and often controversial period in the province's political history. One day after being sworn into office with a massive majority, Premier Gordon Campbell announced a 25 percent personal income tax cut, potentially relinquishing one billion dollars in tax revenue. Seven weeks later, Campbell and his Finance Minister followed up with another billion in business and corporate tax cuts. Based on the apparent success of tax cuts in provinces like Ontario, where tax cuts coincided with very strong economic growth, they believed tax cuts in 2001 would prove efficacious despite sharply declining economic indices. Cautionary advice was dismissed and tax cuts quickly translated into a $4.4 billion deficit and deep expenditure reductions for ministries other than Health, Education, and Advanced Education. Their decision proved to be a compelling, real-world example of prescription before diagnosis. The 2001/02 fiscal year sawonly 0.6 percent economic growth, much as the Ministry of Finance had predicted, not the 3.8 percent growth anticipated by the Premier and Finance Minister. An overall $4.4 billion deficit quickly translated into deep expenditure reductions for ivministries other thanHealth, Education, or Advanced Education. The latter ministries accounted for seventy percentof BC’s budget and were protected from cuts by a campaign commitment.Resource ministries were hit hard with cuts of up to 45 percent but could not come close to filling the budgethole. The New Era thus offers a second and stark example of prescriptionbefore diagnosis: the belief that social ministries could also manage deep budget cuts without detrimental consequences to the disadvantaged and vulnerable clients they served.Long before tax cut optimism began to fade, Campbell introduced an array of processes –like core review, deregulation, devolution,and alternative service delivery –drawn from other jurisdictions and, indirectly, from the tenets of New Public Management. Those processes were clearly designed to foster smaller government, prompting a critical question:was the introduction of dramatic tax cuts into a recessionary environment intended to produce aself-induced crisis, thereby underlining the imperative of austerity? My dissertation supportsthat suggestion, butalso concludes that the “burning platform” became a far greater conflagration than its authors anticipated. The BC Liberal New Era campaignplatform’s ambitious social policy agenda was consequently sacrificed to sustain its economic agenda. The New Era campaign document aimed to maximize voter appeal by promising “everything at the same time”and similar expectations drove New Era processes.Ministries were obliged to deliver on process goals as well asexpensive New Era platform commitments while simultaneously cutting staff and programs. Confronted by seemingly endless and intractable problems, ministries looked nationally and internationally for policy experience that might inform provincial solutions. Policy transfer produced mixed results. The New Era experience suggests that the frequency and intensity of process demands –compounded by budget-driven resource attrition –inhibited rather than fostered policy success. / Graduate / 2020-12-04

This thesis explores the development of Bertrand Russell‘s theory of definite descriptions. It aims at demonstrating the connection between Russell‘s views on the subject of denoting and his attempt, in the period 1903-05, to develop a solution to 'the Contradiction' (i.e. the Russell Paradox). The thesis argues that the discovery of the theory of descriptions, and the way in which it works, are best understood against the backdrop of Russell‘s work on the paradoxes. A new understanding of Russell‘s seminal paper 'On Denoting' is presented, including a novel interpretation of the notorious 'Gray‘s Elegy Argument', in which Russell argues against his earlier theory of denoting. That Russell‘s work on denoting is connected to his work on the paradoxes is reasonably well-known: the nature of the connection has not, however, been adequately brought out in the literature. This is addressed through demonstrating the relationship between Russell‘s work on denoting and his development of the 'substitutional theory' of classes and relations. This theory eliminates classes and propositional functions in favour of matrices and substitutions. The role of the theory of descriptions in the development of the substitutional theory is commonly supposed to be merely that the theory of descriptions facilitates the ontological elimination of classes. But this elimination was equally possible on Russell‘s earlier theory of denoting (which he had rejected in the Gray‘s Elegy Argument). In the thesis it is suggested that the theory of descriptions brings with it a new conception of analysis, and that it is through the introduction of this new form of analysis—rather than through the elimination of classes—that the theory of descriptions facilitates the substitutional approach.

“Being with oneself in the other” is Hegel's famous definition of freedom, and, I argue, it is also the key topic of his entire Science of Logic. Hegel's Logic is an ontological analysis of the underlying relational structure of everything: the structure of thinking as much as the structure of the world. Hegel proposes at the beginning of the Logic that this structure must display the form of “being with oneself in the other”, i.e. consist in a relation of identity and difference between a totality and its elements. After presenting the different forms of “being with oneself in the other” developed in the Logic, I will offer a new interpretation of the Philosophy of Right and the Philosophy of History in the light of my interpretation of the Logic. This serves to show how exactly Philosophy of Right is the exposition of the existence of freedom and how it is grounded in the Logic. While the connection between Hegel's Logic and social philosophy has often been taken to have authoritarian and anti-individualist implications, I will show that this is not the case and that this connection instead highlights the republican aspects in Hegel's theory.