Hasil untuk "Modern history, 1453-"

S. Subrahmanyam

Richard de Grijs

In the nineteenth century, the Dutch established time signals in their Atlantic colonies to synchronise maritime navigation with European standards. In Paramaribo (Suriname), a sophisticated sequence of apparatus -- including time balls, noon guns, discs and flags -- operated from 1851 until World War I. Naval officers aboard guard ships used sextants equipped with artificial horizons to determine local noon, thus integrating the colony into the global Greenwich-based cartographic system. This infrastructure was not merely technical; it became a civic ritual, with the daily noon gun structuring urban life and becoming a point of political negotiation between naval commanders and the colonial governor. In contrast, the Dutch Caribbean islands employed simpler, pragmatic systems. Curaçao used a daily time flag, a cost-effective solution suited to its climate and harbour scale, while smaller islands like Aruba and St. Eustatius relied on occasional noon guns. This diversity reflected a decentralised colonial administration that adapted technologies to local conditions and budgets. The history of these time signals reveals a process of hybrid adaptation, not simply replication of European models. They were shaped by environmental challenges, fiscal constraints and local politics, functioning simultaneously as navigational aids and civic landmarks. Their eventual decline, owing to budgetary pressures and new technologies like wireless telegraphy, underscores the fragile and negotiated nature of colonial scientific infrastructures.

Banafsheh Karimian, Alexis Guichemerre, Soufiane Belharbi et al.

Breast cancer remains a leading cause of cancer-related mortality worldwide. Longitudinal mammography risk prediction models improve multi-year breast cancer risk prediction based on prior screening exams. However, in real-world clinical practice, longitudinal histories are often incomplete, irregular, or unavailable due to missed screenings, first-time examinations, heterogeneous acquisition schedules, or archival constraints. The absence of prior exams degrades the performance of longitudinal risk models and limits their practical applicability. While substantial longitudinal history is available during training, prior exams are commonly absent at test time. In this paper, we address missing history at inference time and propose a longitudinal risk prediction method that uses mammography history as privileged information during training and distills its prognostic value into a student model that only requires the current exam at inference time. The key idea is a privileged multi-teacher distillation scheme with horizon-specific teachers: each teacher is trained on the full longitudinal history to specialize in one prediction horizon, while the student receives only a reconstructed history derived from the current exam. This allows the student to inherit horizon-dependent longitudinal risk cues without requiring prior screening exams at deployment. Our new Privileged History Distillation (PHD) method is validated on a large longitudinal mammography dataset with multi-year cancer outcomes, CSAW-CC, comparing full-history and no-history baselines to their distilled counterparts. Using time-dependent AUC across horizons, our privileged history distillation method markedly improves the performance of long-horizon prediction over no-history models and is comparable to that of full-history models, while using only the current exam at inference time.

Yu Shi, Hao Li, Bram Adams et al.

Automated program repair (APR) has recently shifted toward large language models and agent-based systems, yet most systems rely on local snapshot context, overlooking repository history. Prior work shows that repository history helps repair single-line bugs, since the last commit touching the buggy line is often the bug-introducing one. In this paper, we investigate whether repository history can also improve agentic APR systems at scale, especially for complex multi-hunk bugs. We present HAFixAgent, a History-Aware Bug-Fixing Agent that injects blame-derived repository heuristics into its repair loop. A preliminary study on 854 Defects4J (Java) and 501 BugsInPy (Python) bugs motivates our design, showing that bug-relevant history is widely available across both benchmarks. Using the same LLM (DeepSeek-V3.2-Exp) for all experiments, including replicated baselines, we show: (1) Effectiveness: HAFixAgent outperforms RepairAgent (+56.6\%) and BIRCH-feedback (+47.1\%) on Defects4J. Historical context further improves repair by +4.4\% on Defects4J and +38.6\% on BugsInPy, especially on single-file multi-hunk (SFMH) bugs. (2) Robustness: under noisy fault localization (+1/+3/+5 line shifts), history provides increasing resilience, maintaining 40 to 56\% success on SFMH bugs where the non-history baseline collapses to 0\%. (3) Efficiency: history does not significantly increase agent steps or token costs on either benchmark.

