Early life.

Denisof was born in Salisbury, Maryland, the son of Dr. Christiana Taylor and Gerald Denisof. He is of Russian, French, and Irish ancestry. He moved to Seattle, Washington, when he was three years old. He attended Highline College, where his mother was head of the drama department. After graduating from St. Paul's School in Concord, New Hampshire, he moved to London, England, at age 17, where he lived and worked for several years. Whilst there, he studied at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art.

Career.

Beginning his career in the film industry, Denisof was the fight director for a stage production of "Hamlet", and in 1991 was the fight director for the BBC's "The Other Side", "Romeo and Juliet", and "The Soul's Dark Night". His first lead role was alongside Christopher Lee in the feature film "Murder Story" (1989) where he played an investigative reporter. One of his first known works in television was on the arcade version of the video for "Got My Mind Set On You" by George Harrison. In 1995 he landed a small part in the 1995 movie "First Knight", appearing as one of Arthur's round table knights in multiple scenes with Sean Connery and Richard Gere. Following those roles, Denisof worked with Sean Bean in three episodes of "Sharpe" as Lord John Rossendale in 1997. His best-known character, Wesley Wyndam-Pryce, was first introduced in 1999 to season 3 of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" as Buffy's replacement Watcher. Originally, Wyndam-Pryce was supposed to be killed off in the season 3 finale but, due to Whedon's surprise at how well he fit into the series, Denisof was given the choice about his character's fate and chose for him to live. As a result, he later showed up in season one, episode 10 of "Angel", and was an official main cast member from episode 11 (effectively replacing Doyle), appearing in 100 out of the 110 episodes of the series. The character was heavily endeared to fans due to the transformation from goofy and lovable, to dark, depressed and moody as a result of events that occur over the course of the series.  The end of the series in 2004 saw a bit of a lag in Denisof's career. Save for appearing in three episodes of the hit series "How I Met Your Mother", as the goofy philandering Sandy Rivers, Denisof would not work as much as he used to for the next several years. During this time he appeared in several stage productions, including "Rope" at Chichester Festival Theatre's Minerva Theatre with Anthony Head, who played Wesley's predecessor Rupert Giles on "Buffy". Most likely due to his time playing an English character on "Angel", Denisof was among 200 actors considered for the role of James Bond in "Casino Royale", but lost out to Daniel Craig. Later, in 2008, he appeared in Season 2 of "Private Practice" as a man named Daniel, who has two pregnant wives giving birth on the same day. In 2009, he appeared in four episodes of Joss Whedon's "Dollhouse" as Senator Daniel Perrin. In 2011, Denisof reprised his recurring role in "How I Met Your Mother", as Sandy Rivers; he appeared in 10 episodes, his last appearance was in the episode "Gary Blauman". In a season 1 commentary, creators Craig Thomas and Carter Bays speculated that Denisof was initially reluctant to take the role back in 2006 because he feared it was just charity work on account of his wife, Hannigan, playing a main character on the show. They went on to state that he was not aware, until they actually told him, that they were huge fans of his work dating back to his time on "Angel".  Since 2011, Denisof has been relatively active. He played a voice role in the animated DC movie "". He was featured in the majority of episodes in the AOL webseries, "Little Women, Big Cars". Denisof was then cast as a lead in Bryan Singer's new webseries "". He then reunited with Joss Whedon for two different film projects. The first was a minor role in the summer blockbuster "The Avengers", as The Other, a servant of the character Thanos, and a cohort of Loki. The second was the lead male role in a modern version of Shakespeare's "Much Ado About Nothing", which premiered at the Toronto Film Festival, to positive reviews from critics. The film was released worldwide in June 2013.  In August 2013 he was cast in the third season of NBC's "Grimm" as a recurring character named Viktor Albert Wilhelm George Beckendorf. In 2014, Denisof reprised his role as the Other in "Guardians of the Galaxy". In the same year he began starring in the MTV television series "Finding Carter" as David Wilson. As of 2018, Denisof starred in "I Love Bekka and Lucy" as Glenn, and was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Actor in a Short Form Comedy or Drama Series, his first such nomination.  On November 28, 2018, "Deadline Hollywood" reported that Denisof would play the recurring role of Adam Marsters in the second season of Netflix's "Chilling Adventures of Sabrina". In 2019 he began playing the recurring role of Professor Vardemus in the supernatural television show "Legacies".

Personal life.

According to the DVD release of "Angel"s season five, three weeks before the filming of the season premiere Denisof was stricken with Bell's palsy, from which he later recovered. Due to the paralysis of the left side of his face, scenes were structured as to not show its effects.  Denisof married past co-star Alyson Hannigan, who played Willow Rosenberg in "Buffy the Vampire Slayer", on October 11, 2003. The couple live in Encino, Los Angeles. They have two daughters, born in March 2009 and May 2012.

Alexis Denisof (born February 25, 1966) is an American actor who is primarily known for playing Wesley Wyndam-Pryce in the television series "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and its spin-off "Angel". He also had a recurring role on "How I Met Your Mother" on which his wife, Alyson Hannigan, starred.

Alexis Denisof (* 25. února 1966 Salisbury, Maryland) je americký herec. Ve filmu debutoval na konci 80. let, v televizi se poprvé představil v roce 1991. Jednu ze svých prvních větších rolí dostal ve filmu "První rytíř" (1995). Po epizodních postavách v různých seriálech hrál v letech 1999–2004 Wesleyho Wyndama-Pryce, který se nejprve objevil v seriálu "Buffy, přemožitelka upírů" a následně se stal jednou z hlavních postav v seriálu "Angel". V dalších letech hostoval např. v seriálech "Jak jsem poznal vaši matku", "Private Practice" nebo "Dům loutek". Hrál také ve filmech "Láska, svatba, manželství" (2011), "Avengers" (2012), "Mnoho povyku pro nic" (2012) či "Strážci Galaxie" (2014). V letech 2013–2015 působil v seriálu "Grimm".


Early life.

Head was born in Camden Town, London. His father was Seafield Laurence Stewart Murray Head (1919–2009), a documentary filmmaker and a founder of Verity Films, and his mother was actress Helen Shingler (1919–2019). They had married in 1944 in Watford. His older brother is actor and singer Murray Head. Both brothers have played the part of Freddie Trumper in the musical "Chess" at the Prince Edward Theatre, London, with Murray a part of the original cast in 1986, while Anthony was in the final cast in 1989.

Career.

Head was educated at Sunbury Grammar School and London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA). In discussing why he chose acting as a career, in an interview in 2013 he said that 'When it's in your family, it's a choice, it's there. It's not a jump to say: 'I want to act.' When I was six I was in a little show my mother's friends organised, playing the Emperor in The Emperor's New Clothes. I remember thinking: 'This is the business, this is what I want to do.'  His first role was in the musical "Godspell"; this led to roles in television on both BBC and ITV, one of his earliest being an appearance in the series "Enemy at the Door" (ITV, 1978–1980). In the early 1980s he provided backing vocals for the band Red Box. In the late 1980s, he appeared in a storyline series of twelve coffee commercials with Sharon Maughan for Nescafé Gold Blend. (A version made for North America featured the American brand name Taster's Choice.) The soap opera nature of the commercials brought him wider recognition, along with a part in the Children's ITV comedy drama "Woof!"  Head played Frank N. Furter in the 1990–91 West End revival of "The Rocky Horror Show" at London's Piccadilly Theatre, with Craig Ferguson as Brad Majors. In 1991 Head's rendition of "Sweet Transvestite" was released as a single by Chrysalis Records. Head played the role again in the summer of 1995 at London's Duke of York's Theatre, a 3 May 2006 tribute show at London's Royal Court Theatre, and a 14 October 2000 production at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino, Las Vegas, Nevada.  Success on the stage and a number of brief appearances on American television, such as in the short-lived "VR.5", led to accepting the role of Rupert Giles in "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" in 1997. For this role he lived full-time in the United States during the late 1990s and early 2000s, although his family continued to live in the UK. Head left the regular cast of "Buffy" during the show's sixth season and subsequently appeared several times as a guest star through the conclusion of the series. In many interviews at the time, Head said he left the show to spend more time with his family, having realised that he had spent most of the year outside Britain, which added up to more than half his youngest daughter's life.

Early to mid-2000s.

In 2002, he co-starred in the BBC Two television series "Manchild", a show revolving around four friends approaching their fifties who try to recapture their fading youth and vitality while dealing with life as'mature' men. He also appeared in guest roles in various other dramas, such as "Silent Witness", "", and "Spooks". He appeared in the 4th series of the British hit sitcom "My Family" in 2003 playing one of the main characters' (Abi's) father in the episode "May the Best Man Win". He was featured as the Prime Minister in the popular BBC comedy sketch show "Little Britain" from 2003 to 2005, and guest starred in several episodes of the 2004 series of popular drama "Monarch of the Glen".  Outside television work, he has released an album of songs with musician George Sarah entitled "Music for Elevators". Early in his career he provided vocals for some of the tracks on the Chris de Burgh album "The Getaway" and the reading from "The Tempest" on "Don't Pay the Ferryman".  In 2001, he appeared in a special webcast version of "Doctor Who", a story called "Death Comes to Time", in which he played the Time Lord Valentine. He also guest starred in the "Excelis Trilogy", a series of "Doctor Who" audio adventures produced by Big Finish Productions, and in 2005 narrated the two-part documentary "Project: WHO?", detailing the television revival of the series, for BBC Radio 2 (and released to CD in 2006 by BBC Audio). In April 2006 he appeared as a school's alien headmaster, Mr. Finch, in an episode of the second series entitled "School Reunion". Soon after, he recorded an abridged audio book of the "Doctor Who" novel "The Nightmare of Black Island" by Mike Tucker. He narrated the third and fourth series of "Doctor Who Confidential". He also voiced the character Baltazar, Scourge of the Universe (an evil space pirate searching for the Infinite), in the first ever animated "Doctor Who" special, "The Infinite Quest". Head had previously auditioned for the role of the Eighth Doctor for the 1996 television film, but lost out to Paul McGann.  In early 2006, he appeared in an episode of "Hotel Babylon", a BBC One drama set in a hotel, in which he played a suicidal man who recovers and lands a music deal. The same year he filmed a pilot for a new show entitled "Him and Us", loosely based on the life of openly gay rock star Elton John, for American TV channel ABC, co-starring Kim Cattrall. In July he appeared as Captain Hook at the "Children's Party at the Palace", a live pantomime staged in the grounds of Buckingham Palace as part of Queen Elizabeth II's 80th birthday celebrations. In October 2006, he voiced Ponsonby, leader of MI6, in "Destroy All Humans! 2".

