Hume’s division of truth into agreement with matters of fact or relations of ideas casts doubt on our capacity to have moral knowledge, as moral propositions do not seem to fall obviously into either category. This thesis looks at how two views, ‘descriptive moral functionalism’ and ‘moral concept essentialism’, try...
Non-toxic species of desiccated blue-green algae, or cyanobacteria, may offer potential for use as a fertilizer on irrigated crops. Here, the non-toxic cyanobacteria species Aphanizomenon flos-aquae (AFA), collected from Upper Klamath Lake, Oregon, was evaluated for use as a biofertilizer in a controlled experiment on Swiss chard “Bright Lights” (Beta...
I defend robust realism from arguments that raise epistemological challenges to it based on considerations about either moral disagreement or the genealogy of our moral beliefs. The first argument is the “Argument from Conciliationism,” which contends that the moral disagreements that obtain between moral peers give us reason to believe...
Phycocyanin, a photosynthetic pigment-protein complex produced by cyanobacteria, has critical value in the medical field at high purity. Costs associated with the extraction of this pigment are high, emphasizing the importance of optimal growth conditions. The aim of this study was to investigate potential commercial producers of phycocyanin by evaluating...
We construct a website to explain how Gaussian mixture models can be optimized using the expectation maximization algorithm. Previous free, online material on this process has been extremely limited. All sources surveyed failed to entirely describe our identified criteria for an in-depth description and useful visualizations. After surveying a variety...
Institutionalized oppression is a large multifaceted system that is regularly unrecognized and misunderstood. Marilyn Frye’s birdcage analogy of oppression (1983) demonstrates why this complex system is often invisible, yet always immobilizing. In this analogy, Frye relates the various manifestations of oppressions to the wires of a birdcage, demonstrating that it...
This research examined the potential for using peanut husk as a fiber alternative to wood in the production of melamine-formaldehyde (MF) particleboard. MF resin was used to produce panels with one, three, six, nine or 12 percent resin contents. Modulus of Rupture (MOR), Modulus of Elasticity (MOE), Internal Bond (IB)...
Previous studies have revealed distinctive ecotypic differences between garter snakes living in the meadow and lakeshore environments around Eagle Lake in California. Snakes from these contrasting environments have significantly different growth rates, litter sizes, adult body size, annual survival, and coloration. To try and explain these differences, bird predation was...
Sports, being one of the most popular forms of social play for children (Felfe et al., 2016), can contribute to a child’s development, as they are associated with “physical growth, biological maturation, behavioral development, psychological, and social well-being” (Bailey et al., 2015). The purpose of this study was to attempt...
This is the first study to link exercise with adult romantic attachment style in a university setting. Previous research has associated insecure attachment styles, particularly those associated with high levels of anxiety, with increased pain sensitivity. This thesis hypothesizes that the mechanism responsible for this relationship will correlate with the...