VanJessica Gladney, Breanna Moore, Kathleen Brown

In 2006 and 2016, the University of Pennsylvania denied any ties to slavery. In 2017, a group of undergraduate researchers, led by Professor Kathleen Brown, investigated this claim. Initial research, focused on 18th century faculty and trustees who owned slaves, revealed deep connections between the university's history and the institution of slavery. These findings, and discussions amongst the researchers shaped the Penn and Slavery Project's goal of redefining complicity beyond ownership. Breanna Moore's contributions in PSP's second semester expanded the project's focus to include generational wealth gaps. In 2018, VanJessica Gladney served as the PSP's Public History Fellow and spread the project outreach in the greater Philadelphia area. That year, the PSP team began to design an augmented reality app as a Digital Interruption and an attempt to display the truth about Penn's history on its campus. Unfortunately, PSP faced delays due to COVID 19. Despite setbacks, the project persisted, engaging with activists and the wider community to confront historical injustices and modern inequalities.

Matt Pennell, Ailene MacPherson

Yule's 1925 paper introducing the branching model that bears his name was a landmark contribution to the biodiversity sciences. In his paper, Yule developed stochastic models to explain the observed distribution of species across genera and to test hypotheses about the relationship between clade age, diversity, and geographic range. Here we discuss the intellectual context in which Yule produced this work, highlight Yule's key mathematical and conceptual contributions using both his and more modern derivations, and critically examine some of the assumptions of his work through a modern lens. We then document the strange trajectory of his work through the history of macroevolutionary thought and discuss how the fundamental challenges he grappled with -- such as defining higher taxa, linking microevolutionary population dynamics to macroevolutionary rates, and accounting for inconsistent taxonomic practices -- remain with us a century later.

Lluís Torró Gil

El estudio de los salarios en la Europa preindustrial margina las retribuciones por piezas que, paradójicamente, dominaban las actividades manufactureras. La cuestión se aborda analizando a largo plazo los salarios a destajo en la pañería. Este estudio se complementa con información de los precios de los bienes manufacturados y estimaciones de los costes de producción y la productividad del trabajo. Las conclusiones son que los precios de venta dependían más de la evolución del coste de las materias primas que de los salarios, que estos, con un comportamiento anticíclico en términos reales, tendieron a deteriorarse y que esto fue contrarrestado con un incremento de la cantidad de trabajo invertido y de la productividad del trabajo. Los salarios por pieza hicieron de los asalariados los beneficiarios inmediatos del crecimiento de la productividad. Finalmente, la presión salarial en los períodos de intensa inflación erosionó los beneficios, afectando a los cambios de ciclo.

Harald E. Braun

Sylvia Wenmackers

Problems with uniform probabilities on an infinite support show up in contemporary cosmology. This paper focuses on the context of inflation theory, where it complicates the assignment of a probability measure over pocket universes. The measure problem in cosmology, whereby it seems impossible to pick out a uniquely well-motivated measure, is associated with a paradox that occurs in standard probability theory and crucially involves uniformity on an infinite sample space. This problem has been discussed by physicists, albeit without reference to earlier work on this topic. The aim of this article is both to introduce philosophers of probability to these recent discussions in cosmology and to familiarize physicists and philosophers working on cosmology with relevant foundational work by Kolmogorov, de Finetti, Jaynes, and other probabilists. As such, the main goal is not to solve the measure problem, but to clarify the exact origin of some of the current obstacles. The analysis of the assumptions going into the paradox indicates that there exist multiple ways of dealing consistently with uniform probabilities on infinite sample spaces. Taking a pluralist stance towards the mathematical methods used in cosmology shows there is some room for progress with assigning probabilities in cosmological theories.

Alba Alonso Mora

En el contexto laboral de las sociedades medieval y moderna de Europa occidental, los mineros poseían su propio código y, en algunos momentos, gozaron de una preeminencia y de una consideración social muy poco habituales entre los trabajadores manuales. La tradición heredada del mundo romano, el valor intrínseco de la actividad y una normativa laxa que dejaba amplias parcelas sin regular en referencia a la organización laboral, fomentaron la aparición de unas sociedades llamadas compañías, de carácter igualitario y comunitario. En el Baix Priorat (Tarragona), los mineros utilizaron el sistema de compañías desde la Edad Media, muy favorecido por las ordenanzas dictadas a mediados del siglo XIV por el conde Pere. El presente trabajo define los aspectos más destacados de esta minería, pionera en Cataluña y de las más sobresalientes de la península, que presenta unas conexiones evidentes con los parámetros de explotación europeos en el tránsito del trabajo independiente al asalariado.

