Life Sciences Commons^™

Reef Society And The Tyranny Of Data, Robert Wintner

Animal Sentience

Modern science now approaches divergent processes in many areas, including health assessments of marine eco-systems and social aspects of marine species. Scientific data have long enjoyed a reputation for objectivity but incidents of science-for-hire, data spinning/skewing and political jading are more frequent than ever. In the field of reef creature sensitivity, technical treatises can “logically” explain away what a person of average education can clearly observe on any given reef. Western medicine discounted anecdotal evidence of any cure outside the 4% margin of error until those cures demanded attention and in some cases application. Modern science must now enter an …

Still Wondering How Flesh Can Feel, Gwen J. Broude

Animal Sentience

Reber believes he has simplified Chalmers’s “hard problem” of consciousness by arguing that subjectivity is an inherent feature of biological forms. His argument rests on the related notions of continuity of mind and gradual accretion of capacities across evolutionary time. These notions need to be defended, not just asserted. Because Reber minimizes the differences in mental faculties among species across evolutionary time, it becomes easier to assert, and perhaps believe, that sentience is already present in early biological forms. The more explicit we are about the differences among these mental faculties and the differences across species, the less persuasive is …

Assessing The Vulnerability Of Fishery Villages Influenced By Climate Change And Anthropogenic Activity In The Coastal Zone Of The Tamsui River, Sheng-Yuan Teng, Ming-An Lee, Jhen Hsu, Tzu-Ping Lin, Yu-Chen Lin, Yi Chang

Journal of Marine Science and Technology

Coastal zones located in populated and rapidly developing areas face high risks of natural and anthropogenic disasters. In this study, a framework was developed to determine the indicators of vulnerability to natural and anthropogenic disasters in Chuwei and Tamsui, two northern Taiwanese fishing villages in the coastal zone of the Tamsui River. The analytical hierarchy process (AHP) was used to determine the vulnerability indices of the locations, with experts evaluating the weights assigned to a range of criteria, namely hydrological data (such as sea surface temperature and sea level), stakeholder perceptions, and fishery data. These two villages have a considerably …

Predicting The Catch Potential Of Skipjack Tuna In The Western And Central Pacific Ocean Under Different Climate Change Scenarios, Kuo-Wei Yen, Nan-Jay Su, Tooreka Teemari, Min-An Lee, Hsueh-Jung Lu

Journal of Marine Science and Technology

Skipjack tuna (Katsuwonus pelamis) constitute an important migratory species that contributes significantly to the economy and the global fishery industry. Skipjack tuna play a vital role in the marine ecosystem, particularly in tropical waters of the western and central Pacific Ocean (WCPO). However, climate change may affect the characteristics of fishery resources, leading to substantial reallocation and reduction of the biomass of this species in the WCPO. In this study, catch and effort data for skipjack tuna were collected from a purse seine fishery and subsequently analyzed in combination with remote-sensing environmental variables and simulation data from climate models under …

Assessment Of Landform Changes In Baramarae Tidal Flat, Korea Using Combined Analysis Of Multi-Temporal Remote Sensing Images And Grain Size Measurement Data, Yeseul Kim, Dong-Ho Jang, No-Wook Park, Hee Young Yoo

Journal of Marine Science and Technology

In this study, information on landform change in Baramarae tidal flat, Korea is analyzed using multi-temporal Landsat images and grain size measurement data. Unlike previous studies that focused on the extraction of topographic changes from intertidal digital elevation models (DEMs), information on landform change is assessed in the present study by considering both topography and surface sediment characteristics. DEMs in 2000 and 2010 were first generated using waterlines extracted from 16 Landsat images. Mean grain size distribution maps were also generated by interpolating sample data acquired in the field in 2002 and 2012. The non-spatial and spatial characteristics of the …

Impact Of Climate Change On Shihmen Reservoir Water Supply, Tai-Yi Chu, Jyun-Long Lee, Wen-Cheng Huang

