Science and Technology Studies Commons^™

The Ideological Alignment Of Smart Urbanism In Singapore: Critical Reflections On A Political Paradox, Lily Kong, Orlando Woods

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Over the past decade, much has been written about the potential of smart urbanism to bring about various and lasting forms of betterment. The embedding of digital technologies within urban infrastructures has been well documented, and the efficiencies of smart models of urban governance and management have been lauded. More recently, however, the discourse has been labelled ‘hegemonic’, and accused of developing a view of smart technology that is blinkered by its failure to critique its socio-political effects. By focusing on the case of Singapore’s ‘Smart Nation’ initiative, this paper embraces the paradoxes at the heart of smart urbanism and, …

Increasing Energy Acces In Southeast Asia Through Social Enterprises, Haneol Jeong

Social Space

The 21st century has seen cars go driverless and virtual reality become a reality—yet one fact remains: one in seven people still do not have access to electricity.1 In an age where more people have access to mobile phones than toilets,2 electricity has become as vital a necessity as clean water. To address this issue, social enterprises such as M-KOPA and Sunlabob have pioneered efforts to provide renewable energy for off-grid communities, and yielded innovative energy alternatives and financing solutions. Southeast Asia, however, remains a largely untapped market, with approximately 19 per cent of its population still without access to …

How China Is Preparing For An Ai-Powered Future, Yujia He

Patterson School of Diplomacy and International Commerce Faculty Publications

U.S. leadership in artificial intelligence (AI) research and development (R&D) may be challenged by China’s recent and centralized policy planning aimed at rapidly developing AI-related technologies. The Chinese government supports AI as a strategic area supported by high-level policies with ambitious and quantifiable targets, inter-ministry coordination, government funding for research and development, support for workforce development, and suggestions for international collaboration and expansion. Still, as a relative latecomer in the global AI race, China faces numerous challenges to implement its policy planning, including short-term skills gap and long-term institutional constraints.

People's War In Cyberspace: Using China's Civilian Economy In The Information Domain, Kieran Richard Green

Military Cyber Affairs

China is identified as posing a key challenge to US national security interests in cyberspace. These threats are incurred across the spectrum of conflict, ranging from low-level crime, to network penetration, to cyberattacks that have the potential to cause major physical destruction. Thus far, the majority of strategic assessments of China’s cyber capabilities have focused on the role of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), which is officially tasked with undertaking offensive operations in cyberspace.[1] However, China does not employ its cyber capabilities in isolation. Rather, it considers cyber to be part of the “Information Domain.” In Chinese doctrine, controlling …

Weights And Balances: Integrating Models For Prevention And Response To Southern California Offshore Oil Spills, Carmen Watts Clayton, Amoret Bunn

STAR Program Research Presentations

Licensing offshore oil and gas reserves in the United States waters are overseen by the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Safety and Enforcement (BSEE). The licensing application includes planning for any worst-case oil spill scenario between BSEE and the applicant based on lessons learned from historic offshore spills such as the Deepwater Horizon (2010), Exxon Valdez (1989), and the Union Oil Platform Blowout (1969). The process for planning to respond to oil spills involves coordination with multiple agencies, trustees, and stakeholders to ensure that oil spill responses consider multiple factors, including ecologically sensitive species, commercial transportation and fisheries, …

The Rise Of China's Hacking Culture: Defining Chinese Hackers, William Howlett Iv

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

China has been home to some of the most prominent hackers and hacker groups of the global community throughout the last decade. In the last ten years, countless attacks globally have been linked to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) or those operating within the PRC. This exploration attempts to investigate the story, ideology, institutions, actions, and motivations of the Chinese hackers collectively, as sub-groups, and as individuals. I will do this using sources ranging from basic news coverage, interviews with experts and industry veterans, secondary reportage, leaked documents from government and private sources, government white papers, legal codes, blogs …

Understanding The Human Domain: Modification And Utilization Of A Leopold Matrix To Assess The Impact Of Activity Based Intelligence And Open Source Information Or Other Proposed Solutions, Kenneth Sydnor

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

The emphasis on understanding the human domain (HD) over the last decade of war, counterterrorism, and counterinsurgency operations has provided opportunities to test multiple new tools, data sources and analytical approaches to age-old intelligence problems. While these tools were utilized in Iraq and Afghanistan with varying degrees of success, a comprehensive analytical method was not developed to assess the benefits of the proposed solutions and their impact on understanding the human domain. Given the paradigm shift away from an academic or scholarly way of viewing the Human Domain towards a nomenclature and understanding denoted in “physical” geography-type terms, what tool …

Rethinking Intellectual Property For The 21st Century, Tim Jones

Asian Management Insights

New models are undermining the traditional views of intellectual property.

