This thesis is a critical review of two central theories in the modern sustainability paradigm – namely… (1) the theory that the Earth’s geosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere and atmosphere form a complex adaptive system – the Earth system, and (2) the theory that all human activities are intrinsically dependent on, and constrained by, non-anthropogenic states and processes in the Earth system. The thesis explains the origins and the logic of these theories, and subjects them to formal, semi-formal and comparative criticism. Ultimately, it refutes both on formal and comparative grounds. Most importantly, it shows that theories 1 and 2 are in conflict with the theory of evolution by natural selection, and with the hypothetico-deductive model of scientific research. It also shows that they are in conflict – both directly and indirectly – with the known laws of physics. While it is true that all human activities rely on biospheric resources today, there are no physical, or natural laws that make it impossible for us to break those dependencies over time. In fact, the thesis shows that it is possible in principle to satisfy any human need by strictly artificial means, and abiotic resources that exist in abundance both inside and outside of the Earth system. An important corollary to this finding is that social and economic progress is not inextricably tied – as the modern sustainability literature suggests – to the exploitation of finite and rapidly diminishing resources here on Earth. Theories 1 and 2 both contribute to this confusion, and hence, to the bleak and irrational Malthusianism that still permeates so much of the sustainability domain. In addition, they appear to blind many researchers to the ecological benefits of technological development. That humanity can break its dependence on the biosphere is a very good thing for its non-human inhabitants. As we become more technologically advanced, we will find it easier and easier to sustain ourselves without destabilizing the world's ecosystems. The Earth’s biosphere is an oasis of beauty, complexity and connection in a Universe that is overwhelmingly empty and boring. As the only animals capable of appreciating this fact, we have a clear moral duty to protect and preserve it. And we can protect and preserve it. If we just let go of the religious ideas that have dominated our field since its inception, we will find that our potential to do good in the world is far greater than we previously imagined.

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The human being and her behavior is complex. Research has shown serendipity and chance to play a great part in the scientific research praxis, still the complexity of human information retrieval is not fully acknowledged in modern libraries. This master thesis compares two different worldviews; the mechanistic and the organic. This in order to understand why information seeking today is increasingly linear when human information behavior is not. The way people believe the world to work reflects on how libraries and information seeking work. The mechanistic worldview, comparing the world to a machine, is rooted in humanity since the seventeenth century and is still shaping our world and institutions. Today databases and linear searches are pushing physical books off shelves to make room for computers and searching on limiting linear mechanical terms instead of complex human ones. This pattern often occurs without adequate questioning and online information is argued to be even more available to patrons than the physical library.  This thesis uses complexity theory and philosophical method to broaden perspectives and question linear searches in scientific information retrieval. It aims to highlight the importance of complex information retrieval and physical browsing for scientific innovation and creativity. Erdelez's original information encountering method was used to obtain source material for philosophical analysis. Philosophical method and complexity theory is used throughout the text to analyze the linear worldview leading up to a joint argumentative summary at the end of every chapter bringing the text forward.  The thesis contains a field study with semi-structured interviews with librarians at the Picture Collection, New York Public Library. This highlights the value of physical browsing through the strong criticism that arose from patrons when the library wanted to archive the unique and browsable research collection.  The result of the thesis argues that the linear technological development in libraries with less physical collections, librarian encounters, passive information gathering and random information paths without underlying commercial drivers create more like-mindedness instead of innovation. This significantly reducing the possibility of interdisciplinary discoveries. A technical development that at an alarming rate shifts information from being sought by people, to people being sought by information.  This is a two years master’s thesis in Library and Information Science.