Journal of Marine Science and Technology

This study evaluated the impact of climate change on the water supply of the Shihmen reservoir in northern Taiwan. Five downscaled general circulation models that represent the daily meteorological data of 2046-2065 were adopted. The future inflow of the Shihmen reservoir was estimated using the tank model. Subsequently, the water supply risk under the given demand and operating conditions was simulated and assessed. Compared with 2004-2011, the average annual precipitation of the Shihmen watershed in 2046-2065 is lower, particularly during the wet season (May-October). Therefore, the risk to the water supply will increase in the first cropping season (from March …

Risk Maps And Coastal Defense Criteria In Taiwan, Wei-Po Huang, Lien-Kwei Chien, Lee-Hsueh Lee

Journal of Marine Science and Technology

To promote sustainable development, the Coastal Zone Management Act prescribes that coastal areas should be divided into two levels of protection zones. However, the complexity and variety of coastal defenses and land use cannot be described completely by using these two levels alone. Coastal risk maps, based on natural and manmade characters of a region, showing different degrees of vulnerability and hazard potentials, can aid in making decisions. In this study, the criteria for coastal protection and land use in terms of risk maps were adopted. A tentative risk map was presented for the northern Kaohsiung City coastal area, Southwest …

Review Of Northwestern African Buthacus, With Description Of Buthacus Stockmanni Sp. N. From Morocco And Western Sahara (Scorpiones, Buthidae), František Kovařík, Graeme Lowe, František Šťáhlavský

Euscorpius

Northwestern African Buthacus species are revised. Buthacus stockmanni sp. n. from Morocco and Western Sahara is described and fully complemented with color photos of live and preserved specimens, as well as their habitat. The hemispermatophore of B. stockmanni sp. n. is illustrated and described. In addition to morphology and hemi-spermatophores, we also describe the karyotypes of B. stockmanni sp. n. (2n=20). B. stockmanni sp. n. is compared with B. occidentalis Vachon, 1953 and B. ziegleri Lourenço, 2000. Both these species are differentiated from B. stockmanni sp. n. geographically and morphologically. The male of B. stockmanni sp. n. has fingers of …

First Report Of Lissothus Occidentalis Vachon, 1950 (Scorpiones: Buthidae) From Morocco And Western Sahara, With Notes On Ecology And Captive Breeding, Mark Stockmann, Carlos Turiel, Felix Althoff, Graeme Lowe, František Kovařík

Euscorpius

Genus Lissothus Vachon, 1948 represented by L. occidentalis Vachon, 1950 is reported for the first time from four localities in Morocco and the Western Sahara. We provide a revised diagnosis of L. occidentalis, fully complemented with color photos of live and preserved specimens. Hemispermatophore is also illustrated and described in detail. Furthermore, we describe aspects of the ecology of this species, and provide photos of collection sites and habitats. We also report on the reproductive biology of this species based on captive breeding and rearing. and provide the first envenomation report for the species.

Animals Aren’T Persons, But Is It Time For A Neologism?, Helen Steward

Animal Sentience

Mark Rowlands argues that at least some animals are persons, based on the idea that (i) many animals have a property he calls “pre-reflective awareness,” (ii) the capacity for pre-reflective awareness is sufficient to satisfy the traditional Lockean definition of personhood, and (iii) satisfaction of the traditional Lockean definition of personhood is sufficient for being a person. I agree with (i) and can see that there is a persuasive case for (ii), but I think the case against (iii) blocks the conclusion that animals are persons. I suggest that we may need instead to coin a neologism in order to …

Reber’S Caterpillar Offers No Help, Carl Safina

Animal Sentience

Reber’s target article “Caterpillars, consciousness and the origins of mind” seems only to shift but not to address the question of where the mind is and how minds occur.