The Future Of Arabic Music: No Sound Without Silence, Nesma Magdy Khodier Vcuq

Theses and Dissertations

For centuries, Arabic music has been intrinsically linked to Arab culture and by extension bonded to the environmental landscape of the region, reflecting their emotions, moods, and behaviors. Numerous technological advancements in the latter half of the twentieth century, have greatly affected the rich legacy of Arabic music, significantly impacting the natural progression of traditional Arabic musical genres, scales, and instrumentation.

This thesis serves as an introduction to generative methods of music production, specifically music generated through gestures. Through generative music, and its unique ability to map gestures to different musical parameters, music can be produced using computer algorithms.

The …

Evaluating The Enterprise Resource Planning (Erp) Systems’ Success At The Individual Level Of Analysis In The Middle East, Mohammad Alzoubi

CCAC Theses and Dissertations

Although ERP systems have been depicted as a solution in many organizations, there are many negative reports on ERP success, benefits, and effect on user’s performance. Previous research noted that there is a lack of knowledge and awareness of ERP systems and their overall value to ERP organizations. ERP systems have been widely studied during the past decade, yet they often fail to deliver the intended benefits originally expected. One notable reason for their failures is the lack of understanding in users’ requirements. This dissertation study was designed to understand the relative importance of system quality (SQ), IQ (IQ), service …

Impermeable Assemblages: Flooding, Urban Infrastructure, And Stormwater Politics In São Paulo, Brazil, Nate Millington

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

This project analyzes efforts to remake the relationship between water and city in São Paulo, Brazil. Currently experiencing overlapping problems of flooding, scarcity, and pollution, São Paulo illustrates the challenges of managing water in a contemporary mega-city. This dissertation subsequently considers the city’s water management through an approach that borrows from urban political ecology, social studies of science, and post-colonial urban theory. With an epistemological grounding in these literatures, this project analyzes ongoing conversations about water management in São Paulo, and focuses on how water is encountered and engaged with in the landscape by engineers, artists, and activists. This project …

Uses Of Sampling Techniques & Inventory Control With Capacity Constraints, Florentin Smarandache, Sachin Malik, Neeraj Kumar

Branch Mathematics and Statistics Faculty and Staff Publications

The main aim of the present book is to suggest some improved estimators using auxiliary and attribute information in case of simple random sampling and stratified random sampling and some inventory models related to capacity constraints. This volume is a collection of five papers, written by six co-authors (listed in the order of the papers): Dr. Rajesh Singh, Dr. Sachin Malik, Dr. Florentin Smarandache, Dr. Neeraj Kumar, Mr. Sanjey Kumar & Pallavi Agarwal. In the first chapter authors suggest an estimator using two auxiliary variables in stratified random sampling for estimating population mean. In second chapter they proposed a family …

The Future Of Farming In Capable And Small Hands: The Young Farmer’S Movement In Waterloo Region 1907-1924, Morgan Williams

Laurier Undergraduate Journal of the Arts

No abstract provided.

Learning From Cinara: Exploring The Depths Of Participatory Water Engagement In Cali, Colombia, Zachary T. Strickland

Honors College Theses

Located within the Universidad del Valle in Cali, Colombia, CINARA is an academic institution, comprised of both engineers and social scientists, that has almost three decades of experience regarding participatory approaches to water supply and environmental sanitation. In this paper, I argue that CINARA’s work is important due to its emphasis on meaningful community participation that significantly involves communities in decisions on technical matters that are usually allocated exclusively to “experts.” Furthermore, the valuation of social considerations and non-technical knowledge found amongst CINARA’s engineers stands in distinct contrast to traditional development practices and engineering mindsets. This paper will go on …

Research Performance In South-East Asia, Elsevier Analytical Services, British Council, Foreign And Commonwealth Office

Public Reports

This report was commissioned by the UK-South-East Asia Knowledge Partnership, an alliance between the British Council and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to analyse and present the research performance of five South-East Asia countries: Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam. The bibliometric study undertaken by Elsevier Analytical Services examined each country’s research performance, identifying its strengths, its most prolific or impactful institutions, and its collaborators between 2009 and 2013. The five countries selected have the most prolific scholarly output in the region and are partner countries for the UK’s Newton Fund, excluding Singapore due to its superior research performance.