2000s.

At Comic-Con International in 2007, Joss Whedon said talks were almost completed for a 90-minute "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" spin-off, "Ripper", as a BBC special, with both Head and the BBC on board. In 2007, he portrayed Stockard Channing's gay brother in the English film "Sparkle" and appeared as Mr Colubrine in the ITV1 comedy drama "Sold". Head also appeared as Sir Walter Elliot in "Persuasion". Head also narrated a BBC behind-the-scenes programme for the American television series "Heroes", "Heroes Unmasked". He has also been seen as Maurice Riley in the BBC Drama "The Invisibles" alongside Warren Clarke.  After seeing Anthony Head in the Buffy musical episode, "Once More With Feeling", "Saw" director Darren Lynn Bousman cast him in his 21st century rock opera, "Repo! The Genetic Opera". Head portrays an organ repossessor, employed by a fictional dystopian medical firm; "Anthony Head was my number one choice for Repo Man from the very beginning", said Bousman in an interview shortly before the film's release on 7 November 2008. The film also stars Sarah Brightman and Paris Hilton.  Head has also performed for radio, taking two of the lead roles—arch-villain Mr Gently Benevolent, and his descendant, journalist Jeremy Sourquill—in the BBC Radio 4 comedy series, "Bleak Expectations" (five series, 2007–12). He also had a significant recurring role in the last two series (2011–13) of the Radio 4 sitcom "Cabin Pressure" as Hercules Shipwright, a romantic interest for the airline CEO played by Stephanie Cole, and returned for show's two-part finale in 2014.  Head was part of the regular cast of the BBC drama series "Merlin", about the mythical wizard Merlin. Head played King Uther Pendragon, the father of Prince Arthur.

2010s.

Head also provides voice-over work in the Nintendo Wii video game, "Flip's Twisted World", developed by Frozen North Productions.  For his acting in the film "Despite the Falling Snow" he won the Best Supporting Actor award at the 2016 Prague Independent Film Festival.  In July 2018 Head was added to the cast of long-running BBC radio soap-opera "The Archers", playing Robin Fairbrother, member of a family with several past and current connections to the Archers themselves.

Personal life.

Head lives in Bath with his partner Sarah Fisher and has two daughters, Emily, born in December 1988, and Daisy, born in 1991, both of whom are actresses.

External links.

Articles and interviews

Anthony Stewart Head (born 20 February 1954) is an English actor and musician. He rose to fame in the UK following his role in the Gold Blend couple television advertisements for Nescafé Gold Blend, and is known for his roles as Rupert Giles in "Buffy the Vampire Slayer", Uther Pendragon in "Merlin", and the Prime Minister in "Little Britain".

Anthony Stewart Head (* 20. února 1954 Londýn) je anglický herec a hudebník. Svoji první roli dostal v muzikálu "Godspell", v televizi debutoval v roce 1978 v seriálu "Enemy at the Door". V průběhu 80. let hrál v různých britských seriálech, v 90. letech se prosadil i v americké produkci. Působil např. ve sci-fi seriálu "VR.5" (1995) a především v letech 1997–2003 v seriálu "Buffy, přemožitelka upírů", kde ztvárnil postavu Ruperta Gilese. Po návratu do Británie účinkoval např. v seriálech "Druhá míza" či "Monarch of the Glen", hostoval v "Pánovi času" a hrál v seriálech "Malá Velká Británie" (2007–2009) a "Merlin" (2008–2012). V roce 2013 se objevil v americké sci-fi show "Skladiště 13", v letech 2014–2015 působil v seriálu "Dominion" a roku 2016 si zahrál se svou dcerou Daisy v seriálu "Guilt". Dále hrál např. ve filmech "Sólokapr" (2006), "Železná lady" (2011) či "" (2013).


Introduction.

The need for closure is the motivation to find an answer to an ambiguous situation. This motivation is enhanced by the perceived benefits of obtaining closure, such as the increased ability to predict the world and a stronger basis for action. This motivation is also enhanced by the perceived costs of lacking closure, such as missing deadlines. According to Kruglanski et al., need for closure exerts its effects via two general tendencies: the urgency tendency (the inclination to attain closure as quickly as possible) and the permanence tendency (the tendency to maintain it for as long as possible). Together, these tendencies may produce the inclinations to seize and then freeze on early judgmental cues, reducing the extent of information processing and hypothesis generation and introducing biases in thinking.  The level of the need for cognitive closure is a fairly stable individual characteristic. It can affect what information individuals seek out and how they process it. However, this need can be affected by situational factors like time constraints. For example, in the presence of a high need for closure (induced using time constraints), individuals are more likely to use simple cognitive structures to process information.

Need for Closure Scale.

The need for closure in social psychology is thought to be a fairly stable dispositional characteristic that can, nonetheless, be affected by situational factors. The Need for Closure Scale (NFCS) was developed by Arie Kruglanski, Donna Webster, and Adena Klem in 1993 and is designed to operationalize this construct and is presented as a unidimensional instrument possessing strong discriminant and predictive validity.  People who score high on the need for closure scale are more likely to exhibit impression primacy effects to correspondence bias, make stereotypical judgments, assimilate new information to existing, active beliefs, and, in the presence of prior information, resist persuasion. Someone rating low on need for closure will express more ideational fluidity and creative acts. Items on the scale include statements such as "I think that having clear rules and order at work is essential to success," and "I do not like situations that are uncertain." Items such as "Even after I've made up my mind about something, I am always eager to consider a different opinion," and "I like to have friends who are unpredictable" are reverse scored.  Composed of 42 items, the scale has been used in numerous research studies and has been translated into multiple languages. Although Webster and Kruglanski (1994) treated the Need for Closure Scale as unidimensional (i.e., as measuring a single factor), the scale actually contains two orthogonal factors, decisiveness and need for structure. Thus, using a total scale score can overlook effects for each factor and complicate interpretations. In 2007, Roets and Van Hiel tried to resolve this issue by revising the scale so it would measure only one thing. They came up with a set of new decisiveness items that provided a viable alternative for the old Decisiveness subscale of the NFCS, which was poorly related to the other NFCS facet scales and had questionable validity. The new items were developed with explicit reference to decisiveness but formulated in such a way that they relate to the need rather than to the ability to decide. In 2011, Roets and Van Hiel created an abridged and empirically validated NFC scale consisting of only 15 items from the original NFC.  NFCS items correlate positively with authoritarianism, intolerance of ambiguity, dogmatism, need for order and structure and negatively with cognitive complexity and impulsivity, among several other cognitive tools and personality traits.  High NFC scores consistently correlate with items on the C-Scale (conservatism) as well as other measures of political and social conservatism.

Need to avoid.

Functionally opposite to the need for closure is the need to avoid closure. Need to avoid closure reflects the desire to suspend judgmental commitment. It also contains the subcategories specific and non-specific need to avoid closure. Avoidance of specific closure reflects the desire to avoid specific answers to one's questions. The non-specific need to avoid closure is much like the need for closure irrespective of whether or not this new knowledge points to a conclusion having positive or negative implications for them.  The need to avoid closure may stem from the perceived costs of possessing closure (e.g., envisioned penalties for an erroneous closure or perceived drawbacks of actions implied by closure) and the perceived benefits of lacking closure (e.g., immunity from possible criticism of any given closure). The need to avoid closure is controlled by the desire to avoid negative consequences of achieving closure of a situation or to continue the benefits of not closing but elongating a situation.  The need and avoidance of closure are conceptualized as ends of a continuum ranging from strong strivings for closure to strong resistance of closure. This is applied in the NFC Scale.

Lack of.

The lack of closure leaves a situation in ambiguity. People high in need for closure seek to avoid this ambiguity at all costs where people high in need to avoid closure strive to make situations more ambiguous. Some perceived benefits of cognitive closure may relate to predictability, the basis for action, or social status accorded the possessors of knowledge (i.e., "experts"). Similarly, some perceived costs of lacking closure may relate to the additional time and effort required to attain closure, or the unpleasantness of process whereby closure must be reached. Occasionally, however, lack of closure maybe perceived to offer various advantages such as freedom from a constraining commitment, neutrality in an acrimonious dispute, the maintenance of a romantic mystery and so on. Though lack of closure is generally thought of as being negative, it is clear that closure and lack of closure have positive or negative implications depending on the person and situation surrounding them.

Implications.

A need for cognitive closure may occur while engaged in goal-driven or goal-motivated cognitive functions (e.g., attention control, memory recall, information selection and processing, cognitive inhibition, etc.). Ideally, people should attempt to acquire new knowledge to satisfy questions regarding particular issues (specific cognitive closure) irrespective of whether that knowledge points to a conclusion having positive or negative implications for them (non-specific cognitive closure). But because urgency and permanence are central to the motivational core of this overall process, individuals (or groups) may be compelled, consciously or unconsciously, to obtain information prematurely and irrespective of content.  A high need for cognitive closure might then invite bias in:  For example, the level of NFCC can influence decision-making strategies used by an individual. In a study by Choi et al. that manipulated NFCC, the authors found that a higher NFCC was associated with a preference for using the faster "attribute-based search" which involves examining all available alternatives on one attribute and then moving on to the next attribute. Individuals with a lower NFCC, in contrast, used the "alternative-based search", such that they examine all attributes of one alternative, then move on to the next alternative. Thus, studying NFCC has huge implications for consumer buying behavior.  Need for closure has also been found to have a role in race- and gender-based prejudice. Roets describes a conceptual fit between Allport's "motivated cognitive style" of individuals who exhibit prejudice and Kruglanksi and Webster's concept of high-NFCC individuals, such that both display urgency tendency i.e. the desire for quick, definite answers and permanence tendency i.e., the perseverance of the obtained answer in spite of contradictory information. Thus, NFC provides a strong empirical base for Allport's hypothesized underlying cognitive style of prejudiced individuals. A high need also induces the tendency to form knowledge more quickly, tying into other concepts, such as a tendency to prefer autocracy i.e. "hard" forms of influence that motivate the targets to comply with the agents' demands quickly via the promise of positive consequences or the threat of negative consequences, rather than "soft" forms of influence that might use extended argumentation or persuasion.  Additionally, and especially in those with strong needs for certainty (as measured on NFC Scale), the impulse to achieve cognitive closure may sometimes produce or evoke a mood instability, and/or truncated perceptions of one's available behavioral choices, should some newly acquired information challenge preconceptions that they had long considered to be certain, permanent and inviolate e.g. certain religious or ethical views and values.  Thus it is apparent that the need for cognitive closure may have important implications for both personal and inter-personal thoughts and actions, including some related to educational processes and school learning.