Leaf Miner's Leaves, Susan Hoenig

The STEAM Journal

For many years I have been collecting leaves and discovered a phenomena that I find truly fascinating on specific leaves called "leaf miner's leaves". The leaves are the dwellings of animals, various insects' architectural habitat. Leaf miner's leaves are a phenomena in nature in the plant kingdom where the larvae of various insects tunnel their way through a leaf eating its living tissue. The leaf miners create distinctive patterns on each leaf. The snake-like serpentine tunnels protect them from predators and plant defenses.

Using Storytelling To Raise Interest In Vultures, Elise C. Osenga

The STEAM Journal

The tradition of oral storytelling is an art that stretches back to humankind's earliest cultures. While storytelling is often considered as a form of entertainment, it has also long been used as a teaching tool as well-- a way of engaging listeners to come to new understanding of their world through subtle means. It is my belief that stories, particularly stories with a clear tie to students' sense of place, can be more widely applied to effectively generate interest in specific scientific topics and help students to form emotional connections with the topics under discussion. The following personal narrative describes …

Two New Species Of Euscorpius Thorell, 1876 From Southern Turkey (Scorpiones: Euscorpiidae), Gioele Tropea, Ersen Aydın Yağmur

Euscorpius

Two new species of scorpion of the genus Euscorpius Thorell, 1876 are described from southern Turkey based on morphological ratio and trichobothrial data. E. hakani sp. n. from Mt. Eşeler, in Denizli Province in southwestern Turkey and E. aladaglarensis sp. n. from the Aladağlar Mts., in Niğde, Kayseri, and Adana Provinces. With the description of two new taxa, 17 species of Euscorpius are currently recognized in Turkey.

Insect Consciousness: Commitments, Conflicts And Consequences, Colin Klein, Andrew B. Barron

Animal Sentience

Our target article, “Insects have the capacity for subjective experience,” has provoked a diverse range of commentaries. In this response we have collated what we see as the major themes of the discussion. It is clear that we differ from some commentators in our commitments to what subjective experience is and what the midbrain is capable of. Here we clarify where we stand on those points and how our view differs from some other influential perspectives. The commentaries have highlighted the most lively areas of disagreement. We revisit here the debates surrounding whether the cortex is essential for any form …

Consciousness And Evolutionary Biology, Yew-Kwang Ng

Animal Sentience

Reber’s axiom: “Any organism with flexible cell walls, a sensitivity to its surrounds and the capacity for locomotion will possess the biological foundations of mind and consciousness” does not seem to be supported by things we know and the logic of evolutionary biology. The latter leads to the conclusion that conscious species are flexible in their behavior (rather than in their cell walls), as argued in Ng (1995, 2016). Locomotion may be completely hard-wired and need not involve consciousness. It is hard enough to explain how consciousness could emerge in a sophisticated brain: Isn’t it a harder problem to show …

Body Mass Estimates From Bone And Tooth Measurements In White-Tailed Deer, Odocoileus Virginianus, Brandi Morris, Alfred J. Mead

Georgia Journal of Science

The distal forelimbs and mandibles of 110 female and 240 male white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) from the Piedmont National Wildlife Refuge, Georgia, were used to examine the relationship between metacarpal dimensions, first lower molar occlusal surface area, and mandibular width versus body mass. The strongest correlation was found between female metacarpal proximal area vs. body mass (R2 = 0.74). The combined-sexes metacarpal proximal area vs. body mass displayed a lower correlation (R2 = 0.54). The female first lower molar surface area vs. body mass produced the highest dental correlation (R2 = 0.56). The study suggests that body mass estimates using …

The Difference Between Conscious And Unconscious Brain Circuits, Ezequiel Morsella, Zaviera Reyes

Animal Sentience

Theoretical frameworks in which consciousness is an inherent property of the neuron must account for the contrast between conscious and unconscious processes in the brain and address how neural events can ever be unconscious if consciousness is a property of all neurons. Other approaches have sought answers regarding consciousness by contrasting conscious and unconscious processes and through investigating the complex interactions between the two kinds of processes, as occurs most notably in human voluntary action. In voluntary action, consciousness is associated most, not with motor control or low-level perceptual processing, but with the stage of processing known as action selection.

