Feminists have re-visioned women as active subjects in knowledge by granting them agency and diversity and by challenging divisions like public versus private. But both feminist and traditional knowledge remain deeply adult centered. Adult perspectives infuse three contemporary images of children: as threats to adult society, as victims of adults, and as learners of adult culture. We can bring children more fully into knowledge by clarifying ideological constructions, with attention to the diversity of children's actual lives and circumstances; by emphasizing (...) children's agency as well as their subordination; and by challenging their conceptual privatization. The re-visioning of children involves complex issues of gender, generation, autonomy, and relatedness. (shrink)

Human perception responds primarily to sound character rather than sound level. Wind farms are unique sound sources and exhibit special audible and inaudible characteristics that can be described as modulating sound or as a tonal complex. Wind farm compliance measures based on a specified noise number alone will fail to address problems with noise nuisance. The character of wind farm sound, noise emissions from wind farms, noise prediction at residences, and systemic failures in assessment processes are examined. Human perception of (...) wind farm sound is compared with noise assessment measures and complaint histories. The adverse effects on health of persons susceptible to noise from wind farms are examined and a hypothesis, the concept of heightened noise zones (pressure variations), as a marker for cause and effect is advanced. A sound level of LAeq 32 dB outside a residence and above an individual’s threshold of hearing inside the home are identified as markers for serious adverse health effects affecting susceptible individuals. The article is referenced to the author’s research, measurements, and observations at different wind farms in New Zealand and Victoria, Australia. (shrink)

Implications of variance in the time at which sibs become mature are considered, particularly with respect to the fragmentation of a parental genome over time. It is concluded that regardless of the adaptive derivation of various intra-sibship maturation schedules, they each have important genetic consequences.