The article presents the results of an interview in a student’s group on the problem of the fall into sin based on the discussion at the seminar of Dante's «divine Comedy». The authors consider human as an image and likeness of God, who creates himself, choosing between good and harm. There were changes in the perception of the structure of Inferno: the number of circles of hell in the minds of young people interviewed decreased: all respondents do not see sin (...) in unbelief, three-quarters of respondents − in gluttony, half − in lust. The inter-pretation of heresy and fraud as ways to promote their projects is relevant. The effect of absolute rejection of violence, contemptuous attitude to treachery is revealed. The authors believe that secularization has touched only the first five circles of Hell, but at the bottom everything is still the same. (shrink)

Although the topic of value congruence has attracted considerable attention from researchers and practitioners, evidence for the link between person–supervisor value congruence and followers’ reactions is less robust than often assumed. This study addresses three central issues in our understanding of person–supervisor value congruence by assessing the impact of objective person–supervisor value congruence rather than subjective value congruence, by examining the differential effects of value congruence in strongly versus moderately held values, and by exploring perceived empowerment as a central mediating (...) mechanism. Results of a multi-source study comprising 116 person–supervisor dyads reveal that objective value congruence relates to followers’ job satisfaction and affective commitment and that this link can be explained by followers’ perceived empowerment. Moreover, polynomial regression and response surface analyses reveal that congruence effects vary with the importance that leaders and followers ascribe to a certain value: Congruency in strongly held values have more robust relations with followers’ outcomes than congruence in moderately held values. (shrink)

Three indexes have been compiled: authors of main articles (including our special departments such as ‘Projects in progress’ and ‘Notes and discussions’); essay reviews; and book reviews. Co-author...

LANGUAGE NOTE | Document text in Chinese; abstract also in English. 本文回顧及討論2021年1月至2022年4月COVID-19疫情期間香港抗疫中曾在公共領域提出或引起關注的倫理問題。新型的傳染病是複雜和具有不確定的挑戰，COVID-19全球大流行引起的倫理問題有普世 的性質，但亦必須結合本地具體的情況討論。作者對其中的倫理焦點提出觀察分析，包括接種COVID-19疫苗的知情同意程序及其局限性，以及為精神上無行為能力的老年人接種疫苗決定的特殊挑戰。 This article reviews and discusses ethical issues that emerged in the public realm in the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic in Hong Kong, between January 2021 and March 2022. Emerging infectious diseases are complex and bring about uncertain challenges. Although many of the ethical issues during the pandemic were universally experienced, it is important to understand them within the local contexts in which they arose. The paper (...) reports on observations related to some of these ethical issues, namely, the process of informed consent for COVID-19 vaccination and its limitations, and the challenge of arriving at vaccination decisions for mentally incapacitated elders. (shrink)

A brief review of two-body Dirac and Kemmer-Duffin-Petiau approaches for the bound state problem of two fermions is presented from an algebraic point of view in a comparative manner. Reduction of the direct product of two Dirac spaces is discussed.

Volume 25, Issue 2, February 2025, Page 138-139.

Avery’s et al. ’s 1944 paper provides the first direct evidence of DNA having gene-like properties and marks the beginning of a new phase in early molecular genetics (with a strong focus on chemistry and DNA). The study of its reception shows that on the whole, Avery’s results were immediately appreciated and motivated new research on transformation, the chemical nature of DNA’s biological specificity and bacteria genetics. It shows, too, that initial problems of transferring transformation to other systems and prominent (...) criticism of its results nurtured skepticism. Avery’s experiment was downplayed and neglected particularly by many of those scientists who worked in the new fields of biochemical and biophysical genetics, genetic phage, and TMV research. This was not due to the fact that the implications of the paper could not be connected to generally accepted knowledge. Contrary to a widespread belief, the assumed uniformity of DNA as opposed to proteins was not used as an argument against the validity of Avery’s et al.’s finding. The indifference rather reflected, among other things, the disciplinary gap between the chemically oriented microbiologists and the old and new geneticists who remained committed to genetic and physical methods (in particular x-ray studies) and clung to the assumption that proteins were the sole carriers of biological specificity. The responses to Avery’s et al.’s paper show how different research interests in the areas between microbiology, genetics, and biochemistry interacted with the prejudices, dogmas, individual farsightedness or short-sightedness, and scientific authority during a pivotal period of early molecular biology. (shrink)

The set-theoretic and individual-theoretic analyses of collections make the same mistake: their ontologies are far removed from language. Our basic notion, the collector, has a clear linguistic counterpart: the definite article. Our theory furnishes a theory of definite descriptions as a special case. We use 3-valued valued logic in order to come to grips with the existential presuppositions of the collections.