Resolving The Hard Problem And Calling For A Small Miracle, Arthur S. Reber

Animal Sentience

With the exception of the commentary by Key, the commentaries on Reber have a common feature: the commenters feel, with varying levels of enthusiasm, that there is at least some virtue in the core assumption of the Cellular Basis of Consciousness (CBC) theory that consciousness (or subjectivity or sentience) accompanies the earliest forms of life. The model has two important entailments: (a) it resolves the (in)famous Hard Problem by redirecting the search for the biochemical foundations of sentience away from human consciousness; and (b) it reduces the need for an emergentist miracle to a far simpler scale than is currently …

No Help On The Hard Problem, Derek Ball

Animal Sentience

The hard problem of consciousness is to explain why certain physical states are conscious: why do they feel the way they do, rather than some other way or no way at all? Arthur Reber (2016) claims to solve the hard problem. But he does not: even if we grant that amoebae are conscious, we can ask why such organisms feel the way they do, and Reber’s theory provides no answer. Still, Reber’s theory may be methodologically useful: we do not yet have a satisfactory theory of consciousness, but perhaps the study of simple minds is a way to go about …

Unconscious Higher-Order Thoughts (Hots) As Pre-Reflective Self-Awareness?, Rocco J. Gennaro

Animal Sentience

Rowlands argues that many nonhuman animals are “persons,” contrary to the prevailing orthodoxy which rests on a mistaken conception of the kind of self-awareness relevant to personhood. He argues that self-awareness bifurcates into two importantly different forms — reflective self-awareness and pre-reflective self-awareness — and that many animals can have the latter, which is sufficient for personhood. I agree that there is good reason to think that many animals can have pre-reflective self-awareness, but I think Rowlands is mistaken about its nature. His account runs the risk of leading to an infinite regress objection, and his notion of pre-reflective self-awareness …

The Psychological Concept Of “Person”, Kristin Andrews

Animal Sentience

Reluctance to overextend personhood seems to drive many of the skeptical responses in the first round of commentaries on Rowlands's target article. Despite Rowlands’s straightforward Response that we already accept some nonhumans as persons, there is still hesitation to accept that other nonhuman animals are persons. Rowlands's argument is sound but the skeptics don’t accept the Lockean notion of person. The metaphysical sense of person is a psychological one, however, and psychological properties grant one moral status according to many ethical theories.

Fish Names Variability Traces The Geo-Historical Dynamics Of Moroccan Fishermen Communities, Hicham Masski, Abdelaziz Ait Hammou

Journal of Ecological Anthropology

Fish vernacular names in Morocco needs a structuring system. Though used widely, these names are highly variable and do not necessarily meet trade requirements. The 138 species considered in this study have 691 vernacular names and the vernacular names lists of the 16 study sites show large disparities. The most part of this variability is of linguistic origin coming from four geographic regions and thus cultural groups. Even if possible, the adoption of a unique standard, which is the goal of the national fisheries regulation authorities, might encounter resistance to its dissemination throughout fishermen and the local population.

Influence Of Porcine Plasma Supplementation On Gestating Sow Serum Igf-1 Concentration And Litter Weights, Mathew Vaughn, Crystal Serrano, Derris Burnett, Duane Davis, Jason Woodworth, John Gonzalez

Professional Agricultural Workers Journal

The objective of this pilot study was to determine the effect of dietary porcine plasma on circulating insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) concentrations in gestating sows and characteristics of their litters. Primiparous and multiparous sows were randomly allocated to two treatment groups of sows fed a basal diet or sows fed the basal diet plus 6 g of porcine plasma throughout gestation. On 4 periods during gestation and farrowing, blood was collected for IGF-1 analysis. After farrowing, gestation length, number born, birth weight, and total litter weight were recorded. There were no three-way or two-way interactions between treatments, day of …

