Tracing sickle blade levels of wear and discard patterns: a new sickle gloss quantification method

Although sickle blades gloss is known to form during the harvest, which is a dynamic process and although it is known to be a type of wear which is the outcome of the repetitive encounters between the sickle blades working edges and plant stems; there is no common way to quantify its intensity. Since there is no consensus over a specific scale that will enable the estimation of the amount of wear, based on the quantification of gloss brightness intensity. In this paper we propose a new measurement system which is based on the projection of laser (He–Ne) beam on glossed sickle blades and an analysis of the reflected images. The results form a relative scale from which it is possible to infer on the sickle blades level of wear, and to create discard models.     

IMPRESSIONS： HOW SPECIAL IS THE TIBET＇S CHANGTANG？

The goup, numbering 30 or 35, all moved in unison, dressed in thick bluish-gray coats, they descended the steep rocky slopes. Their goal was obvious. These blue sheep were looking for water. They dropped lower. My colleague and friend, Dr. Aili Kang, and I used our binoculars for a better look. Suddenly, the animals bolted, fleeing in different directions and all moving upslope away from snowfields.     

A Framework for Exploring Urban Retail Discontinuities. 探索城市零售业不连续性的框架

A key area in the analysis of urban structural evolution is identifying discontinuities. Effective analysis could improve long‐term forecasting and provide a better understanding of how to steer an urban system toward a desirable future state. We use a simple aggregate retail model to demonstrate an algorithm for identifying discontinuities in model parameter space. Explorations of retailing in both Greater London and South Yorkshire in the United Kingdom illustrate how understanding a system's potential for discontinuity can provide insights for both policy makers and retail businesses. The Harris and Wilson model, described in the section so‐named, is used as a simple archetype to illustrate the new framework. This model can be developed in a straightforward way to incorporate further refinement. In “ Executing the model and visualizing the results ,” we describe a single model run and in “ Investigating discontinuities ,” we explain our framework for detecting and analyzing discontinuities. “ Identifying discontinuities in the London retail system ” shows the results of applying this methodology to the Greater London retail system, and in “ Practical applications ,” we explore the policy applications for this technique as related to the decline of town centers in the South Yorkshire retail system. Some concluding comments are offered in “ Conclusions .”     

Missing links: W. V. Quine, the making of ‘Two Dogmas’, and the analytic roots of post-analytic philosophy

This essay argues that post-analytic philosophy finds its origins not only in an invented tradition—that of ‘analytic philosophy’—but also in an invented dilemma: namely, the response to the allegedly overweening dominance of ‘positivism’ in American philosophy. I begin by surveying the problems with the folk wisdom about positivism and analytic philosophy. This pervasive narrative locates the emergence of post-analytic philosophy after a period of hegemony for logical positivism and cognate philosophical subfields. Taking seriously evidence indicating a distinct overlap in the construction of the analytic and post-analytic traditions, I return to the founding moment of American analytic philosophy in the years immediately following World War II. What we see, I suggest, is not a reaction against a clearly defined and powerful logical positivist mainstream, but the careful, piecewise co-ordination of what would become characteristic ‘analytic’ modes of argument, problematics, and tool kits. Willard Van Orman Quine played a central role in this process, and for this reason I focus on the circumstances in which his field-defining 1951 article, ‘Two Dogmas of Empiricism’ was written and received. I conclude with the claim that both analytic and post-analytic philosophers relied on a peculiar image of the failure of logical positivism, and of the opportunities that failure presented.