Open peer commentary on the article “Exploring the Depth of Dream Experience: The Enactive Framework and Methods for Neurophenomenological Research” by Elizaveta Solomonova & Xin Wei Sha. Upshot: Solomonova and Sha propose a research programme for the study of dreaming based on the theoretical framework of enactivism. This commentary intends to demonstrate several unclear points connected to the theoretical framework applied and the proposed methodological solutions. By considering the potential reach of various phenomenological approaches in the research of dreams, I (...) intend to show that taking a more radical phenomenological position might further support the authors’ intention to de-pathologise the research of dreams and, even more importantly, might open up a significant new testing ground for the research of lived human experience. (shrink)

Penrose proved that a computational or formalizable theory of the brainís cognitive functioning is impossible, but suggested that a physical non-computational and non-formalizable one may be viable. Arguments as to why Penroseís program is unrealizable are presented. The main argument is that a non-formalizable theory should be verbal. However, verbal paradoxes based on Cantorís diagonal processes show the impossibility of a consistent verbal theory of the brain comprising its arithmetical cognition. It is suggested that comprehensive theories of the human brain (...) and of physical experience are Kantian rather than Platonic ideas. This suggestion is likewise based on arguments related to diagonal processes. (shrink)

The increasing global demand for energy necessitates devoted attention to the formulation and exploration of mechanisms of thermal heat exchangers to explore and save heat energy. Thus, innovative thermal transport fluids require to boost thermal conductivity and heat flow features to upsurge convection heat rate, and nanofluids have been effectively employed as standard heat transfer fluids. With such intention, herein, we formulated and developed the constitutive flow laws by utilizing the Rossland diffusion approximation and Stephen’s law along with the MHD (...) effect. The mathematical formulation is based on boundary layer theory pioneered by Prandtl. Governing nonlinear partial differential flow equations are changed to ODEs via the implementation of the similarity variables. A well-known computational algorithm BVPh2 has been utilized for the solution of the nonlinear system of ODEs. The consequence of innumerable physical parameters on flow field, thermal distribution, and solutal field, such as magnetic field, Lewis number, velocity parameter, Prandtl number, drag force, Nusselt number, and Sherwood number, is plotted via graphs. Finally, numerical consequences are compared with the homotopic solution as a limiting case, and an exceptional agreement is found. (shrink)

Издание содержит: основные проблемы водо-, теплоснабжения, энергосбережения и экологии; строительные материалы, конструкции, механика грунта, основания и фундаменты, автомобильные дороги и др.

Young children help others in a range of situations, relatively indiscriminate of the characteristics of those they help. Recent results have suggested that young children’s helping behaviour extends even to humanoid robots. However, it has been unclear how characteristics of robots would influence children’s helping behaviour. Considering previous findings suggesting that certain robot features influence adults’ perception of and their behaviour towards robots, the question arises of whether young children’s behaviour and perception would follow the same principles. The current study (...) investigated whether two key characteristics of a humanoid robot (animate autonomy and friendly expressiveness) would affect children’s instrumental helping behaviour and their perception of the robot as an animate being. Eighty-two 3-year-old children participated in one of four experimental conditions manipulating a robot’s ostensible animate autonomy (high/low) and friendly expressiveness (friendly/neutral). Helping was assessed in an out-of-reach task and animacy ratings were assessed in a post-test interview. Results suggested that both children’s helping behaviour, as well as their perception of the robot as animate, were unaffected by the robot’s characteristics. The findings indicate that young children’s helping behaviour extends largely indiscriminately across two important characteristics. These results increase our understanding of the development of children’s altruistic behaviour and animate-inanimate distinctions. Our findings also raise important ethical questions for the field of child-robot interaction. (shrink)

Chemistry and biochemistry in Germany was notably affected by the dismissal and emigration of Jewish scientists. The expulsion of Jewish scientists aided to significantly reduce the international regard for German science, particularly in biochemistry, physical chemistry, and quantum chemistry, after 1945. In most cases remaining scientists adjusted quickly after 1933 to the new political circumstances, with a few exceptions. A number of them even actively supported the politics of National Socialism. This fact as well as the common stance to forget (...) the 12 years of National Socialist rule complicated the exchange of international scientific knowledge after 1945 and delayed affiliation of the weakened fields of research to the level of international research. (shrink)

In the most of existing cosmological investigations, the isotropic space–time models have been considered. In the present work, we focus on beyond this limitation and discuss the influence of anisotropy from thermodynamical perspective. The main goal of this study is to discuss the first and the generalized second laws of thermodynamics in an expanding anisotropic inhomogeneous model of the cosmos from the teleparallel gravity perspective, which is filled with the baryonic matter interacting with the dark energy and the cold dark (...) matter by assuming the cosmos as a thermodynamical system, which is bounded by a dynamical horizon. (shrink)