This thesis constitutes a narrative that explores an alternative meaning construction for the experience of loss. During the telling of this story, I consider the appropriateness of adopting the 'new paradigm' approach for this particular thesis, and the constructivist and social constructionist epistemological assumptions underlying such an approach. I delve into the use of 'self as researcher under this epistemological umbrella. This is followed by an exploration of 'chaos theory' and its application to social systems. And finally, I consider the usefulness of this theory in constructing meanings for loss experiences on various systemic levels within my own family system. / Psychology / M.A.(Clinical Psychology)

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-25T16:45:04Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Tiago Alves Costa.pdf: 830440 bytes, checksum: 40b830a47bb712666dd4a4ecfbcde61c (MD5) Previous issue date: 2008-04-29 / The finance science, as all sciences, shows an evolutionary line and according to Kuhn (1970), it is marked by shortly periods of knowledge accumulation. However, according to the author, such periods are inserted with scientific revolutions. In other words, the scientific evolution is stamped by revolutions which abandon oldfashioned paradigm and create new ones. The revolution is followed by a period where the researches are guided by the new paradigm and its purpose is strengthen the own paradigm. In other way, the finance science has today a central paradigm well-known by efficiency market hyperlink (EMH) which was witnessed and adopted by the entire scientific community around the 70 s. And since those times, almost entire research done in finance, mainly until the de 90 s, was leaded and done to validate the EMH. This dissertation attempted to evidence that the finance evolutionary line proposed by Haugen (2000) follows the same principle evidenced by Kuhn (1970), and in the present-day, the EMH find itself in a period which precede the scientific revolution which is called by time crisis by Kuhn (1970). This time crisis could weaken the EMH and open a space to create a new paradigm. This way, the proposal of dissertation is to prove how the revolutionary process will happen in finance too, soon after, to prove what would the candidates more inclined to replace the EMH be as a central paradigm in finance. To do so, this work considered only two candidates: the behavioral finance and the chaos theory. To do this analyze it was used the schooling principles nominated by Mckinley, Mone and Moon (2002). Such authors propose that a thought must display a combination of novelty, continuity, and scope to achieve school status in organizational theory. The purpose of this dissertation is to do a theory ransom which intends to show the fragility of the EMH as a central paradigm that orients the finance researches. The dissertation concludes that the current finance faces a crisis, and in this period, the behavioral finance displays the biggest chance to replace the EMH in the near future, however, the chaos theory provides the bigger promise considering a far future / A ciência das finanças, como toda ciência, apresenta uma linha evolutiva que de acordo com Kuhn (1970) é marcada por períodos de breve acumulação de conhecimento. Porém, de acordo com o autor, tais períodos são intercalados com revoluções científicas. Em outras palavras, a evolução científica é marcada por revoluções que abandonam antigos paradigmas e criam novos. Posteriormente à revolução, segue se um período onde as pesquisas são guiadas pelo novo paradigma com o propósito de fortalecer o próprio paradigma. De outra forma, a ciência financeira possui hoje um paradigma central conhecido como a hipótese de mercados eficientes (HME) que foi reconhecida e adotada pela comunidade científica por volta da década de 70. E desde aquela época, quase toda pesquisa feita na área, principalmente até a década de 90, foi guiada, e feita para validar e fortalecer a própria HME. Nesse sentido, este trabalho procurou evidenciar que a linha evolucionária das finanças proposta por Haugen (2000) segue o mesmo princípio evidenciado por Kuhn (1970), e que no momento atual, a HME encontra-se em um período que antecede a revolução científica e que é chamado de período de crise por Kuhn (1970). Esse período de crise, que antecede as revoluções, poderia enfraquecer a HME e abrir espaço para a criação de um novo paradigma. Sendo assim, o trabalho também propõe a evidenciar como que o processo de revolução poderá acontecer em finanças, e em seguida, também propõe quais seriam os candidatos mais propensos a substituir a HME como paradigma central em finanças. Para tanto, o trabalho considerou apenas dois candidatos: as finanças comportamentais e a teoria do caos. Para fazer tal análise, foram utilizados os princípios de escolarização propostos por Mckinley, Mone e Moon (2002). Tais autores propõem que um pensamento tem que possuir três características (novidade, continuidade e escopo) para ser considerado uma escola em teoria organizacional. O propósito do trabalho é de um resgate teórico básico que procura evidenciar a fragilidade da HME enquanto paradigma principal norteador das pesquisas em finanças. Assim sendo, o trabalho conclui que as finanças atuais enfrentam uma crise, e que nesse período, as finanças comportamentais apresentam a maior chance de substituir a HME em um futuro próximo, porém, a teoria do caos fornece uma promessa maior considerando um futuro mais distante

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-26T20:19:58Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Davio Antonio Prado Zarzana Junior.pdf: 545163 bytes, checksum: 24ed5e49b6e73973d3cf79e7f0d5042d (MD5) Previous issue date: 2011-04-26 / This work, focusing on the financing of Social Security, intends to conduct three checks: first, the existence of deviations in the application of the funds raised for this financing, including from a formulation of one concept of deviation. Second, to examine potential imbalances produced by these possible deviations, from the perspective of Systems Theory, using, in addition, terminology from Communicational Theory. And third, to probe the possibility of complementary application of Chaos Theory to the problem of deviations, if found. The overall result of these investigations, through the dialecticalempirical method, will contribute to the perception of the importance of compliance with the constitutional application of resources to finance the Social Security / Este trabalho, focalizando o custeio da Seguridade Social, pretende realizar três verificações: a primeira, a existência ou não de desvios na aplicação dos recursos arrecadados para este financiamento, inclusive a partir da formulação de um conceito de desvio. A segunda, examinar os desequilíbrios que esses possíveis desvios produziriam, sob a ótica da Teoria dos Sistemas, utilizando-se, em adição, terminologia própria da Teoria Comunicacional. E a terceira, perscrutar a possibilidade de aplicação complementar da Teoria do Caos à problemática dos desvios eventualmente encontrados. O resultado global destas investigações, por meio do método empírico-dialético, deverá colaborar para a percepção da importância do cumprimento constitucional da aplicação dos recursos para o custeio da Seguridade Social

