The Plant Ontology (PO) is a community resource consisting of standardized terms, definitions, and logical relations describing plant structures and development stages, augmented by a large database of annotations from genomic and phenomic studies. This paper describes the structure of the ontology and the design principles we used in constructing PO terms for plant development stages. It also provides details of the methodology and rationale behind our revision and expansion of the PO to cover development stages for all plants, particularly (...) the land plants (bryophytes through angiosperms). As a case study to illustrate the general approach, we examine variation in gene expression across embryo development stages in Arabidopsis and maize, demonstrating how the PO can be used to compare patterns of expression across stages and in developmentally different species. Although many genes appear to be active throughout embryo development, we identified a small set of uniquely expressed genes for each stage of embryo development and also between the two species. Evaluating the different sets of genes expressed during embryo development in Arabidopsis or maize may inform future studies of the divergent developmental pathways observed in monocotyledonous versus dicotyledonous species. The PO and its annotation databasemake plant data for any species more discoverable and accessible through common formats, thus providing support for applications in plant pathology, image analysis, and comparative development and evolution. (shrink)

In this study we seek to determine whether catastrophic events lead to corporate charitable giving unrelated to levels of firm profitability. We examine the issue relative to the corporate philanthropic response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks of 2001. Based on a sample of 489 Fortune 500 companies, we find that differences in the extent of corporate contributions following 9/11 are positively and significantly associated with differences in firms' profitability. Further, while the degree of connection to the catastrophic event led to (...) higher levels of giving in comparison to the contributions of less connected firms, differences in the extent of philanthropy are still␣related to short-term profitability for the more connected firms. The study thus provides evidence suggesting that even in the wake of catastrophic events, corporate philanthropic giving is constrained by economic concerns. (shrink)

This volume collects seventeen new essays by well-established and junior scholars on the philosophical relevance of metaxological philosophy and its main proponent, William Desmond. The volume mines metaxological thought for its salience in contemporary discussions in Continental philosophy, specifically in the fields of metaphysics, philosophy of religion, ethics, and aesthetics. Among others, topics under discussion include the goodness of being, the existence and nature of God, and the aesthetic dimensions of human becoming. Interest in metaxological philosophy has been on (...) the rise in recent years, and this volume provides both a practical introduction and thorough engagements with it by experts in the field. The volume concludes with a series of responses by William Desmond on the issues raised by the contributors. (shrink)

This article explores and critically assesses the metaxological account of a philosophy of God professed by William Desmond. Postmodern reflection on the philosophy of God has a tendency to focus on the 'signs' of God and urges for a passive acceptance of these signs. Desmond argues, contrary to this tendency, for a mindful togetherness of philosophical activity and religious passivity. After exploring Desmond's thought on this topic, I move to assess his 'metaxological yes' to God as the agapeic origin (...) from an existential point of view. Initially it seems that his 'yes' is somewhat strained as it burdens itself with an excessive task of having faith into something that is beyond determination. I illustrate this insight by referring to Friedrich Nietzsche’s 'Thus Spoke Zarathustra.' Nietzsche's existential 'No' toward transcendence is a consequence of a mindful confrontation with the excesses as play. (shrink)

Women do most of the parenting. To provide a stable and healthier setting for children they must sublimate their own interests and feelings, which puts greater pressures on women to communicate needs clearly or to be deceptive when the occasion demands. The likely advantage in communication skills and self-control may ameliorate the impact of disorders like ADHD where the most serious deficit is in self-inhibition. This would account for the strikingly uneven male to female sex ratio of 2:1 (in epidemiological (...) samples) to 10:1 (in clinical settings), the higher threshold for females, and the sex difference in the pattern of associated mental disorders. (shrink)

UK-based research conducted within a healthcare setting generally requires approval from the National Research Ethics Service. Research ethics committees are required to assess a vast range of proposals, differing in both their topic and methodology. We argue the methodological benchmarks with which research ethics committees are generally familiar and which form the basis of assessments of quality do not fit with the aims and objectives of many forms of qualitative inquiry and their more iterative goals of describing social processes/mechanisms and (...) making visible the complexities of social practices. We review current debates in the literature related to ethical review and social research, and illustrate the importance of re-visiting the notion of ethics in healthcare research. (shrink)

William Desmond has come to be known over the last few decades as an important interlocutor in debates about the history of philosophy, metaphysics, philosophy of religion and aesthetics. His more...