In education.

Formal education environments, such as elementary and secondary schools, present opportunities for learners to acquire new knowledge and skills, and to achieve deep, domain-specific conceptual mastery which, through well-designed pedagogical guidance and academic study, may enhance future career readiness, civic engagement, and general well-being. However, although it is understood that the basic principles of learning assert the importance of attending to students’ prior knowledge, fostering conceptual understanding, and cultivating metacognitive awareness, students must also become engaged and be willing to tolerate and cognitively work through the intellectual ambiguity often associated with exposure to novel information and tasks.  Yet for students who have high need for cognitive closure, this phenomenon may inadvertently lead to the inhibition of cognitive functions and processes essential to the learning process, so that they can maintain their prior certainty and/or perceived permanence of personally or socially important ideas, even if those ideas or knowledge are distinctly unrelated to any specific content or information being presented in the classroom. In instances such as these, an individual's desire for cognitive closure in another area may outweigh her/his motivation to expend cognitive resources toward learning new information. As a result, the student may appear uninterested and susceptible to under-achieving e.g. poor grades or not performing to expected levels.  Unfortunately, in the absence of understanding and consideration of how need for cognitive closure may influence academic and/or achievement motivation, educators may erroneously conclude that a student does not have a desire to learn or that she/he has a cognitive, psychological, intellectual, or behavioral deficiency that is impeding the learning process. This is not to suggest that need for cognitive closure is a suitable explanation for all learning problems; however, in working with students who appear to be experiencing learning challenges manifested through amotivation or low motivation, it would not be unreasonable to explore need for cognitive closure as a potential factor.

Research.

Individuals scoring high on the NFCS are more likely to attempt to draw closure by relying on incipient cues, and the first-encountered apparent fit. The need for closure is also said to predispose a very narrow or shallow information search, along with a higher tendency to use cognitive heuristics, when seeking solutions. (Van Hiel and Mervielde, 2003)  In studies on creativity, individuals with high need-for-closure ratings had low creativity scores. Those low in need-for-closure more frequently produced novel solutions that motivated and inspired others in their groups, and the outcomes of the projects in which they participated were rated as correspondingly more productive.  Most research on the need for closure has investigated its relation to social stimuli. However, recent research suggests that it may also predict responses to non-social stimuli. In particular, the need for closure predicts an evaluative bias against deviant non-social stimuli (e.g., the letter "A" presented in a category of letter "B"s)  "Closure" has also been used more loosely to refer to the outcome of an experience which, by virtue of its completion, demonstrates a therapeutic value. Legal scholars have linked "closure" to "catharsis" and "satisfaction" and at times the legal system may be enlisted into an individual's desire for the cessation of uncertainty. In the case of the death penalty, for example, victims seeking "closure" may adopt effective strategies as diverse as retribution, on one hand, and forgiveness on the other.

Closure or need for closure (NFC) (used interchangeably with need for cognitive closure (NFCC)) are social psychological terms that describe an individual's desire for a firm answer to a question and an aversion toward ambiguity. The term "need" denotes a motivated tendency to seek out information.

Potřeba kognitivního uzavření (někdy též potřeba uzavření, kognitivní uzavření či NFC z angl. Need for Cognitive Closure) je psychologický termín zavedený A. W. Kruglanskim, který popisuje touhu lidí po jednoznačnosti a tendenci vyhýbat se nejednoznačnosti. Lidé s vyšší mírou NFC preferují rychlá, jednoznačná rozhodnutí, zvažují méně alternativ. Lidé s nižší mírou NFC jsou kreativnější, produkují více alternativních hypotéz o pozorovaných jevech. NFC slabě a negativně souvisí s potřebou poznání (Need for Cognition), naopak nesouvisí například s inteligencí. Potřeba kognitivního uzavření je důležitá při studiu postojů a zejména předsudků, protože tendence k vytváření pevných, jednoznačných a nedostatečně podložených závěrů (tedy právě stereotypů vůči minoritám) je jednou z charakteristik osob s vyšší mírou NFC.


History.

In 1845, it was decided, by Royal Decree, that a museum was to be founded with works of art of deceased and living Belgian artists. A national commission was established to select important works of art. The first president of the commission was the Count de Beaufort. Other members were:  Many of the founding members were active in the Royal Academy of Science, Letters and Fine Arts of Belgium.

The museums.

The museums are situated in the downtown Royal District, on the Coudenberg, in Brussels. There are six museums connected with the Royal Museums; two of them are located in the main building – the Oldmasters Museum or Museum of Ancient Art, whose collections cover European art until 1750, and the Museum of Modern Art. The Magritte Museum, opened in 2009, and Fin-de-Siècle Museum, opened in 2013, are adjacent to the main building. The smaller Constantin Meunier Museum and the Antoine Wiertz Museum, dedicated to these two Belgian artists, are located a few kilometers from the city centre.

Oldmasters Museum.

The museum has an extensive collection of paintings, sculptures and drawings from the fifteenth to the eighteenth century. The bulk of the collection is formed around Flemish painting, presented in chronological order. For example, there are valuable panels by the Flemish Primitives (including Bruegel, Rogier van der Weyden, Robert Campin ("the Master of Flémalle"), Hieronymus Bosch, Anthony van Dyck, and Jacob Jordaens). The museum is also proud of its "Rubens Room", which houses more than 20 paintings by the artist. The painting "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus", long-attributed to Bruegel, is located there and forms the subject of W. H. Auden's famous poem "Musée des Beaux Arts", named after the museum. There are also constant temporary exhibitions.

Magritte Museum.

The museum has one of the richest collections of paintings by the Belgian surrealist painter René Magritte. Inaugurated on 20 May 2009, the Magritte Museum opened on 2 June 2009.

Fin-de-Siècle Museum.

Inaugurated on 6 December 2013, the museum presents collections of artists such as Constantin Meunier, James Ensor, Henri Evenepoel, Fernand Khnopff, Leon Spilliaert, Jusepe de Ribera, Jacques-Louis David and George Minne.

Wiertz Museum.

The life and work of Antoine Wiertz are honored in the painter's former studio, in the heart of the Leopold Quarter. This unique museum offers a striking view of the monumental paintings, statues and sketches marked by the Belgian romantic movement.

Meunier Museum.

Located in the former house and workshop of Constantin Meunier, the museum houses 150 works and documents by the realist painter and sculptor.

Directors.

The chief curators or directors of the museum have been:

The building.

The main building which now houses the "Museum of Ancient Art" was built as the Palais des Beaux-Arts, designed by Belgian architect Alphonse Balat and funded by King Leopold II. Balat was the king's principal architect, and the building was one part of the king's vast construction projects for Belgium. The building was completed in 1887, and stands as an example of the Beaux-Arts architecture use of themed statuary to assert the identity and meaning of the building.The extensive program of architectural sculpture includes the four figures of "Music", "Architecture", "Sculpture", and "Painting" atop the four main piers, the work of sculptors, Joseph Geefs, Louis Samain, and Guillaume de Groot respectively. The finial, gilded "Genius of Art" was also designed by de Groot. The three rondels of "Rubens", "van Ruysbroek", and "Jean de Bologne", who represent "Painting", "Architecture", and "Sculpture", are the work of Antoine-Joseph van Rasbourgh, Antoine-Félix Bouré and Jean Cuypers. The two bas-relief panels are "Music" by Thomas Vincotte and "Industrial Arts" by Charles Brunin. The two bronze groups on pedestals represent "The Crowning of Art" by Paul de Vigne, and "The Teaching of Art" by Charles van der Stappen.  On the side of the building, a memorial commemorates five members of the Mouvement National Royaliste, a resistance group, killed during the liberation of Brussels on 3–4 September 1944. Alongside the western face of the building is a sculpture park, with works by Aristide Maillol, Emilio Greco, Paul Hanrez and Bernhard Heiliger.

The Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium (, ) are a group of art museums in Brussels, Belgium. The Royal Museums contains over 20,000 drawings, sculptures, and paintings, which date from the early 15th century to the present.

Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique (nizozemsky Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België) je soubor několika muzeí umění chovajících státní sochařské i malířské sbírky Belgie. Počátky instituce se odvozují od let 1801–1803, kdy v Bruselu vzniklo jedno z muzeí zřizovaných v jednotlivých departmentech na územích ovládaných Francií.


Origin of name.

The name Devil's Tower originated in 1875 during an expedition led by Colonel Richard Irving Dodge, when his interpreter reportedly misinterpreted a native name to mean "Bad God's Tower". All information signs in that area use the name "Devils Tower", following a geographic naming standard whereby the apostrophe is omitted.  Native American names for the monolith include "Bear's House" or "Bear's Lodge" (or "Bear's Tipi", "Home of the Bear", "Bear's Lair"; Cheyenne, Lakota "Matȟó Thípila", Crow "Daxpitcheeaasáao" "Home of Bears"), "Aloft on a Rock" (Kiowa), "Tree Rock", "Great Gray Horn", and "Brown Buffalo Horn" (Lakota "Ptehé Ǧí").  In 2005, a proposal to recognize several Native American ties through the additional designation of the monolith as "Bear Lodge National Historic Landmark" met with opposition from United States Representative Barbara Cubin, arguing that a "name change will harm the tourist trade and bring economic hardship to area communities". In November 2014, Arvol Looking Horse proposed renaming the geographical feature "Bear Lodge" and submitted the request to the United States Board on Geographic Names. A second proposal was submitted to request that the U.S. acknowledge what it described as the "offensive" mistake in keeping the current name and to rename the monument and sacred site "Bear Lodge National Historic Landmark". The formal public comment period ended in fall 2015. Local state senator Ogden Driskill opposed the change. The name was not changed.

