A diagnosis of dementia often comes with difficulties in understanding a conversational context and expressing how one feels. So far, research on how to facilitate advance care planning for people with dementia focused on defining relevant themes and topics for conversations, or on how to formalize decisions made by surrogate decision makers, e.g., family members. The aim of this review is to provide a better scope of the existing research on practical communication aspects related to dementia in ACP conversations. In (...) November 2020, seven databases were searched to select papers for inclusion. This search was updated in December 2021. The search strategy consisted of three tiers, intersected by using the Boolean term “AND,” and resulted in 787 studies. Two researchers followed explicit criteria for two sequential levels of screening, based on titles and abstracts and full papers. A total of 22 studies were included for data analysis. Seven topics emerged clustered around two themes. This scoping review provides practical suggestions for healthcare professionals to improve ACP communication and uncovered gaps in research on communication aspects related to dementia in ACP conversations, such as non-verbal behavior, timing and implementation, and personal preferences. (shrink)

An important contribution to the foundations of probability theory, statistics and statistical physics has been made by E. T. Jaynes. The recent publication of his collected works provides an appropriate opportunity to attempt an assessment of this contribution.

The pioneering work of Edwin T. Jaynes in the field of statistical physics, quantum optics, and probability theory has had a significant and lasting effect on the study of many physical problems, ranging from fundamental theoretical questions through to practical applications such as optical image restoration. Physics and Probability is a collection of papers in these areas by some of his many colleagues and former students, based largely on lectures given at a symposium celebrating Jaynes' contributions, on the occasion of (...) his seventieth birthday and retirement as Wayman Crow Professor of Physics at Washington University. The collection contains several authoritative overviews of current research on maximum entropy and quantum optics, where Jaynes' work has been particularly influential, as well as reports on a number of related topics. In the concluding paper, Jaynes looks back over his career, and gives encouragement and sound advice to young scientists. All those engaged in research on any of the topics discussed in these papers will find this a useful and fascinating collection, and a fitting tribute to an outstanding and innovative scientist. (shrink)

An important contribution to the foundations of probability theory, statistics and statistical physics has been made by E. T. Jaynes. The recent publication of his collected works provides an appropriate opportunity to attempt an assessment of this contribution.

Selected articles of Ēṭukūru Balarāmamūrti on Marxist philosophy; includes contributed on his life and work.

The last Latin colony in Italy named by Livy is Aquileia; but Velleius Paterculus in a well-known passage says that Luca received a colony in 177 B.C., and follows his usual practice of not stating whether it was of the Latin or of the citizen type. Livy does not know of a colony at Luca, but does mention a citizen colony planted at Luna in 177 b.c.

(1983). Orthodoxie religieuse et sciences humaines suivi de (religious) orthodoxy, rationality and scientific knowledge. History of European Ideas: Vol. 4, No. 3, pp. 346-348.

The function of Metaphysics is to furnish an intelligible and significant perspective. The tendency of recent speculation is to abstain from the attempt to give a total or absolute perspective of the world as a unit—there is some question as to whether we can think of the world as a whole—but rather to understand the objects about us, to bring values, formerly located in a transcendental realm, into life and conduct here and now, and to broaden our understanding and interests (...) to included related activities and other communities. To make our perspective within a single science intelligible it is necessary, as Professor Miller has demonstrated, to fill in the gaps between perceptual objects with inexperienceable “interphenomena” and to employ methodological concepts and principles derived by abstraction and inference. Then again, each of the special sciences selects certain aspects of the general perspective for intensive research leaving gaps between the sciences to be filled in by integrating concepts. Finally, values emerge at the various levels, and these need to be related to the conditions out of which they arise and to the fields of applied knowledge in which they function. (shrink)

It was Kronecker who sought to avoid the use in mathematics of all numbers other than the positive integers, and he outlined the means for carrying through this program. In the introductory sections of his memoir he briefly indicates the personal philosophy which made such a project appear desirable.

In the fifth book of Livy there is a passage of which hitherto no good explanation has been forthcoming: Romae interim multiplex seditio erat, cuius leniendae causa coloniam in Volscos, quo tria milia civium Romanorum scriberentur, deducendam censuerant; triumvirique ad id creati terna iugera et septunces viritim diviserant.

« Mais pourquoi diable les humains, sur leur petite planète bleue, s’intéressent-ils à ce point à moi, qui ne suis qu’un extraterrestre? » : telle est la question que pose un E. T. parmi tant d’autres, depuis l’espace intersidéral, à une autrice de science-fiction qui a transformé ce genre littéraire qu’est le space opéra et à un astrophysicien qui est aussi le président du plus grand festival de sciences et de science-fiction en France : les Utopiales à Nantes.

One of the most recent writers on the early history of Rome has shown that the framework of the traditional story is perhaps to be trusted, even though there are many details, inconsistent and self-contradictory, which are obviously to be rejected. In view of this fact, it might be worth while to reconsider the Coriolanus story, the prevailing opinion concerning which is that vouchsafed by Mommsen many years ago: ‘die Erzählung ist ein spät, in die Annalen eingefügtes, darum in alien (...) Stücken denselben ungleichartiges und widersprechendes Einschiebsel.’ The reasons for arriving at such an opinion are sufficiently obvious to warrant their receiving but the barest recital. First, it is incredible that the Volsci would either choose a renegade Roman to be their general, or, even if they did, allow him at the last minute to rob them of the fruits of victory. Secondly, inconsistencies in the version of the story which we possess induce us to suspect its historicity; for example, Dionysius of Syracuse is made to send corn to the starving Romans'—yet Dionysius lived some hundred years later; a youthful Coriolanus is represented as having considerable influence in the senate—yet in those early days the senate was essentially a gathering of venerable men; the Roman populace learns immediately the gist of Coriolanus' remarks in the senate—yet senate meetings were held in secret; Volsci are allowed to attend the ‘ludi’ and to meet at the Spring of Ferentina—yet in the fifth century none but Latini could do this; the Roman Marcius is given an honorific cognomen, Coriolanus, because of his behaviour at the capture of Corioli—yet such cognomina were not granted until the third century or even later and even then only to the general and not to the subordinate; the plebs is represented as wielding great power in the assembly1—yet we know that in the fifth century it did nothing of the kind. (shrink)