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In the first half of my dissertation, I study the effects of type Ia supernova (SNIa) systematic errors on dark energy using current data from the Supernova Legacy Survey. I consider how these systematics affect constraints from combined cosmological probes that include SNIa, baryon acoustic oscillations, and the cosmic microwave background. The temporal evolution of dark energy is described in terms of principal components of the equation of state, though simpler models are examined as well. The SNIa systematics are found to degrade the generalized figure of merit, which characterizes constraints in the multidimensional dark energy parameter space, by a factor of three to four. Nevertheless, overall constraints obtained on more than five principal components are very good with current data, even with the inclusion of known systematics. In the second half, I perform tests of the consistency of the standard wCDM model in the framework of General Relativity by separating out the information between geometry and growth of structure. Each late-universe dark energy parameter is replaced with two parameters: one describing geometrical information, and the other controlling the growth of structure. I use data from all principal cosmological probes to constrain both geometry and growth; of these, SNIa, baryon acoustic oscillations, and the cosmic microwave background primarily measure geometry, while cluster counts, weak gravitational lensing shear, and redshift space distortions constrain both geometry and growth. Both geometry and growth separately favor the LCDM cosmology with the matter density relative to critical Omega_M=0.3. Allowing the split equations of state to vary separately results in good agreement with the LCDM value (w=-1), with the major exception of redshift space distortions which favor less growth than in LCDM at 3-sigma confidence, favoring instead w^grow=-0.8. This preference by redshift space distortions for less growth has been noted previously and may be due to systematics, or be explained by the sum of the neutrino masses higher than that expected from the simplest mass hierarchies, m_nu=0.45 eV. Even in the new, larger parameter space the constraints are tight due to the impressive complementarity of different cosmological probes.

Economy and Rhetoric of Exchange in Early Modern SpainbyEduardo German RuizDoctor of Philosophy in Hispanic Languages and LiteratureUniversity of California, BerkeleyProfessor Ignacio Navarrete, ChairIn this dissertation I analyze four canonical works (Lazarillo de Tormes, La Vida es Sueño, "El Celoso Extremeño," and Heráclito Cristiano) with the goal of highlighting material-economic content and circumstantial connections that, taken together, come to shape selfhood and identity. I use the concept of sin or scarcity (lack) to argue that Lazarillo de Tormes grounds identity upon religious experience and material economy combined. In this process the church as institution depends on economic forces and pre-capitalistic profit motivations as well as rhetorical strategies to shape hegemonic narratives. Those strategies have economic and moral roots that, fused together through intimate exchanges, surround and determine the lacking selfhood represented by the title character. La Vida es Sueño begins with defective selfhoods, too. Segismundo and Rosaura must negotiate spatial reinsertions and organic reconstitutions through material and rhetorical exchanges that, in the end, also shape their identities. One of the rhetorical exchanges in Calderón's play adopts the form of an intertextuality, specifically a pretextuality that harks back to one of El Conde Lucanor's medieval examples, which is grounded upon the "material" notion of hunger and the related theme of the master-and-slave dynamic between an ignorant master and his wise servant. In the Cervantes tale of the jealous man this dynamic of mutual inscription undergoes a renewal via the capitalistic and colonial circumstance faced by Carrizales, the protagonist. First he has to escape his circumstance; then he has to undergo reinsertion in order to survive as a functioning but deeply troubled self. His project of a viable selfhood appears unachievable unless through the added space and agency of colonial alterity. Only in this way can the subject be fulfilled and hegemonic narrative reconstituted, even if an ultimate or potential downfall also dooms the protagonist. Hence the slave plays an essential role in the formation of hegemonic identity (represented by Carrizales). The slave, one of the incarnations of dominant discourse, occupies an interstitial space, which allows him to expose, undermine, and ultimately make available to discourse such transformative powers as are required for hegemonic continuation. Finally I study Francisco de Quevedo's metaphysical poetry in Heráclito Cristiano and trace there some of the colonial metaphors that, through their economic weight, pull the metaphysical content towards the sinner's physical suffering, manifested psychologically as a need for conversion and a keen awareness of grotesque death.