Geological history.

The landscape surrounding Devils Tower is composed mostly of sedimentary rocks. The oldest rocks visible in Devils Tower National Monument were laid down in a shallow sea during the mid- to late-Triassic period, 225 to 195 million years ago. This dark red sandstone and maroon siltstone, interbedded with shale, can be seen along the Belle Fourche River. Oxidation of iron minerals causes the redness of the rocks. This rock layer is known as the Spearfish Formation.  Above the Spearfish Formation is a thin band of white gypsum, called the Gypsum Springs Formation. This layer of gypsum was deposited during the Jurassic period, 195 to 136 million years ago.  Created as sea levels and climates repeatedly changed, gray-green shales (deposited in low-oxygen environments such as marshes) were interbedded with fine-grained sandstones, limestones, and sometimes thin beds of red mudstone. This composition, called the Stockade Beaver member, is part of the Sundance Formation. The Hulett Sandstone member, also part of the Sundance Formation, is composed of yellow fine-grained sandstone. Resistant to weathering, it forms the nearly vertical cliffs that encircle the Tower.  During the Paleocene Epoch, 56 to 66 million years ago, the Rocky Mountains and the Black Hills were uplifted. Magma rose through the crust, intruding into the existing sedimentary rock layers.

Theories of formation.

Geologists Carpenter and Russell studied Devils Tower in the late 19th century and came to the conclusion that it was formed by an igneous intrusion. Modern geologists agree that it was formed by the intrusion of igneous material, but not on exactly how that process took place. Several believe the molten rock composing the Tower might not have surfaced; others are convinced the tower is all that remains of what once was a large explosive volcano.  In 1907, geologists Nelson Horatio Darton and C.C. O'Harra (of the South Dakota School of Mines) theorized that Devils Tower must be an eroded remnant of a laccolith. A laccolith is a large mass of igneous rock which is intruded through sedimentary rock beds without reaching the surface, but makes a rounded bulge in the sedimentary layers above. This theory was quite popular in the early 20th century, since numerous studies had earlier been done on laccoliths in the Southwest.  Other theories have suggested that Devils Tower is a volcanic plug or that it is the neck of an extinct volcano. Some pyroclastic material of the same age as Devils Tower has been identified elsewhere in Wyoming.  The igneous material that forms the Tower is a phonolite porphyry intruded about 40.5 million years ago, a light to dark-gray or greenish-gray igneous rock with conspicuous crystals of white feldspar. As the magma cooled, hexagonal (and sometimes 4-, 5-, and 7-sided) columns formed, each about six feet in diameter. As the rock continued to cool, the vertical columns shrank in width and cracks began to occur at 120-degree angles, generally forming compact 6-sided columns. The nearby Missouri Buttes, to the northwest of Devils Tower, are also composed of columnar phonolite of the same age. Devils Postpile National Monument in California and Giant's Causeway in Northern Ireland, are also columnar basalt, which are superficially similar, but with columns typically in diameter.  Devils Tower did not visibly protrude out of the landscape until the overlying sedimentary rocks eroded away. As the elements wore down the softer sandstones and shales, the more resistant igneous rock making up the tower survived the erosional forces. As a result, the gray columns of Devils Tower began to appear as an isolated mass above the landscape.  As rain and snow continue to erode the sedimentary rocks surrounding the Tower's base, more of Devils Tower will be exposed. Nonetheless, the exposed portions of the Tower still experience certain amounts of erosion. Cracks along the columns are subject to water and ice erosion. Erosion due to the expansion of ice along cracks and fractures within rock formations is common in colder climates, a prime example being the columnar “hoodoo” formations at Bryce Canyon National Park. Portions, or even entire columns, of rock at Devils Tower are continually breaking off and falling. Piles of broken columns, boulders, small rocks, and stones, called scree, lie at the base of the tower, indicating that it was once wider than it is today.

Native American culture.

According to the Native American tribes of the Kiowa and Lakota, a group of girls went out to play and were spotted by several giant bears, who began to chase them. In an effort to escape the bears, the girls climbed atop a rock, fell to their knees, and prayed to the Great Spirit to save them. Hearing their prayers, the Great Spirit made the rock rise from the ground towards the heavens so that the bears could not reach the girls. The bears, in an effort to climb the rock, left deep claw marks in the sides, which had become too steep to climb. Those are the marks which appear today on the sides of Devils Tower. When the girls reached the sky, they were turned into the stars of the Pleiades.  Another version tells that two Sioux boys wandered far from their village when Mato the bear, a huge creature that had claws the size of tipi poles, spotted them, and wanted to eat them for breakfast. He was almost upon them when the boys prayed to Wakan Tanka the Creator to help them. They rose up on a huge rock, while Mato tried to get up from every side, leaving huge scratch marks as he did. Finally, he sauntered off, disappointed and discouraged. The bear came to rest east of the Black Hills at what is now Bear Butte. Wanblee, the eagle, helped the boys off the rock and back to their village. A painting depicting this legend by artist Herbert A. Collins hangs over the fireplace in the visitor's center at Devils Tower.  In a Cheyenne version of the story, the giant bear pursues the girls and kills most of them. Two sisters escape back to their home with the bear still tracking them. They tell two boys that the bear can only be killed with an arrow shot through the underside of its foot. The boys have the sisters lead the bear to Devils Tower and trick it into thinking they have climbed the rock. The boys attempt to shoot the bear through the foot while it repeatedly attempts to climb up and slides back down leaving more claw marks each time. The bear was finally scared off when an arrow came very close to its left foot. This last arrow continued to go up and never came down.  Wooden Leg, a Northern Cheyenne, related another legend told to him by an old man as they were traveling together past the Devils Tower around 1866–1868. A Native American man decided to sleep at the base of Bear Lodge next to a buffalo head. In the morning he found that both he and the buffalo head had been transported to the top of the rock by the Great Medicine with no way down. He spent another day and night on the rock with no food or water. After he had prayed all day and then gone to sleep, he awoke to find that the Great Medicine had brought him back down to the ground, but left the buffalo head at the top near the edge. Wooden Leg maintained that the buffalo head was clearly visible through the old man's spyglass. At the time, the tower had never been climbed and a buffalo head at the top was otherwise inexplicable.  The buffalo head gives this story special significance for the Northern Cheyenne. All the Cheyenne maintained in their camps a sacred teepee to the Great Medicine containing the tribal sacred objects. In the case of the Northern Cheyenne, the sacred object was a buffalo head.

Recent history.

Fur trappers may have visited Devils Tower, but they left no written evidence of having done so. The first documented Caucasian visitors were several members of Captain William F. Raynolds's 1859 expedition to Yellowstone. Sixteen years later, Colonel Richard I. Dodge escorted an Office of Indian Affairs scientific survey party to the massive rock formation and coined the name Devils Tower. Recognizing its unique characteristics, the United States Congress designated the area a U.S. forest reserve in 1892 and in 1906 Devils Tower became the nation's first National monument.

Climbing.

In recent years, climbing Devils Tower has increased in popularity. The first known ascent of Devils Tower by any method occurred on July 4, 1893, and is accredited to William Rogers and Willard Ripley, local ranchers in the area. They completed this first ascent after constructing a ladder of wooden pegs driven into cracks in the rock face. A few of these wooden pegs are still intact and are visible on the tower when hiking along the Tower Trail at Devils Tower National Monument. Over the following thirty years many climbs were made using this method before the ladder fell into disrepair.  The first ascent using modern climbing techniques was made by Fritz Wiessner with William P. House and Lawrence Coveney in 1937. Wiessner led almost the entire climb free, placing only a single piece of fixed gear, a piton, which he later regretted, deeming it unnecessary.  In 1941 George Hopkins parachuted onto Devils Tower, without permission, as a publicity stunt resulting from a bet. He had intended to descend by a 1,000 ft (300 m) rope dropped to him after successfully landing on the butte, but the package containing the rope, a sledge hammer and a car axle to be driven into the rock as an anchor point slid over the edge. As the weather deteriorated, a second attempt was made to drop equipment, but Hopkins deemed it unusable after the rope became snarled and frozen due to the rain and wind. Hopkins was stranded for six days, exposed to cold, rain and 50 mph (80 km/h) winds before a mountain rescue team led by Jack Durrance, who had successfully climbed Devils Tower in 1938, finally reached him and brought him down. His entrapment and subsequent rescue was widely covered by the media of the time.  Today, hundreds of climbers scale the sheer rock walls of Devils Tower each summer. The most common route is the Durrance Route, which was the second free route established in 1938. There are many established and documented climbing routes covering every side of the tower, ascending the various vertical cracks and columns of the rock. The difficulty of these routes range from relatively easy to some of the most challenging in the world. All climbers are required to register with a park ranger before and after attempting a climb. No overnight camping at the summit is allowed; climbers return to base on the same day they ascend.  The Tower is sacred to several Plains tribes, including the Lakota, Cheyenne and Kiowa. Because of this, many Native American leaders objected to climbers ascending the monument, considering this to be a desecration. The climbers argued that they had a right to climb the Tower, since it is on federal land. A compromise was eventually reached with a voluntary climbing ban during the month of June when the tribes are conducting ceremonies around the monument. Climbers are asked, but not required, to stay off the Tower in June. According to the PBS documentary "In the Light of Reverence", approximately 85% of climbers honor the ban and voluntarily choose not to climb the Tower during the month of June. However, several climbers along with the Mountain States Legal Foundation sued the Park Service, claiming an inappropriate government entanglement with religion.

Wildlife.

Devils Tower National Monument protects many species of wildlife, such as white-tailed deer, prairie dogs, and bald eagles.

In popular culture.