Assessing Georgia Consumer Attitudes And Beliefs About Locally Or Regionally Produced Livestock And Products, Jannette R. Bartlett, Reem I. Omer, Akua Adu-Gyamfi, David Nii O. Tackie, Francisca A. Quarcoo, Bridget J. Perry

Professional Agricultural Workers Journal

Abstract

Interest in local and regional food production has been growing in the last few years. The study, therefore, assessed consumer attitudes and beliefs regarding local or regional livestock products. Data were obtained from a convenience sample of 384 participants from several counties of Georgia, and were analyzed by descriptive statistics, including chi-square tests. A majority of respondents thought using chemicals and additives in locally or regionally produced beef or goat meat was a serious or somewhat serious hazard. Consequently, many were willing to pay more for meat certified as locally or regionally produced. Furthermore, a majority agreed or strongly …

Table Of Contents

Professional Agricultural Workers Journal

No abstract provided.

Assessing Florida Consumer Attitudes And Beliefs About Locally Or Regionally Produced Livestock And Products, Akua Adu-Gyamfi, Reem I. Omer, Jannette R. Bartlett, David Nii O. Tackie, Bridget J. Perry

Professional Agricultural Workers Journal

Abstract

In recent years, consumer interest in locally or regionally produced foods has been growing. This study analyzed consumer attitudes and beliefs on local or regional livestock products in Florida. Data were collected from a convenience sample of 404 participants from counties in Florida. They were assessed by descriptive statistics, including chi-square tests. Most participants believed using chemicals in locally or regionally produced beef or goat meat was at minimum a somewhat serious hazard. Thus, many were willing to pay more for meat certified as locally or regionally produced. Moreover, most agreed or strongly agreed with statements on meat attributes. …

Grazing With Goats Changed The Woodland Plant-Species Composition During Summer, Rishi Khatri, Uma Karki, Jerry Bettis, Yubaraj Karki

Professional Agricultural Workers Journal

Abstract

Woodland grazing is a common practice in the Southeast; however, information is limited on its effects on the woodland plant-species composition. The study objective was to determine the effect of summer grazing on woodland plant-species composition. Before- and after-grazing observations were taken at the ground, mid, and high levels in three plots (1-acre each) along the pre-established transects. Kiko wethers (29, 6-8 months old, 26.8±0.67 kg body weight) were allowed to graze the plots after before-grazing observations were taken. After-grazing observations were taken immediately after the goats were moved out from the plots. Grazing showed a significant effect on …

Review: Interspecies Ethics By Cynthia Willett, Thomas E. Randall

Between the Species

This paper provides a review of Cynthia Willett's book Interspecies Ethics. Willett aims to outline the beginnings of biosocial eros ethics – an ethical outline that sketches the potentiality of a cross-species cosmopolitan ideal of compassion (agape), derived through acknowledging and emphasizing the existence of spontaneous, playful interaction between social animals. Though this book is recommended for offering an innovative framework from which to explore the possibility of non-anthropocentric cross-species ethic, readers should be wary of expecting to find a fully-fledged moral program detailing how this would work.

A New Species Of Centruroides (Scorpiones: Buthidae) From Quiché, Northwestern Guatemala, Rony E. Trujillo, Luis F. De Armas

Euscorpius

A new species of the genus Centruroides Marx, 1890 is described from Sotzil Village (15.61775°N, -91.09745°W, 1173 m a.s.l.), Chajul Municipality, Quiché Department, Guatemala, on basis of one female and one male. It closely resembles Centruroides caral Armas et Trujillo, 2013 from northeastern Guatemala (240 Km southeast of Chajul), but male differs by having a most globose pedipalp manus, as well as metasoma clearly more attenuate (len-gth/width ratio: segments II–IV = 2.4, 2.7 and 1.4, respectively; 1.7, 2.2 and 2.5 in the holotype of C. caral, the only known specimen of this taxon). Data on its habitat and some …