William Desmond has come to be known over the last few decades as an important interlocutor in debates about the history of philosophy, metaphysics, philosophy of religion and aesthetics. His more...

Bio-ontologies are essential tools for accessing and analyzing the rapidly growing pool of plant genomic and phenomic data. Ontologies provide structured vocabularies to support consistent aggregation of data and a semantic framework for automated analyses and reasoning. They are a key component of the Semantic Web. This paper provides background on what bio-ontologies are, why they are relevant to botany, and the principles of ontology development. It includes an overview of ontologies and related resources that are relevant to plant science, (...) with a detailed description of the Plant Ontology (PO). We discuss the challenges of building an ontology that covers all green plants (Viridiplantae). Key results: Ontologies can advance plant science in four keys areas: 1. comparative genetics, genomics, phenomics, and development, 2. taxonomy and systematics, 3. semantic applications and 4. education. Conclusions: Bio-ontologies offer a flexible framework for comparative plant biology, based on common botanical understanding. As genomic and phenomic data become available for more species, we anticipate that the annotation of data with ontology terms will become less centralized, while at the same time, the need for cross-species queries will become more common, causing more researchers in plant science to turn to ontologies. (shrink)

The Planteome project provides a suite of reference and species-specific ontologies for plants and annotations to genes and phenotypes. Ontologies serve as common standards for semantic integration of a large and growing corpus of plant genomics, phenomics and genetics data. The reference ontologies include the Plant Ontology, Plant Trait Ontology, and the Plant Experimental Conditions Ontology developed by the Planteome project, along with the Gene Ontology, Chemical Entities of Biological Interest, Phenotype and Attribute Ontology, and others. The project also provides (...) access to species-specific Crop Ontologies developed by various plant breeding and research communities from around the world. We provide integrated data on plant traits, phenotypes, and gene function and expression from 95 plant taxa, annotated with reference ontology terms. (shrink)

Review essay on William Desmond's critical account of Hegel's philosophy of God.

The Plant Ontology (PO; http://www.plantontology.org/) is a publicly-available, collaborative effort to develop and maintain a controlled, structured vocabulary (“ontology”) of terms to describe plant anatomy, morphology and the stages of plant development. The goals of the PO are to link (annotate) gene expression and phenotype data to plant structures and stages of plant development, using the data model adopted by the Gene Ontology. From its original design covering only rice, maize and Arabidopsis, the scope of the PO has been expanded (...) to include all green plants. The PO was the first multi-species anatomy ontology developed for the annotation of genes and phenotypes. Also, to our knowledge, it was one of the first biological ontologies that provides translations (via synonyms) in non-English languages such as Japanese and Spanish. There are about 2.2 million annotations linking PO terms to over 110,000 unique data objects representing genes or gene models, proteins, RNAs, germplasm and Quantitative Traits Loci (QTLs) from 22 plant species. In this paper, we focus on the plant anatomical entity branch of the PO, describing the organizing principles, resources available to users, and examples of how the PO is integrated into other plant genomics databases and web portals. We also provide two examples of comparative analyses, demonstrating how the ontology structure and PO-annotated data can be used to discover the patterns of expression of the LEAFY (LFY) and terpene synthase (TPS) gene homologs. (shrink)

Drawing on philosophy, theology and psychoanalysis as well as on literary criticism, this collection of essays explores a range of fantasy texts with particular attention to the various ways in which they seek to deal with the reality of death. The essays uncover some fascinating links, and indeed tensions, between the writers discussed.

The recent publication of twenty European travel journals originally written in the nineteenth century by William Maclure, the sometime ‘father of American geology’, has entailed major revisions in our understanding of their author. In the present essay I review geological portions of all twenty journals, integrating their contents with Maclure's already known but never before comprehensively discussed publications, which now appear in a new perspective. I then suggest a more adequate evaluation of Maclure's significance within a considerably revised schematization (...) of the history of early American geology. (shrink)