The 1977 movie "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" used the formation as a plot element and as the location of its climactic scenes. Its release was the cause of a large increase in visitors and climbers to the monument..  Similarly, the 2011 movie "Paul" used the formation at the film's climax as an homage to "Close Encounters of the Third Kind".  The Native American story of the formation of the stars of the Pleiades at Devils Tower is featured in the 2014 science documentary series "".  In a 2019 episode of "The UnXplained" titled "Unnatural Nature", documenting and speculating about the formation.

See also.

Four areas of Devils Tower National Monument are on the National Register of Historic Places:

Devils Tower (also known as Bear Lodge Butte) is a butte, possibly laccolithic, composed of igneous rock in the Bear Lodge Ranger District of the Black Hills, near Hulett and Sundance in Crook County, northeastern Wyoming, above the Belle Fourche River. It rises 1,267 feet (386 m) above the Belle Fourche River, standing 867 feet (265 m) from summit to base. The summit is 5,112 feet (1,559 m) above sea level.

Devils Tower (česky "Ďáblova věž") je skalní útvar typu kamenné varhany ve státě Wyoming v USA. Dosahuje výšky 264 m, vystupuje 386 m nad okolní terén, nadmořskou výšku má 1559 m, u úpatí má průměr 305 m.


Biography.

Early years.

Katalin Karády was born as Katalin Kanczler, on 8 December 1910 in Budapest. She spent her childhood in the Kőbánya district with seven siblings in great poverty. Her parents were Rozália Lőrinc and Ferenc Kanczler, a shoemaker, whom Katalin remembered as an aggressive person. Helped by a charity organization, she spent five years in Switzerland and the Netherlands. After returning home, she studied in a Women's Marketing school, already famed for her beauty. With the language knowledge from previous years, her simple clothing and vigorous demand for cleanliness, she already stood out from her classmates. After her father's death in 1930, she married Rezső Varga, a customs official, 30 years older than herself, but they divorced after a few months.  She started acting in 1936, taking classes from Ernő Tarnay, and Artúr Bárdos. After gaining the attention of journalist Zoltán Egyed in a bar in Buda (who also proposed the name Karády) she was introduced to Ilona Aczél, a former actress, in whose acting school she learned the basics of the profession in the following three years, including singing. Karády's first performance was during the 1930s, in Dániel Jób's theatres: between 1931 and 1941, she appeared in the Pesti Színház and Vígszínház in various roles.

Becoming a star.

Her first movie role, "Halálos Tavasz" (Deadly Spring) gave her instant fame as a diva and sex-symbol, supported by her unusual, humming voice, and "femme fatale" character. In the next nine years, she appeared in 20 movies. Zoltán Egyed became her manager, and successfully created a Hollywood-like image around her, as a result, thousands of fans tried to mimic her clothing, hairstyle and behavior throughout the country. Karády's personal life was a constant topic of gossip, conflicting rumors about she a man-eater, or lesbian. The theories were stirred up even more when she had an intimate relationship with Regent Miklós Horthy's secret service chief, István Ujszászy, who also proposed to her, and bought her a villa.

Downfall.

After the German invasion of Hungary, authorities put pressure on Karády by banning her songs from the National Radio, her new film "Machita" from theatres, and stopping the ongoing production of "Gazdátlan asszony" (Orphan woman) (later the crew finished the movie with Erzsi Simor). In 1944 she was arrested with allegations that she spied for the Allied Forces. Karády was in prison for three months, during which time she was tortured, and nearly beaten to death. She was rescued by friends of Major General Ujszászy, in dire condition both physically and emotionally. Despite mishaps, she carried on with life in the war-torn capital, even rescuing numerous families at the bank of the Danube waiting to be shot by Arrow Cross guards, in exchange for personal belongings and gold which she had saved from her robbed apartment. She took a number of children home to care for them until the fighting stopped. In the summer of 1945 came news from Moscow that General Ujszászy was dead, though later evidence showed that at that time he was still alive. Suffering from a nervous breakdown, she lay in bed for the following nine months.

Later years.

After the war, Karády became increasingly disregarded. Between 1945–48 she appeared in the Operettszínház in a few leading roles, the restarting Hungarian film production did not count on her (besides two movies, "Forró mezők" being her last). Being a popular star of the Horthy era, there was no place for her under the new communist rule. In 1949, all of her films were banned along with her theater appearances. She was taken by the authorities, was brutally beaten and abused, her teeth got knocked out etc. Only being able to work at small venues in the countryside, often with a drunk audience, she left the country in 1951 permanently. First she lived in Salzburg, Austria, then moved to Switzerland, and after a year to Brussels. In 1953, she lived in São Paulo, Brazil, opening a fashion shop. In 1968, finally receiving a visa after Ted and Robert Kennedy intervened, she moved to New York City, opening a hat salon. Performing rarely for friends only, she lived in retirement, refusing to appear in the media. Receiving a governmental invitation at her 70th birthday to return to Hungary, she only sent a hat, baffling officials. She died on 8 February 1990. On 19 February her body was transferred to Hungary; a memorial service was held in Budapest at the St. Stephen's Basilica, after which she was buried in Farkasréti Cemetery.

Filmmusic.

1979 in the movie "Szabadíts meg a gonosztól" (songs "Tudom, hogy vársz", "Mindig az a perc" and "Hamvadó cigarettavég")

Katalin Karády (8 December 1910 – 8 February 1990) was a Hungarian actress and singer. A leading actress in Hungarian movies made between 1939–1945, she is best known outside Hungary as an awardee of the Righteous among the Nations honour for rescuing a number of Hungarian Jews.

Katalin Karády (8. prosince 1910 Budapešť – 8. února 1990 New York) byla maďarská herečka a zpěvačka. Hvězda maďarského filmu v letech 1939–1945 je mimo Maďarsko známá především záchranou mnoha židovských dětí, za kterou byla oceněna titulem Spravedlivý mezi národy.


Life and work.

He was born at Nancy, in northeastern France, to an artistic and theatrical family. The name "Grandville" was his grandparents' professional stage name. Grandville received his first instruction in drawing from his father, a painter of miniatures. At the age of twenty-one he moved to Paris, and soon afterwards published a collection of lithographs entitled "Les Tribulations de la petite proprieté". He followed this with "Les Plaisirs de tout âge" and "La Sibylle des salons" (1827); but the work which first established his fame was "Les Métamorphoses du jour" (1828–29), a series of seventy scenes in which individuals with the bodies of men and faces of animals are made to play a human comedy. These drawings are remarkable for the extraordinary skill with which human characteristics are represented in animal facial features.  The success of this work led to his being engaged as artistic contributor to various periodicals, such as "La Silhouette", "L'Artiste", "La Caricature", "Le Charivari"; and his political caricatures which were characterized by marvelous fertility of satirical humour, soon came to enjoy a general popularity.  After the reinstitution of prior censorship of caricature in 1835, Grandville turned almost exclusively to book illustration, supplying illustrations for various standard works, such as the songs of Béranger, the fables of La Fontaine, "Don Quixote", "Gulliver's Travels", "Robinson Crusoe". He also continued to issue various lithographic collections, among which may be mentioned "La Vie privée et publique des animaux", "Les Cent Proverbes", "Un Autre Monde" and "Les Fleurs animées".  Though the designs of Grandville are occasionally unnatural and absurd, they usually display keen analysis of character and marvellous inventive ingenuity, and his humour is always tempered and refined by delicacy of sentiment and a vein of sober thoughtfulness. He died on 17 March 1847 and is buried in the Cimetière Nord of Saint-Mandé just outside Paris.  A short notice of Grandville appears in Théophile Gautier's "Portraits contemporains". See also Charles Blanc, "Grandville" (Paris, 1855).

Legacy.

Grandville's ability for political provocation made his work much in demand. He worked in a wide variety of formats, from his first job illustrating the parlor game "Old Maid", to illustrated newspaper strips of which he was a master. His illustrations for "Le Diable à Paris" ("The Devil In Paris"; 1844–46) were used by Walter Benjamin for his study of that city as an urban organism. One of Grandville's supreme achievements, at a time when French printing technology was ascendant, was "Les Fleurs Animées", a series of images that are both poetic and satirical. But perhaps his most original contribution to the illustrated book form was "Un Autre Monde", which approaches the status of pure surrealism, despite being conceived in a pre-Freudian age. Leading members of the Surrealist movement such as André Breton and Georges Bataille recognised in Grandville a significant precursor and inspiration for the movement. British rock band Queen used part of his artwork for their 1991 album "Innuendo" and alternate pieces for most of the subsequent single releases: the album's title track, "I'm Going Slightly Mad", "These Are the Days of Our Lives" and "The Show Must Go On". The single "Headlong" also featured one of Grandville's characters on the back of the sleeve and as the basis for a picture disc release.  His style and humour had a marked influence on John Tenniel and various other Punch-cartoonists.  American grunge band Alice in Chains used part of Grandville's artwork for their self-titled 1995 album.  The graphic novel "Grandville" by Bryan Talbot was greatly inspired by Grandville's illustrations.  Grandville's art is used extensively in the video game "Aviary Attorney", which is set during a fictionalized version of the French Revolution of 1848.

Jean Ignace Isidore Gérard (13 September 1803, Nancy, Meurthe-et-Moselle – 17 March 1847, Vanves), generally known by the pseudonym of Jean-Jacques or J. J. Grandville, was a French caricaturist.

Grandville či J. J. Grandville [gravil], občanským jménem Jean Ignace Isidore Gérard, (13. září 1803 Nancy – 17. března 1847 Vanves) byl francouzský kreslíř, ilustrátor a karikaturista.


History.

Background.

The generally accepted theory about much of the earthwork attributes its construction to Offa, King of Mercia from 757 to 796. The structure did not represent a mutually agreed boundary between the Mercians and the Kingdom of Powys. It had a ditch on the Welsh (western) side, with the displaced soil piled into a bank on the Mercian (eastern) side. This suggests that Mercians constructed it as a defensive earthwork, or to demonstrate the power and intent of their kingdom.  Throughout its entire length, the Dyke provides an uninterrupted view from Mercia into Wales. Where the earthwork encounters hills or high ground, it passes to the west of them.  Although historians often overlook Offa's reign due to limitations in source material, he ranks as one of the greatest Anglo-Saxon rulers – as evidenced in his ability to raise the workforce and resources required to construct Offa's Dyke. The construction of the earthwork probably involved a "corvée" system requiring vassals to build certain lengths of the earthwork for Offa in addition to the normal services that they provided to their king. The Tribal Hidage, a primary document, shows the distribution of land within 8th-century Britain; it shows that peoples were located within specified territories for administration.