Perspectivas Culturais Na Comunicação Climática (Cultural Perspectives On Climate Communication), Karen E. Pennesi

Anthropology Publications

Este artigo considera que a previsão climática deve ser interpretada dentro de contextos sociais, culturais e linguísticos. Dentro de uma perspectiva antropológica baseada em entrevistas, observações e um questionário, será investigado como mudanças no meio-ambiente são entendidas por diferentes indivíduos, e transformadas em previsões que são comunicadas a diversos públicos. A linguagem utilizada e a maneira como a previsão é comunicada depende da experiência e dos objetivos do previsor, enquanto que a interpretação e a avaliação da previsão por outros são influenciadas por seus diferentes objetivos, atitudes, conhecimento e práticas. Esta etnografia da comunicação enfatiza o processo da comunicação das …

The Use Of Improved Technology And Market-Based Incentives To Increase Forest Resource And Biodiversity Conservation In Rwanda, Kelly M. Rayens

Theses and Dissertations--Forestry and Natural Resources

This study evaluated the effectiveness of two distinct approaches to ecosystem conservation in Rwanda’s Nyungwe National Park: cookstove technology adoption and market-based policy instruments. A June 2014 survey of 250 households revealed that use of improved cookstove technology dramatically decreased fuelwood consumption for households in rural Rwanda, but that design, engineering and conflicting policy issues can hamper the widespread use of energy-efficient cooking technology. The second component of this research used the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) within a multi-criteria analysis (MCA) framework to explore the options for designing and implementing market-based instruments around the country’s conservation targets, particularly the highly …

Transforming Wealth Management Through Technology, Vineet Malhotra

Asian Management Insights

Wealth managers can see the potential benefits of rapidly evolving mobile technology and are taking steps to significantly enhance interaction with their clients and transform the way information is presented and shared.

Utopias Misplaced: The Cost Of Outsourcing Dystopian Poetics To North Korea, Seo-Young J. Chu

Publications and Research

This is a slightly revised version of the text of a talk that I (Seo-Young Chu) gave as part of the Fall 2014 Franke Lectures in the Humanities at Yale University. I'm sharing the text here to make the lecture more accessible. Topics include: North Korea/the DPRK, the "uncanny body politic," the uncanny valley, "dystopian poetics," what it means to outsource dystopian poetics, the intersection of aesthetics and politics. Authors/artists mentioned include: Thomas Hobbes, Mary Shelley, David Mitchell, Marjane Satrapi, Song Byeok, Sun Mu, Masahiro Mori, Andy Warhol. The talk also discusses the James Bond film Die Another Day.

Nets Or Vaccines: Malaria Vaccine Research, David Ernenwein

Pepperdine Policy Review

The global battle against malaria has seen many victories in the developed world but the undeveloped world and particularly Africa continue to suffer from this disease. The development of the RTS,S vaccine and ongoing research into additional vaccines have been touted as the solution to the crisis. However, the news of the successful RTS,S trial should be viewed with caution. Concerns over the effectiveness of the existing vaccine and the cost of further development may not be justified, especially given the known effectiveness of current treatment methods. This research must be watched carefully lest the allure of the vaccine blind …

Extrapolating Strategies For The Scientific And Technological Development Of Underdeveloped Societies From The Examples Of South Korea, Slovenia And Serbia, Vuk Uskoković, Dragan Uskoković

Pharmacy Faculty Articles and Research

The recent history of scientific excellence of a society could be used as an indicator of its economic, cultural and communal prosperity. In this work, two examples of countries that successfully arose from the remnants of comparative poverty and established themselves as scientifically thriving societies, South Korea and Slovenia, are compared with the case of Serbia, a country that is presumably on the doorsteps of a similarly explosive developmental path. Guidelines for social progress in the direction of greater scientific and social prominence are outlined in the course of the discourse. It is concluded that the ideal model of growth …

The Myth Of Progress In Science: Dialectics, Distortion And Lysenkoism In The Soviet Union, Mark A. Ferguson Jr.

The Hilltop Review

The scientific controversy surrounding Lysenkoism is both unparalleled and well known amongst historians and philosophers of science (Joravsky 1970, McMullin 1987, Pollock 2009, Wolfe 2010). Yet, while this may be true for scholars and students a generation ago, I argue that the controversy of Lysenkoism is not widely known today. Particularly in political science, this historical period and phenomenon in the Soviet Union remains irrelevant or at least, inconsequential to the scientific study of politics.