Information systems (IS) projects are complex and costly, but only a 3rd of IS projects are successful; the Standish Group reported that 32% of IS projects were successful in 2012. Although investments in research have led to improvements in practice, there is a general perception that management failures are responsible for the low rate of IS project success. The effects of initiating factors on project outcome had not been sufficiently explored; few IS researchers have explored the initiation phase. The purpose of this grounded theory study was to explore project initiation factors, including relational, as well as decision-making aspects, and how they might be addressed to enhance the possibility of success. The research questions were oriented at identifying key initiation factors, how they might be managed to promote project success, and how decision-making factors at initiation might facilitate project success. A conceptual framework consisting of chaos theory and Ashby's law of requisite variety was used. Purposive and snowballing sampling techniques were used, and 24 IS managers and project managers were interviewed. A 3-stage data analysis approach was used and included open coding, focused coding, and theoretical coding. Key themes identified included project governance and management, as well as stakeholder engagement. The emergent theory of IS project initiation indicated that the factors represented by the themes must be identified during initiation but implemented throughout the project lifecycle to ensure project success. Positive social change may be realized as IS managers, and project managers apply the findings and recommendations to achieve project success and avoid costly failures thus benefiting both companies and customers.

This thesis analyses research into the evolution and adaptation of the communities in Rotorua and Kaikoura by using a complex systems perspective. This perspective requires that the analyst look beyond the obvious impacts of tourism such as employment, crowding, and congestion, to the processes that underlie the experiences of local people in relation to tourism. The configuration of the destination, the flows of people in the area, the visitor types and the ratio of hosts to guests all influence a community's interactions with tourists. In small destinations, the effect of host interactions with guests is potentially much greater than is the case in larger destinations. However, in using a complex systems perspective to analyse the effects of tourism on these two destinations, it becomes clear that the impacts of tourism are more than just the impacts of tourists. The impacts of tourism are intertwined with the processes of trust, leadership and decision making occurring both within the community and within the wider regional and national socio-economic systems. As such, local perceptions of tourism are associated with history, geography, local politics and local social processes. As concepts, the meanings of both 'tourism' and 'community' emerge from the experiences people have, and the associations that they make with the two terms. Thus, the meaning of both 'tourism' and 'community' are idiosyncratic and locally defined. Each term means different things to residents in Rotorua and Kaikoura, and each affects how residents perceive tourism in their respective towns. For example, the associations that people make between historical events and processes such as restructuring are quite different in each of the two communities. In Rotorua, tourism is seen as a source of stability, as a phenomenon that confers a higher level of perceived control on the community. In Kaikoura, tourism is seen as a source of change and it confers a lesser sense of perceived control on the community overall. Likewise, the relationship between the local council and the community underlies the sense of security people feel about local decision making processes. This relationship is mediated by a range of processes including the effort that the council put into communicating with community members, the leadership shown by the council, the way in which they facilitate community visioning processes, which then provide a basis for both leadership and decision making. Underlying these processes are community processes of rivalry, competition, cooperation, labelling and stereotyping that all affect the levels of trust that the community have in those around them. Community cohesion (which is not the same as community agreement) underlies a community's ability to work together to manage tourism. Thus using a complex systems approach to analyse the impacts of tourism in two destinations has shown that there is much more to tourism than the impacts of tourists and their activities. Instead, the way the community system interacts with the tourism system gives rise to the impacts of tourism. Tourism can be usefully conceptualised as a process that is inextricably interwoven with history, politics and community interaction processes at the destination level. Perceptions of tourism reflect these processes and the understanding that local people have of them, and the level of control that they feel they have over tourism development. With little trust in local decision making processes, people have a low sense of control over how tourism development affects them. In tourism planning, therefore, it may be more effective to focus primarily on the processes by which tourism development and management occurs in the local area and to look at mitigating the effects of tourists only after building community capacity to adaptively manage tourism in their area. Communities need a sense of control over their world, and this is only undermined when experts and institutions try to advise courses of action without involving a range of community players in the process of managing tourism. Thus, government and other organisations and institutions at local level must focus on working with communities to build local capacity to manage tourism, without imposing on those communities to convince them to 'treat tourists well' or to manage their environment better, so they become more attractive as a destination.