Early scholarship.

The first historians and archaeologists to examine the Dyke seriously compared their conclusions with the late 9th-century writer Asser, who wrote: "there was in Mercia in fairly recent time a certain vigorous king called Offa, who terrified all the neighbouring kings and provinces around him, and who had a great dyke built between Wales and Mercia from sea to sea". In 1955 Sir Cyril Fox published the first major survey of the Dyke. He concurred with Asser that the earthwork ran 'from sea to sea', theorising that the Dyke ran from the River Dee estuary in the north to the River Wye in the south: approximately. Although Fox observed that Offa's Dyke was not a continuous linear structure, he concluded that earthworks were raised in only those areas where natural barriers did not already exist.  Sir Frank Stenton, the UK's most eminent 20th-century scholar on Anglo-Saxon England, accepted Fox's conclusions. He wrote the introduction to Fox's account of the Dyke. Although Fox's work has now been revised to some extent, it still remains a vital record of some stretches of Offa's Dyke that still existed between 1926 and 1928, when his three field surveys took place, but have since been destroyed.

Later research.

In 1978, Dr Frank Noble challenged some of Fox's conclusions, stirring up new academic interest in Offa's Dyke. His MPhil thesis entitled "Offa's Dyke Reviewed" (1978) raised several questions concerning the accepted historiography of Offa's Dyke. Noble postulated that the gaps in the Dyke were not due to the incorporation of natural features as defensive barriers, but instead the gaps were a "ridden boundary", perhaps incorporating palisades, that left no archaeological trace. Noble also helped establish the Offa's Dyke Association, which maintains the Offa's Dyke Path. This long-distance footpath mostly follows the route of the dyke, and is a designated British National Trail.  John Davies wrote of Fox's study: "In the planning of it, there was a degree of consultation with the kings of Powys and Gwent. On the Long Mountain near Trelystan, the dyke veers to the east, leaving the fertile slopes in the hands of the Welsh; near Rhiwabon, it was designed to ensure that Cadell ap Brochwel retained possession of the Fortress of Penygadden." And, for Gwent, Offa had the dyke built "on the eastern crest of the gorge, clearly with the intention of recognizing that the River Wye and its traffic belonged to the kingdom of Gwent".  Ongoing research and archaeology on Offa's Dyke has been undertaken for many years by the Extra-Mural Department of the University of Manchester. Interviews with Dr David Hill, broadcast in episode 1 of In Search of the Dark Ages (aired in 1979), show support for Noble's idea. Most recently Hill and Margaret Worthington have undertaken considerable research on the Dyke. Their work, though far from finished, has demonstrated that there is little evidence for the Dyke stretching from sea to sea. Rather, they claim that it is a shorter structure stretching from Rushock Hill north of the Herefordshire Plain to Llanfynydd, near Mold, Flintshire, some 64 miles (103 km). According to Hill and Worthington, dykes in the far north and south may have different dates, and though they may be connected with Offa's Dyke, there is as yet no compelling evidence behind this. However, not all experts accept this view.

Contrary evidence.

'Ofer' means 'border' or 'edge' in Old English, giving rise to the possibility of alternative derivations for some border features associated with Offa.  The Roman historian Eutropius in his book "Historiae Romanae Breviarium", written around 369, mentions the Wall of Severus, a structure built by Septimius Severus who was Roman Emperor between 193 and 211:  "Novissimum bellum in Britannia habuit, utque receptas provincias omni securitate muniret, vallum per CXXXIII passuum milia a mari ad mare deduxit. Decessit Eboraci admodum senex, imperii anno sexto decimo, mense tertio." "Historiae Romanae Breviarium, viii 19.1"

 He had his most recent war in Britain, and to fortify the conquered provinces with all security, he built a wall for 133 miles from sea to sea. He died at York, a reasonably old man, in the sixteenth year and third month of his reign.  This source is conventionally thought to be referring, in error, to either Hadrian's Wall,, or the Antonine Wall,, which were both shorter and built in the 2nd century. Recently, some writers have suggested that Eutropius may have been referring to the earthwork later called Offa's Dyke. Most archaeologists reject this theory.  The Venerable Bede also mentions the barrier built by Septimus Severus. But Bede says that the rampart was made of earth and timber, a description which would closer match Offa's Dyke than Hadrian's Wall, though it would describe the Antonine Wall:  After many great and severe battles, (Severus) thought fit to divide that part of the island, which he had recovered, from the other unconquered nations, not with a wall, as some imagine, but with a rampart. For a wall is made of stones, but a rampart, with which camps are fortified to repel the assaults of enemies, is made of sods, cut out of the earth, and raised high above the ground, like a wall, having in front of it the trench whence the sods were taken, with strong stakes of wood fixed above it. Thus Severus drew a great trench and strong rampart, fortified with several towers, from sea to sea. "Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of England, Bk 1-5" However, the solution to the problem lies a few chapters later in Bede's account. In Book One Chapter Twelve of Bede's "Ecclesiastical History", he writes that the Romans "built a strong wall of stone directly from sea to sea in a straight line between the towns that had been built as strong-points, where Severus had built his earthwork... straight from east to west". The strong wall of stone cannot refer to the Antonine Wall or Offa's Dyke, so it clearly refers to Hadrian's Wall, especially as Offa's Dyke runs from north to south. Also, as Severus's earthwork is described as being in the same location as Hadrian's Wall, it cannot be Offa's Dyke either, so the earth rampart with a great trench that Bede refers to must be the Vallum, the adjoining earthen barrier immediately south of Hadrian's Wall. Where Bede got it wrong was in attributing the Vallum to Septimius Severus, and saying that it predated the Wall. In fact the Vallum was the work of Hadrian, and slightly post-dated the Wall.  Evidence has also been found that challenges the accepted date of the construction of Offa's Dyke. In December 1999, Shropshire County Council archaeologists uncovered the remains of a hearth or fire on the original ground surface beneath Wat's Dyke near Oswestry, England. Carbon dating analysis of the burnt charcoal and burnt clay "in situ" showed it was covered by earth on or around AD 446. Archaeologists concluded that this part of Wat's Dyke, so long thought of as Anglo-Saxon and a mid-8th-century contemporary of Offa's Dyke, must have been built 300 years earlier in the post-Roman period.  In 2014, excavations by the Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust focused on nine samples of the Dyke near Chirk. Radio carbon dating of redeposited turf placed the construction between the years 541 and 651, and lower layers of construction are dated to as early as 430. This evidence suggests that the Dyke may have been a long-term project by several Mercian kings, that was started during the early fifth century probably by Romano-Britons.

Current.

The England–Wales border still mostly passes within a few miles of the course of Offa's Dyke through the Welsh Marches. A section of the Dyke, which overlooks Tintern Abbey and includes the Devil's Pulpit near Chepstow, is now managed by English Heritage.

Statutory protection.

All sections of Offa's Dyke that survive as visible earthworks, or as infilled but undeveloped ditch, are designated as a Scheduled Monument. However, some parts of the Dyke may also remain buried under later development. Some sections are also defined as Sites of Special Scientific Interest, including stretches within the Lower Wye Valley SSSI and the Highbury Wood National Nature Reserve. Parts are located within the Wye Valley and Shropshire Hills Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Most of the line of Offa's Dyke is designated as a public right of way, including those sections which form part of the Offa's Dyke Path.  In August 2013, a section of Dyke, between Chirk and Llangollen, was destroyed by a local landowner. The destruction of the Dyke to build a stable was said to be like "driving a road through Stonehenge" but the perpetrator escaped punishment.

Candidate World Heritage Site.

In 2010, the Dyke was proposed by the Offa's Dyke Association and local authorities for World Heritage Site status. Part of the proposal stated:  The proposal was rejected in 2011.

The Offa's Dyke Centre.

The Offa's Dyke Centre is a purpose-built information centre in the town of Knighton, on Offa's Dyke on the border between England (Shropshire) and Wales (Powys). Some of the best remains of the earthworks can be seen within a two-minute walk from the centre.

Offa's Dyke Path.

The Offa's Dyke Path (Welsh: "Llwybr Clawdd Offa") is a long-distance footpath close to the England–Wales border. Although large sections are close to the Dyke itself, the Path is longer, and in some places passes at some distance from the earthworks. Opened in 1971, the Path is one of Britain's longest National Trails, stretching for from the Severn estuary at Sedbury, near Chepstow, to Prestatyn on the north Wales coast. There is a visitor centre at Knighton.

Cultural importance.

The dyke has a cultural significance symbolising the separation between England and Wales: a symbolism similar to Hadrian's Wall between England and Scotland in the Scottish Marches. George Borrow in his "Wild Wales" (1862), drawn from folklore, claimed that:

Offa's Dyke () is a large linear earthwork that roughly follows the current border between England and Wales. The structure is named after Offa, the Anglo-Saxon king of Mercia from AD 757 until 796, who is traditionally believed to have ordered its construction. Although its precise original purpose is debated, it delineated the border between Anglian Mercia and the Welsh kingdom of Powys.

Offův val (, ) je dlouhá terénní úprava v Británii na hranici mezi Anglií a Walesem. Vybudován byl v 8. století pro ochranu hranice mezi Mercií a Powysem.


Background.

On January 7, 2014, Deadmau5 announced on Twitter that his seventh album was completed. He also announced that it was a double album containing a continuous mix for each disc and that the album as a whole, minus the mixes, would contain 25 tracks. On May 10, 2014, "While(1<2)" was officially unveiled by Deadmau5 through his subscription service, and also announced the album's digital release date of June 17, 2014 with a physical release on June 24.

Singles.