Groundwater Research In Middle Earth, Thomas Lapoint

Liberal Arts and Engineering Studies

My senior project focused on studying saltwater intrusion in a coastal town of New Zealand. I feel lucky that I was able to travel to such a distant place, conduct research that was insightful and interesting, and immerse myself in an international culture all in the name of my education. As a Liberal Arts and Engineering Studies student, I aim to analyze not only the cultural differences and similarities that the foreign environment offers to me but also the detailed, technical, engineering aspect of my research. I believe that my education should be approached with a well rounded perspective that …

Why Do Some Nations Have More Renewable Energy Policies?, Melissa Dahl

Political Science Theses and Capstones

Some nations have considerably more renewable energy policies than others and this research is attempting to discover why. Renewable energy use is quickly growing in our world and has become a major topic in today’s politics. Existing literature suggests various theories as to why some nations have more renewable energy policies than others. I test these theories with data from two major data sources; REN21, the Renewable Energy Policy Network for the 21st Century, and the International Energy Agency. I anticipate that nations with a larger number of effective political parties, higher GDPs, and larger population would have more renewable …

What The 2000 U.S. Census Tells Us About The Kenyan Diaspora, Martin Mbaya, Paulsen Mrina, Michael J. Levin

Journal of Global Initiatives: Policy, Pedagogy, Perspective

The 2000 U.S. Decennial Census produced profiles of Kenya-born and other Africa-born immigrants for the first time. These tabulations provide useful information about the counts and demographic, social, economic, and housing characteristics of Kenyans living in the United States. This paper compares the characteristics of the East Africa born with the U.S. born, as well as with all U.S. Blacks. Overall, the data show a classic brain drain in the emigration from the East African community as people relocate and settle down in the United States. The East African diaspora represents a crucial cross section of Africa's top minds in …

Strategies For The Scientific Progress Of The Developing Countries In The New Millennium: The Case Of Serbia In Comparison With Slovenia And South Korea, Vuk Uskoković, Milica Ševkušić, Dragan P. Uskoković

Pharmacy Faculty Articles and Research

The underlying premise of this essay is the hypothesis that quality and significance of scientific research in any given society could be used as mirrors reflecting its true prosperity. By comparing the two cases of comparatively prosperous scientific management of South Korea and Slovenia, with the example of Serbia, illustrating the poor scientific and industrial productivity typically faced by the developing countries, a few general guidelines for the evolution of a society towards higher scientific and social prominence are outlined. It is argued that the most favourable pattern of growth should be based on the parallel progress in control of …

Information Technology Acceptance In South Africa: An Investigation Of Perceived Usefulness, Perceived Ease Of Use, And Actual System Use Constructs, Udo Richard Averweg

The African Journal of Information Systems

Information technology (IT) acceptance studies pay much attention to issues of significance in assessing the contributions of variables explaining IT usage for decision-making in organizations. Davis’ Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) states that Perceived Usefulness (PU) and Perceived Ease of Use (PEOU) are the two factors that govern the adoption and use of information technology. Actual System Use (behavior) consists of the number of times of systems use. The author conducted a survey of 31 organizations in KwaZulu/Natal, a region in South Africa, which implemented an Executive Information System (EIS). A validated survey instrument was administered to an EIS stakeholder in …

The Internet And Civil Society: Environmental And Labour Organizations In Hong Kong, Yin-Wah Chu, James T. H. Tang

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

To what extent has the Internet strengthened civil society? In which ways have civil society organizations (CSOs) used the internet to communicate their missions, enhance the discussion of public issues, extend networks and mobilize collective actions? This article seeks to answer these and related questions by reporting on an empirical study in Hong Kong. The study involves an analysis of the web pages launched by 14 environmental groups and 22 labour organizations on the one hand, and in-depth interviews with representatives of five of these organizations on the other. Due to the lack of resources and low level of e-readiness …

Wither The Fruited Plain: The Long Expedition And The Description Of The "Great American Desert", Kevin Z. Sweeney

Great Plains Quarterly (through 2013)

The view from Pikes Peak is breathtaking. Situated where the Great Plains meets the Rocky Mountains, one feels as if the whole nation is laid out before you. It is the perfect vantage point from which to write an inspirational anthem to the environmental magnificence of the United States. In the summer of 1893, Katherine Lee Bates, a Wellesley College English professor, sat on the summit of Pikes Peak, inspired by the panorama to pen the words to "America the Beautiful." Her poem was set to the tune "Materna" by Samuel Augustus Ward two years later to become one of …

The Pen May Be Mightier Than The Sword...But What About A Laser Weapons System, Rebecca Schauer

Honors Capstones

Capstone submitted as a graduation requirement for the BSU Honors Program.