Gegenstand dieser Dissertation ist eine umfassende Analyse der Stabilität von Asteroidenbahnen im Edgeworth-Kuiper-Gürtel am Beispiel der 3:5-, 4:7- und der 1:2-Bahnresonanz mit Neptun. Einen weiteren Schwerpunkt der Arbeit bildet die Untersuchung der numerischen Berechenbarkeit der Lyapunov-Zeit von Asteroidenbahnen. Ausgehend von einer allgemeinen Beschreibung der bei numerischen Berechnungen auftretenden Rundungs- und Diskretisierungsfehler wird deren Wachstum bei numerischen Integrationen ermittelt. Diese, teilweise maschinenabhängigen, Fehler beeinflussen die berechnete Trajektorie des Asteroiden ebenso wie die daraus abgeleitete Lyapunov-Zeit. Durch Beispielrechnungen mit unterschiedlichen Rechnerarchitekturen und Integrationsmethoden wird der Einfluss auf die erhaltenen Lyapunov-Zeiten eingehend untersucht. Als Maß zur Beschreibung dieser Abhängigkeit wird ein Berechenbarkeitsindex $\kappa$ definiert. Weiterhin wird gezeigt, dass die allgemeine Struktur des Phasenraumes robust gegenüber diesen Änderungen ist. Unter Nutzung dieser Erkenntnis werden anschließend ausgewählte Bahnresonanzen im Edgeworth-Kuiper-Gürtel untersucht. Grundlegende Charakteristika, wie die Resonanzbreiten, werden dabei aus einfachen Modellen abgeleitet. Eine möglichst realitätsnahe Beschreibung der Stabilität wird durch numerische Integration einer Vielzahl von Testkörpern zusammen mit den Planeten Jupiter bis Neptun erreicht. Die erhaltenen Ergebnisse werden dabei mit der beobachteten Verteilung der Asteroiden im Edgeworth-Kuiper-Gürtel verglichen. ---- Hinweis: Beim Betrachten der pdf-Version dieses Dokumentes mit dem Acrobat Reader mit einer Version kleiner 8.0 kann es unter Windows zu Problemen in der Darstellung der Abbildungen auf den Seiten 46, 72, 74, 79 und 86 kommen. Um die Datenpunkte zu sehen ist eine Vergrößerung von mehr als 800% notwendig. Alternativ kann in den Grundeinstellungen der Haken für das Glätten von Vektorgraphiken entfernt werden. / This dissertation presents a comprehensive description of the stability of asteroid orbits in the Edgeworth-Kuiper belt taking the 3:5, 4:7 and 1:2 mean motion resonance with Neptune as example. Further emphasis is given to the numerical computability of the Lyapunov time of asteroids. Starting with a general description of rounding and approximation errors in numerical computations, the growth of these errors within numerical integrations is estimated. These, partly machine-dependent errors influence the calculated trajectory of the asteroid as well as the derived Lyapunov time. Different hardware architectures and integration methods were used to investigate the influence on the computed Lyapunov time. As a measure of this dependence a computability index $\kappa$ is defined. Furthermore it is shown, that the general structure of phase space is robust against these changes. Subsequently, several selected mean motion resonances in the Edgeworth-Kuiper belt are investigated using these findings. Basic properties, like the resonance width, are deduced from simple models. To get a realistic description of the stability, a huge number of test particles was numerically integrated together with the planets Jupiter to Neptune. The obtained results are compared to the observed distribution of asteroids in the Edgeworth-Kuiper belt. ---- Additional information: If the pdf-file of this document is viewed using Acrobat Reader with a version less 8.0 under Windows the figures on page 46, 72, 74, 79 and 86 are shown incomplete. To see the data points a zoom factor larger than 800% is necessary. Alternatively the smoothing of vector graphics should be disabled in the settings of the reader.