The first single "Avaritia" became available for purchase on May 20, 2014. One week later, the second single "Seeya", featuring singer Colleen D'Agostino from the band The Material, was made available for purchase on iTunes. On 2 June 2014, the third single "Infra Turbo Pigcart Racer" premiered on mau5trap's SoundCloud page. It was made available for download on iTunes and Beatport the next day. The album's fourth and final single, "Phantoms Can't Hang", was also premiered through SoundCloud the day before its release on iTunes and Beatport which was on 10 June 2014.

Critical reception.

"While(1<2)" received favorable reviews from critics. It currently holds a score of 66 on Metacritic, indicating "generally favourable reviews". Billboard gave the album 4.5/5 stars stating "Sprawling, ambitious and mostly well-executed, "While(1<2)" may confuse his fan base's Ultra-attending electro house contingent, but Deadmau5's double album undoubtedly marks his most mature and forward-thinking release to date". All Music also reviewed positively expressing "While(1<2) is a very good, very restrained, and very inspired Deadmau5 effort. It is a welcome space-walk surprise, recommended for all aspiring EDM astronauts and Ghost in the Shell cast members", with a score of 3.5/5 stars.  "Rolling Stone", however, was more critical of the album stating "Deadmau5 has turned from an electro-house polymath into the world's most unnecessary Nine Inch Nails tribute act" giving it 2 stars out of 5. Slant Magazine was equally critical saying "Deadmau5 enters the fray with the advantage of deeply diminished expectations. His latest, While(1<2), comfortably clears the bar set by his contemporaries, and that would be impressive if the bar wasn't buried underground" also awarding it 2 stars.

Track listing.

Note

While(1<2) (stylized as while(1<2); pronounced "while one is less than two") is the seventh studio album by Canadian electronic music producer Deadmau5, released on June 17, 2014 by Mau5trap, Virgin EMI and Astralwerks, his only album to be released by the latter.

while(1<2) je sedmé studiové album kanadského producenta Deadmau5e. Bylo celosvětově vydáno 17. června 2014. Hodně songů z alba bylo na Joelově SoundCloudu předtím, než je smazal na začátku roku 2014.


Basic stages of object recognition.

Neuropsychological evidence affirms that there are four specific stages identified in the process of object recognition. These stages are:  Within these stages, there are more specific processes that take place to complete the different processing components. In addition, other existing models have proposed integrative hierarchies (top-down and bottom-up), as well as parallel processing, as opposed to this general bottom-up hierarchy.

Hierarchical recognition processing.

Visual recognition processing is typically viewed as a bottom-up hierarchy in which information is processed sequentially with increasing complexities. During this process, lower-level cortical processors, such as the primary visual cortex, are at the bottom of the hierarchy. Higher-level cortical processors, such as the inferotemporal cortex (IT), are at the top, where visual recognition is facilitated. A highly recognized bottom-up hierarchical theory is James DiCarlo's Untangling description whereby each stage of the hierarchically arranged ventral visual pathway performs operations to gradually transform object representations into an easily extractable format. In contrast, an increasingly popular recognition processing theory, is that of top-down processing. One model, proposed by Moshe Bar (2003), describes a "shortcut" method in which early visual inputs are sent, partially analyzed, from the early visual cortex to the prefrontal cortex (PFC). Possible interpretations of the crude visual input is generated in the PFC and then sent to the inferotemporal cortex (IT) subsequently activating relevant object representations which are then incorporated into the slower, bottom-up process. This "shortcut" is meant to minimize the number of object representations required for matching thereby facilitating object recognition. Lesion studies have supported this proposal with findings of slower response times for individuals with PFC lesions, suggesting use of only the bottom-up processing.

Object constancy and theories of object recognition.

A significant aspect of object recognition is that of object constancy: the ability to recognize an object across varying viewing conditions. These varying conditions include object orientation, lighting, and object variability (size, color, and other within-category differences). For the visual system to achieve object constancy, it must be able to extract a commonality in the object description across different viewpoints and the retinal descriptions.[9] Participants who did categorization and recognition tasks while undergoing a functional magnetic found as increased blood flow indicating activation in specific regions of the brain. The categorization task consisted of participants placing objects from canonical or unusual views as either indoor or outdoor objects. The recognition task occurs by presenting the participants with images that they had viewed previously. Half of these images were in the same orientation as previously shown, while the other half were presented in the opposing viewpoint. The brain regions implicated in mental rotation, such as the ventral and dorsal visual pathways and the prefrontal cortex, showed the greatest increase in blood flow during these tasks, demonstrating that they are critical for the ability to view objects from multiple angles. Several theories have been generated to provide insight on how object constancy may be achieved for the purpose of object recognition including, viewpoint-invariant, viewpoint-dependent and multiple views theories.

Viewpoint-invariant theories.

Viewpoint-invariant theories suggest that object recognition is based on structural information, such as individual parts, allowing for recognition to take place regardless of the object's viewpoint. Accordingly, recognition is possible from any viewpoint as individual parts of an object can be rotated to fit any particular view.[10] This form of analytical recognition requires little memory as only structural parts need to be encoded, which can produce multiple object representations through the interrelations of these parts and mental rotation.[10] Participants in a study were presented with one encoding view from each of 24 preselected objects, as well as five filler images. Objects were then represented in the central visual field at either the same orientation or a different orientation than the original image. Then participants were asked to name if the same or different depth- orientation views of these objects presented. The same procedure was then executed when presenting the images to the left or right visual field. Viewpoint-dependent priming was observed when test views were presented directly to the right hemisphere, but not when test views were presented directly to the left hemisphere. The results support the model that objects are stored in a manner that is viewpoint dependent because the results did not depend on whether the same or a different set of parts could be recovered from the different-orientation views.

3-D model representation.

This model, proposed by Marr and Nishihara (1978), states that object recognition is achieved by matching 3-D model representations obtained from the visual object with 3-D model representations stored in memory as vertical shape precepts. Through the use of computer programs and algorithms, Yi Yungfeng (2009) was able to demonstrate the ability for the human brain to mentally construct 3D images using only the 2D images that appear on the retina. Their model also demonstrates a high degree of shape constancy conserved between 2D images, which allow the 3D image to be recognized. The 3-D model representations obtained from the object are formed by first identifying the concavities of the object, which separate the stimulus into individual parts. Recent research suggests that an area of the brain, known as the caudal intraparietal area (CIP), is responsible for storing the slant and tilt of a plan surface that allow for concavity recognition. Rosenburg et al. implanted monkeys with a scleral search coil for monitoring eye position while simultaneously recording single neuron activation from neurons within the CIP. During the experiment, monkeys sat 30 cm away from an LCD screen that displayed the visual stimuli. Binocular disparity cues were displayed on the screen by rendering stimuli as green-red anaglyphs and the slant-tilt curves ranged from 0 to 330. A single trial consisted of a fixation point and then the presentation of a stimulus for 1 second. Neuron activation were then recorded using the surgically inserted micro electrodes. These single neuron activation for specific concavities of objects lead to the discovery that each axis of an individual part of an object containing concavity are found in memory stores. Identifying the principal axis of the object assists in the normalization process via mental rotation that is required because only the canonical description of the object is stored in memory. Recognition is acquired when the observed object viewpoint is mentally rotated to match the stored canonical description.

Recognition by components.

An extension of Marr and Nishihara's model, the recognition-by-components theory, proposed by Biederman (1987), proposes that the visual information gained from an object is divided into simple geometric components, such as blocks and cylinders, also known as "geons" (geometric ions), and are then matched with the most similar object representation that is stored in memory to provide the object's identification (see Figure 1).

Viewpoint-dependent theories.

Viewpoint-dependent theories suggest that object recognition is affected by the viewpoint at which it is seen, implying that objects seen in novel viewpoints reduce the accuracy and speed of object identification. This theory of recognition is based on a more holistic system rather than by parts, suggesting that objects are stored in memory with multiple viewpoints and angles. This form of recognition requires a lot of memory as each viewpoint must be stored. Accuracy of recognition also depends on how familiar the observed viewpoint of the object is.

Multiple views theory.

This theory proposes that object recognition lies on a viewpoint continuum where each viewpoint is recruited for different types of recognition. At one extreme of this continuum, viewpoint-dependent mechanisms are used for within-category discriminations, while at the other extreme, viewpoint-invariant mechanisms are used for the categorization of objects.

Neural substrates.

The dorsal and ventral stream.

The visual processing of objects in the brain can be divided into two processing pathways: the dorsal stream (how/where), which extends from the visual cortex to the parietal lobes, and ventral stream (what), which extends from the visual cortex to the inferotemporal cortex (IT). The existence of these two separate visual processing pathways was first proposed by Ungerleider and Mishkin (1982) who, based on their lesion studies, suggested that the dorsal stream is involved in the processing of visual spatial information, such as object localization (where), and the ventral stream is involved in the processing of visual object identification information (what). Since this initial proposal, it has been alternatively suggested that the dorsal pathway should be known as the 'How' pathway as the visual spatial information processed here provides us with information about how to interact with objects, For the purpose of object recognition, the neural focus is on the ventral stream.

Functional specialization in the ventral stream.

Within the ventral stream, various regions of proposed functional specialization have been observed in functional imaging studies. The brain regions most consistently found to display functional specialization are the fusiform face area (FFA), which shows increased activation for faces when compared with objects, the parahippocampal place area (PPA) for scenes vs. objects, the extrastriate body area (EBA) for body parts vs. objects, MT+/V5 for moving stimuli vs. static stimuli, and the Lateral Occipital Complex (LOC) for discernible shapes vs. scrambled stimuli. (See also: Neural processing for individual categories of objects)

Structural processing: the lateral occipital complex.

The lateral occipital complex (LOC) has been found to be particularly important for object recognition at the perceptual structural level. In an event-related fMRI study that looked at the adaptation of neurons activated in visual processing of objects, it was discovered that the similarity of an object's shape is necessary for subsequent adaptation in the LOC, but specific object features such as edges and contours are not. This suggests that activation in the LOC represents higher-level object shape information and not simple object features. In a related fMRI study, the activation of the LOC, which occurred regardless of the presented object's visual cues such as motion, texture, or luminance contrasts, suggests that the different low-level visual cues used to define an object converge in "object-related areas" to assist in the perception and recognition process. None of the mentioned higher-level object shape information seems to provide any semantic information about the object as the LOC shows a neuronal response to varying forms including non-familiar, abstract objects.  Further experiments have proposed that the LOC consists of a hierarchical system for shape selectivity indicating greater selective activation in the posterior regions for fragments of objects whereas the anterior regions show greater activation for full or partial objects. This is consistent with previous research that suggests a hierarchical representation in the ventral temporal cortex where primary feature processing occurs in the posterior regions and the integration of these features into a whole and meaningful object occurs in the anterior regions.