Carla R Almeida, Maxime J Jacquet

Reasoning by analogies permeates theoretical developments in physics and astrophysics, motivated by the unreachable nature of many phenomena at play. For example, analogies have been used to understand black hole physics, leading to the development of a thermodynamic theory for these objects and the discovery of the Hawking effect. The latter, which results from quantum field theory on black hole space-times, changed the way physicists approached this subject: what had started as a mere aid to understanding becomes a possible source of evidence via the research programme of `analogue gravity' that builds on analogue models for field effects. Some of these analogue models may and can be realised in the laboratory, allowing experimental tests of field effects. Here, we present a historical perspective on the connection between the Hawking effect and analogue models. We also present a literature review of current research, bringing history and contemporary physics together. We argue that the history of analogue gravity and the Hawking effect is divided into three distinct phases based on how and why analogue models have been used to investigate fields in the vicinity of black holes. Furthermore, we find that modern research signals a transition to a new phase, where the impetus for the use of analogue models has surpassed the problem they were originally designed to solve.

Kai Schmitz

This essay is a nontechnical primer for a broader audience, in which I paint a broad-brush picture of modern cosmology. I begin by reviewing the evidence for the big bang, including the expansion of our Universe, the cosmic microwave background, and the primordial abundances of the light elements. Next, I discuss how these and other cosmological observations can be well explained by means of the concordance model of cosmology, putting a particular emphasis on the composition of the cosmic energy budget in terms of visible matter, dark matter, and dark energy. This sets the stage for a short overview of the history of the Universe from the earliest moments of its existence all the way to the accelerated expansion at late times and beyond. Finally, I summarize the current status of the field, including the challenges it is currently facing such as the Hubble tension, and conclude with an outlook onto the bright future that awaits us in the coming years and decades. The text is complemented by an extensive bibliography serving as a guide for readers who wish to delve deeper.

Eric-Jan Wagenmakers, Alexander Ly

The Jeffreys-Lindley paradox exposes a rift between Bayesian and frequentist hypothesis testing that strikes at the heart of statistical inference. Contrary to what most current literature suggests, the paradox was central to the Bayesian testing methodology developed by Sir Harold Jeffreys in the late 1930s. Jeffreys showed that the evidence against a point-null hypothesis $\mathcal{H}_0$ scales with $\sqrt{n}$ and repeatedly argued that it would therefore be mistaken to set a threshold for rejecting $\mathcal{H}_0$ at a constant multiple of the standard error. Here we summarize Jeffreys's early work on the paradox and clarify his reasons for including the $\sqrt{n}$ term. The prior distribution is seen to play a crucial role; by implicitly correcting for selection, small parameter values are identified as relatively surprising under $\mathcal{H}_1$. We highlight the general nature of the paradox by presenting both a fully frequentist and a fully Bayesian version. We also demonstrate that the paradox does not depend on assigning prior mass to a point hypothesis, as is commonly believed.

Jasmine Allen

This article traces the history of a number of stained glass windows designed for the world’s leading museum of art and design, the South Kensington Museum, which opened in 1857. During the expansion of the museum in the 1860s and 1870s under the directorship of Henry Cole, several large-scale windows celebrating the union of science and art formed part of an ambitious interior decorative scheme that reflected the museum’s collection, its unique history, and evolving role as a national institution for the promotion of artistic and technical education. Although most of these windows were later removed, and some have been lost, the rediscovery of some windows in the Victoria and Albert Museum’s store, and the reinstatement of others, provides an opportunity to consider the original scheme, its context, and significance. Drawing on themes of religious and moral instruction, as well as knowledge and learning, combining allegorical and figurative scenes with ornamental motifs, institutional devices, and royal mottos, the iconography of the windows demonstrates a peculiarly British approach to stained glass design for secular public contexts. Interpreting these windows reveals how the decoration of public museums and galleries articulated institutional aims and helped to define and shape nineteenth-century visual culture.

