Alfonso VIII of Castile and the papacy

TELKOMNIKA Telecommunication Computing Electronics and Control, 2024

The humanoid robot soccer system encounters a notable challenge in object detection, primarily concentrating on identifying the ball and often neglecting crucial elements like opposing robots and goals, resulting in on-field collisions and imprecise ball shooting. This study comparatively evaluates three you only look once (YOLO) real-time object detection system variants: YOLOv8, YOLOv7, and YOLO-NAS. A dataset of 2104 annotated images, covering classes such as ball, goalpost, and robot, was curated from Roboflow and robot-captured images. The dataset was partitioned into training, validation, and testing sets, and each YOLO model underwent extensive fine-tuning over 100 epochs on this custom dataset, leveraging the pre-trained common objects in context (COCO) model. Evaluation metrics, including mean average precision (mAP) and inference speed, assessed performance. YOLOv8 achieved the highest accuracy with a mAP of 0.92, while YOLOv7 showed the fastest inference speed of 24 ms on the Jetson Nano platform. Balancing accuracy and speed, YOLO-NAS emerged as the optimal choice. Thus, YOLO-NAS is recommended for object detection for humanoid soccer robots, regardless of team affiliation. Future research should focus on enhancing object detection through advanced training techniques, model architectures, and sensor fusion for improved performance in dynamic environments, potentially optimizing through scenario-specific fine-tuning.

Later version published in Benton, Hawthorne and Rabinowitz (eds), Knowledge, Beliefs and God (OUP)

The laws of physics are unexpectedly inhospitable to life. Scientists did not expect to discover that life depends on seemingly improbable values in the fundamental constants of physics. Scientists expected to discover that life would be possible given a wide variety of values in the fundamental constants. But so it goes. One learns all sorts of weird things from contemporary physics. If this unexpected inhospitability were equally unexpected with or without the existence of God, then the fine-tuning of the fundamental constants would be irrelevant to the philosophy of religion. But the fine-tuning of the fundamental constants is substantially more likely given the existence of God than it is given the non-existence of God. Thus the fine-tuning of the fundamental constants is strong evidence that there is a God. There are some real complexities to the fine-tuning argument, complexities regarding which controversy is appropriate. But the fine-tuning argument is more controversial than it ought to be. The basic idea of the fine-tuning argument is simple. It's as legitimate an argument as one comes across in philosophy. We will formulate the fine-tuning argument using the machinery of Bayesian probability theory. We think that a good deal of structural insight can be obtained by doing so. (In particular, we find Bayesian analyses to be more illuminating than analyses which rely on explanation-theoretic vocabulary, such as “cries out for explanation”.) We hope that our theoretical preferences will be vindicated by our output. After some scene setting, we will sketch what we take to be a promising way of developing the fine-tuning argument, which we dub the “core argument”. Additional detail and explanation will be supplied as we engage with a series of potential concerns about the argument so sketched. Along the way, we will rebut a recent critique of the fine-tuning argument from a philosopher, Jonathan Weisberg, and will also rebut a range of critiques that are common in the popular and scientific literature. We will finally turn to atheistic replies that concede the lessons of the core argument, but which attempt to find a rational home for atheism with its scope. We believe this to be the most promising approach for the atheist.

Cadernos Gestão Pública e Cidadania – CGPC. São Paulo, FGV EAESP, vol. 28, 2023, ISSN 2236-5710. , 2023

O presente estudo pretende identificar as principais tendências dos argumentos e atitudes do Tribunal de Contas da União (TCU) até o ano de 2020 em relação às agências reguladoras federais e avaliar se suas eventuais incursões no mérito da regulação se concentram em assuntos regulatórios específicos. Para tanto, faz um panorama das características institucionais das agências, uma síntese sobre o regime constitucional e legal do controle de contas e uma radiografia dos discursos e decisões do TCU em matéria regulatória.

The objective of this research study was to investigate whether satisfaction and attitude affect the performance of employees at work. At least 20 branches of MCB Bank Multan city were selected for collection of data and a survey method was used and data was collected through a formal questionnaire. The questionnaire was distributed among 120 employees of the selected branches of MCB Bank. SPSS software was used to analyze the data and draw quantitative results, and correlation technique was used to measure strength of relationship between variables. Our results show strong and positive correlation between satisfaction and attitude and performance of employees. Positive attitude at work shows satisfaction and other factors such as pay, promotion, coworker's behavior, supervisors conduct, financial rewards, work load and good environment also affect the performance of employees.

2014

This essay intends to critically reflect on the pedagogical implications of the recently established subject “Scienze Umane” (Human Sciences) in the Italian secondary school curriculum. The research deals with this issue through analysis at different didactic levels. At the macrolevel, it investigates the articulation of the training and education system, whilst at the meso level the curriculum structuring is deeply examined. Finally, the micro level involves analysis of the teaching-learning connection and mediation. The study highlights the unique, heterogeneous, and atypical features of the subject and Liceo delle Scienze Umane, and ends with the suggestion that the didactic should be reconsidered in an integrated form for and with ‘digital natives’.