Semantic Processing.

Semantic associations allow for faster object recognition. When an object has previously been associated with some sort of semantic meaning, people are more prone to correctly identify the object. Research has shown that semantic associations allow for a much quicker recognition of an object, even when the object is being viewed at varying angles. When objects are viewed at increasingly deviated angles from the traditional plane of view, objects that held learned semantic associations had lower response times compared to objects that did not hold any learned semantic associations. Thus, when object recognition becomes increasingly difficult, semantic associations allow recognition to be much easier. Similarly, a subject can be primed to recognize an object by observing an action that is simply related to the target object. This shows that objects have a set of sensory, motor and semantic associations that allow a person to correctly recognize an object. This supports the claim that the brain utilizes multiple parts when trying to accurately identify an object.  Through information provided from neuropsychological patients, dissociation of recognition processing have been identified between structural and semantic processing as structural, colour, and associative information can be selectively impaired. In one PET study, areas found to be involved in associative semantic processing include the left anterior superior/middle temporal gyrus and the left temporal pole comparative to structural and colour information, as well as the right temporal pole comparative to colour decision tasks only. These results indicate that stored perceptual knowledge and semantic knowledge involve separate cortical regions in object recognition as well as indicating that there are hemispheric differences in the temporal regions.  Research has also provided evidence which indicates that visual semantic information converges in the fusiform gyri of the inferotemporal lobes. In a study that compared the semantic knowledge of category versus attributes, it was found that they play separate roles in how they contribute to recognition. For categorical comparisons, the lateral regions of the fusiform gyrus were activated by living objects, in comparison to nonliving objects which activated the medial regions. For attribute comparisons, it was found that the right fusiform gyrus was activated by global form, in comparison to local details which activated the left fusiform gyrus. These results suggest that the type of object category determines which region of the fusiform gyrus is activated for processing semantic recognition, whereas the attributes of an object determines the activation in either the left or right fusiform gyrus depending on whether global form or local detail is processed.  In addition, it has been proposed that activation in anterior regions of the fusiform gyri indicate successful recognition. However, levels of activation have been found to depend on the semantic relevance of the object. The term semantic relevance here refers to "a measure of the contribution of semantic features to the "core" meaning of a concept." Results showed that objects with high semantic relevance, such as artefacts, created an increase in activation compared to objects with low semantic relevance, such as natural objects. This is due to the proposed increased difficulty to distinguish between natural objects as they have very similar structural properties which makes them harder to identify in comparison to artefacts. Therefore, the easier the object is to identify, the more likely it will be successfully recognized.  Another condition that affects successful object recognition performance is that of contextual facilitation. It is thought that during tasks of object recognition, an object is accompanied by a "context frame", which offers semantic information about the object's typical context. It has been found that when an object is out of context, object recognition performance is hindered with slower response times and greater inaccuracies in comparison to recognition tasks when an object was in an appropriate context. Based on results from a study using fMRI, it has been proposed that there is a "context network" in the brain for contextually associated objects with activity largely found in the Parahippocampal cortex (PHC) and the Retrosplenial Complex (RSC). Within the PHC, activity in the Parahippocampal Place Area (PPA), has been found to be preferential to scenes rather than objects; however, it has been suggested that activity in the PHC for solitary objects in tasks of contextual facilitation may be due to subsequent thought of the spatial scene in which the object is contextually represented. Further experimenting found that activation was found for both non-spatial and spatial contexts in the PHC, although activation from non-spatial contexts was limited to the anterior PHC and the posterior PHC for spatial contexts.

Recognition memory.

When someone sees an object, they know what the object is because they've seen it on a past occasion; this is recognition memory. Not only do abnormalities to the ventral (what) stream of the visual pathway affect our ability to recognize an object but also the way in which an object is presented to us. One notable characteristic of visual recognition memory is its remarkable capacity: even after seeing thousands of images on single trials, humans perform at high accuracy in subsequent memory tests and they remember considerable detail about the images that they have seen

Context.

Context allows for a much greater accuracy in object recognition. When an identifiable object is blurred, the accuracy of recognition is much greater when the object is placed in a familiar context. In addition to this, even an unfamiliar context allows for more accurate object recognition compared to the object being shown in isolation. This can be attributed to the fact that objects are typically seen in some setting rather than no setting at all. When the setting the object is in is familiar to the viewer, it becomes much easier to determine what the object is. Though context is not required to correctly recognize, it is part of the association that one makes with a certain object.  Context becomes especially important when recognizing faces or emotions. When facial emotions are presented without any context, the ability to which someone is able to accurately describe the emotion being shown is significantly lower than when context is given. This phenomenon remains true across all age groups and cultures, signifying that context is essential in accurately identifying facial emotion for all individuals.

Familiarity.

Familiarity is a mechanism that is context-free in the sense that what one recognizes just feels familiar without spending time trying to find in what context one knows the object. The ventro-lateral region of the frontal lobe is involved in memory encoding during incidental learning and then later maintaining and retrieving semantic memories. Familiarity can induce perceptual processes different from those of unfamiliar objects which means that our perception of a finite number of familiar objects is unique. Deviations from typical viewpoints and contexts can affect the efficiency for which an object is recognized most effectively. It was found that not only are familiar objects recognized more efficiently when viewed from a familiar viewpoint opposed to an unfamiliar one, but also this principle applies to novel objects. This deduces to the thought that representations of objects in our brain are organized in more of a familiar fashion of the objects observed in the environment. Recognition is not only largely driven by object shape and/or views but also by dynamic information. Familiarity can benefit the perception of dynamic point-light displays, moving objects, the sex of faces, and face recognition.

Recollection.

Recollection shares many similarities with familiarity; however, it is context-dependent, requiring specific information from the inquired incident.

Impairments.

Loss of object recognition is called "visual object agnosia". There are two broad categories of visual object agnosia: apperceptive and associative. When object agnosia occurs from a lesion in the dominant hemisphere, there is often a profound associated language disturbance, including loss of word meaning.

Effects of lesions in the ventral stream.

Object recognition is a complex task and involves several different areas of the brain – not just one. If one area is damaged then object recognition can be impaired. The main area for object recognition takes place in the temporal lobe. For example, it was found that lesions to the perirhinal cortex in rats causes impairments in object recognition especially with an increase in feature ambiguity. Neonatal aspiration lesions of the amygdaloid complex in monkeys appear to have resulted in a greater object memory loss than early hippocampal lesions. However, in adult monkeys, the object memory impairment is better accounted for by damage to the perirhinal and entorhinal cortex than by damage to the amygdaloid nuclei. Combined amygdalohippocampal (A + H) lesions in rats impaired performance on an object recognition task when the retention intervals were increased beyond 0s and when test stimuli were repeated within a session. Damage to the amygdala or hippocampus does not affect object recognition, whereas A + H damage produces clear deficits. In an object recognition task, the level of discrimination was significantly lower in the electrolytic lesions of globus pallidus (part of the basal ganglia) in rats compared to the Substantia- Innominata/Ventral Pallidum which was in turn worse compared to Control and Medial Septum/Vertical Diagonal Band of Broca groups; however, only globus pallidus did not discriminate between new and familiar objects. These lesions damage the ventral (what) pathway of the visual processing of objects in the brain.

Visual agnosias.

Agnosia is a rare occurrence and can be the result of a stroke, dementia, head injury, brain infection, or hereditary. Apperceptive agnosia is a deficit in object perception creating an inability to understand the significance of objects. Similarly, associative visual agnosia is the inability to understand the significance of objects; however, this time the deficit is in semantic memory. Both of these agnosias can affect the pathway to object recognition, like Marr's Theory of Vision. More specifically unlike apperceptive agnosia, associative agnosic patients are more successful at drawing, copying, and matching tasks; however, these patients demonstrate that they can perceive but not recognize. Integrative agnosia(a subtype of associative agnosia) is the inability to integrate separate parts to form a whole image. With these types of agnosias there is damage to the ventral (what) stream of the visual processing pathway. Object orientation agnosia is the inability to extract the orientation of an object despite adequate object recognition. With this type of agnosia there is damage to the dorsal (where) stream of the visual processing pathway. This can affect object recognition in terms of familiarity and even more so in unfamiliar objects and viewpoints. A difficulty in recognizing faces can be explained by prosopagnosia. Someone with prosopagnosia cannot identify the face but is still able to perceive age, gender, and emotional expression. The brain region that specifies in facial recognition is the fusiform face area. Prosopagnosia can also be divided into apperceptive and associative subtypes. Recognition of individual chairs, cars, animals can also be impaired; therefore, these object share similar perceptual features with the face that are recognized in the fusiform face area.

Alzheimer's disease.

The distinction between category and attribute in semantic representation may inform our ability to assess semantic function in aging and disease states affecting semantic memory, such as Alzheimer's disease (AD). Because of semantic memory deficits, persons suffering from Alzheimer's disease have difficulties recognizing objects as the semantic memory is known to be used to retrieve information for naming and categorizing objects. In fact, it is highly debated whether the semantic memory deficit in AD reflects the loss of semantic knowledge for particular categories and concepts or the loss of knowledge of perceptual features and attributes.

Visual object recognition refers to the ability to identify the objects in view based on visual input. One important signature of visual object recognition is "object invariance", or the ability to identify objects across changes in the detailed context in which objects are viewed, including changes in illumination, object pose, and background context.

Rozpoznávání objektů je schopnost nahlížet vlastnosti fyzického objektu (jako tvar, barva, textura) a schopnost připisovat mu sémantické atributy jako pochopení použití předmětu, zkušenosti o předmětu a to, jaký je jeho vztah k ostatním předmětům.