This thesis examines the utility of the Rényi entropy (RE), a measure of the complexity of probability density functions, as a tool for finding physically meaningful patterns in geophysical data. Initially, the RE is applied to observational data of long-lived atmospheric tracers in order to analyse the dynamics of stratospheric transitions regions associated with barriers to horizontal mixing. Its wider applicability is investigated by testing the RE as a method for highlighting internal boundaries in snow and ice from ground penetrating radar (GPR) recordings. High-resolution 500 MHz GPR soundings of dry snow were acquired at several sites near Scott Base, Antarctica, in 2008 and 2009, with the aim of using the RE to facilitate the identification and tracking of subsurface layers to extrapolate point measurements of accumulation from snow pits and firn cores to larger areas. The atmospheric analysis focuses on applying the RE to observational tracer data from the EOS-MLS satellite instrument. Nitrous oxide (N2O) is shown to exhibit subtropical RE maxima in both hemispheres. These peaks are a measure of the tracer gradients that mark the transition between the tropics and the mid-latitudes in the stratosphere, also referred to as the edges of the tropical pipe. The RE maxima are shown to be located closer to the equator in winter than in summer. This agrees well with the expected behaviour of the tropical pipe edges and is similar to results reported by other studies. Compared to other stratospheric mixing metrics, the RE has the advantage that it is easy to calculate as it does not, for example, require conversion to equivalent latitude and does not rely on dynamical information such as wind fields. The RE analysis also reveals occasional sudden poleward shifts of the southern hemisphere tropical pipe edge during austral winter which are accompanied by increased mid-latitude N2O levels. These events are investigated in more detail by creating daily high-resolution N2O maps using a two-dimensional trajectory model and MERRA reanalysis winds to advect N2O observations forwards and backwards in time on isentropic surfaces. With the aid of this ‘domain filling’ technique it is illustrated that the increase in southern hemisphere mid-latitude N2O during austral winter is probably the result of the cumulative effect of several large-scale, episodic leaks of N2O-rich air from the tropical pipe. A comparison with the global distribution of potential vorticity strongly suggests that irreversible mixing related to planetary wave breaking is the cause of the leak events. Between 2004 and 2011 the large-scale leaks are shown to occur approximately every second year and a connection to the equatorial quasi-biennial oscillation is found to be likely, though this cannot be established conclusively due to the relatively short data set. Identification and tracking of subsurface boundaries, such as ice layers in snow or the bedrock of a glacier, is the focus of the cryospheric part of this project. The utility of the RE for detecting amplitude gradients associated with reflections in GPR recordings is initially tested on a 25 MHz sounding of an Antarctic glacier. The results show distinct regions of increased RE values that allow identification of the glacial bedrock along large parts of the profile. Due to the low computational requirements, the RE is found to be an effective pseudo gain function for initial analysis of GPR data in the field. While other gain functions often have to be tuned to give a good contrast between reflections and background noise over the whole vertical range of a profile, the RE tends to assign all detectable amplitude gradients a similar (high) value, resulting in a clear contrast between reflections and background scattering. Additionally, theoretical considerations allow the definition of a ‘standard’ data window size with which the RE can be applied to recordings made by most pulsed GPR systems and centre frequencies. This is confirmed by tests with higher frequency recordings (50 and 500 MHz) acquired on the McMurdo Ice Shelf. However, these also reveal that the RE processing is less reliable for identifying more closely spaced reflections from internal layers in dry snow. In order to complete the intended high-resolution analysis of accumulation patterns by tracking internal snow layers in the 500 MHz data from two test sites, a different processing approach is developed. Using an estimate of the emitted waveform from direct measurement, deterministic deconvolution via the Fourier domain is applied to the high-resolution GPR data. This reveals unambiguous reflection horizons which can be observed in repeat measurements made one year apart. Point measurements of average accumulation from snow pits and firn cores are extrapolated to larger areas by identifying and tracking a dateable dust layer horizon in the radargrams. Furthermore, it is shown that annual compaction rates of snow can be estimated by tracking several internal reflection horizons along the deconvolved radar profiles and calculating the average change in separation of horizon pairs from one year to the next. The technique is complementary to point measurements from other studies and the derived compaction rates agree well with published values and theoretical estimates.