Jörn Seemann

Abstract Though Humboldt’s travels to the Americas have been analyzed from a wide range of viewpoints, there are specific aspects that still await further investigation. Little is written about Humboldt in the field, specifically how he moved between different locations and simultaneously measured and mapped places and phenomena. The aim of this article is to discuss the triad movement-measure-ment-map that led to the development of specific practices of knowledge building on the move. Humboldt’s search for the connections between the watersheds of the Orinoco and the Amazon rivers and the resulting maps and drawings are used as an example to point out his cartographic impulse in his quest to understand and explain the physical world. Zusammenfassung Obwohl Humboldts Reisen nach Amerika unter ver-schiedenen Gesichtspunkten analysiert wurden, gibt es bestimmte Aspekte, die noch weiter untersucht werden müssen. Wenig ist jedoch über Humboldt im Feld geschrieben, insbesondere darüber, wie er sich zwischen verschiedenen Orten bewegte und gleichzeitig Lokalitäten und Phänomene maß und kartierte. Das Ziel dieses Artikels ist es, die Triade Bewegung-Messung-Landkarte zu diskutieren, die zur Entwicklung spezifischer Praktiken des „Wissenschaffens“ in Bewegung führte. Humboldts Suche nach den Verbindungen zwischen den Wassereinzugsgebieten des Orinoco und des Amazo-nasflusses sowie die daraus resultierenden Karten und Zeichnungen dienen als Beispiel, um seinen kartografischen Impuls bei seinem Bestreben, die physische Welt zu verstehen und zu erklären, hervorzuheben. Resumen Aunque los viajes de Humboldt a las Américas han sido analizados desde una amplia gama de puntos de vista, hay aspectos específicos que aún esperan una mayor investigación. Poco se escribe sobre Humboldt en el campo, específicamente cómo se movió entre diferentes lugares y simultáneamente midió y cartografió lugares y fenómenos. El objetivo de este artículo es discutir la tríada movimien-to-medición-mapa que condujo al desarrollo de prácticas específicas de construcción de conocimiento en movimiento. La investigación de Humboldt de las conexiones entre las cuencas hidrográficas del Orinoco y del Amazonas y los mapas y dibujos resultantes se utiliza como un ejemplo para señalar su impulso cartográfico en su búsqueda para comprender y explicar el mundo físico.

Jennifer Blanke, Thomas Riechert

The use of Semantic Web Technologies supports research in the field of digital humanities. In this paper we focus on the creation of semantic independent online databases such as those of historical prosopography. These databases contain biographical information of historical persons. We focus on this information with an interest in German professorial career patterns from the 16th to the 18th century. In that respect, we describe the process of building an Early Modern Scholarly Career RDF Knowledge Graph from two existing prosopography online databases: the Catalogus Professorum Lipsiensium and the Catalogus Professorum Helmstadiensium. Further, we provide an insight in how to query the information using KBox to answer research questions.

Bodun Hu, Christopher J. Rossbach

This paper presents Altis, a benchmark suite for modern GPGPU computing. Previous benchmark suites such as Rodinia and SHOC have served the research community well, but were developed years ago when hardware was more limited, software supported fewer features, and production hardware-accelerated workloads were scarce. Since that time, GPU compute density and memory capacity has grown exponentially, programmability features such as unified memory, demand paging, and HyperQ have matured, and new workloads such as deep neural networks (DNNs), graph analytics, and crypto-currencies have emerged in production environments, stressing the hardware and software in ways that previous benchmarks did not anticipate. Drawing inspiration from Rodinia and SHOC, Altis is a benchmark suite designed for modern GPU architectures and modern GPU runtimes, representing a diverse set of application domains. By adopting and extending applications from Rodinia and SHOC, adding new applications, and focusing on CUDA platforms, Altis better represents modern GPGPU workloads to enable support GPGPU research in both architecture and system software.

Jean Rodrigues Sales

O artigo apresenta um itinerário da produção histórica existente a respeito do Partido Comunista do Brasil (PCdoB). Analisa trabalhos realizados dentro e fora da universidade e aponta as principais linhas interpretativas e debates políticos que envolvem essa produção.   Palavras-chave: Partido Comunista do Brasil (PCdoB). História. Historiografia

Jon Penche González

Reseña del libro que se indica.

Raquel Sánchez García