In the contemporary world, the safeguarding and transmission of cultural heritage have garnered increasing attention, emphasizing the need for comprehensive strategies to preserve such legacies. American vocal music, with its rich spiritual and cultural connotations, represents a critical element of this heritage. This paper explores the unique characteristics and historical significance of American singing styles, particularly focusing on how these forms embody broader philosophical and spiritual narratives. Employing digital technologies, this study not only seeks to preserve the authentic essence of (...) these musical expressions but also to enhance their accessibility and educational value. The implementation of digital tools has facilitated an extensive reach, with coverage of American vocal music’s historical context achieving a 95% rate. Updates are frequent, occurring approximately 85 times, ensuring the material remains relevant and engaging. The application of digital strategies has significantly impacted educational outcomes, with student feedback scoring between 9.2 and 9.5 on a scale of 10, and a 95% acceptance rate of digital content on American vocal music. These findings underscore the effectiveness of digital media in promoting and preserving musical heritage, thereby increasing awareness and appreciation among newer generations. More importantly, this approach allows for a deeper engagement with the philosophical and spiritual dimensions of American singing, ensuring that the transmission of this cultural form remains not only intact but vibrant and meaningful. Through the digital preservation and educational dissemination of American vocal music, this study contributes to the ongoing development of music education and the broader understanding of its cultural and spiritual impact. (shrink)

BACKGROUND: It can be argued that the ethical conduct of research involves achieving a balance between the rights and needs of three parties-potential research participants, society, and researchers. Local Research Ethics Committees (LRECs) have a number of roles and functions in the research enterprise, but there have been some indications that LREC members, researchers and the public can have different views about these responsibilities. Any such differences are potential sources of disagreement and misunderstanding. OBJECTIVES: To compare the views of LREC (...) members, researchers and the public towards the roles and functions of LRECs. DESIGN: A questionnaire that contained items concerned with a variety of such roles was distributed to general practice patients (as proxies for potential research participants), researchers and LREC members. FINDINGS: While general practice patients believed that the main function of LRECs is to ensure that research participants come to no harm, LREC members were more concerned with the protection of participants' rights. There was also some disagreement between members and researchers with regard to the consideration of proposals on the grounds of scientific merit. CONCLUSIONS: Local Research Ethics Committee members need to be aware of potential differences in views, that they ought to make their priorities clear, and that membership of LRECs ought to reflect the views of both researchers and potential research participants. (shrink)

This essay presents a critical review of recent literature on evil in medieval philosophy, as understood by thinkers from Anselm of Canterbury onward. "Evil" is taken to include not only serious, deliberate wrongdoing, but also everyday sins done from ignorance or passion. Special attention is paid to Aquinas's De Malo, Giles of Rome and the aftermath of the 1277 Condemnation, scholarly disputes about Scotus's teachings, and commentaries on the Nicomachean Ethics by Walter Burley, Gerald Odonis, and John Buridan.

This paper identifies the legal and policy framework relating to the use of aborted fetuses in stem cell research and therapies and contrasts this with the collection of embryos for research. It suggests that more attention should be given to questions about the kind of consent sought by researchers from women and that there should be more transparency about how aborted fetuses are used. It reports on variability in current practices of research ethics committees and researchers and uncertainty about the (...) guidance available to them. It argues that there is a need for wide public discussion about the policy issues relating to fetal tissue use in stem cell research and the need for clarification of the law in this area. (shrink)

Kirby and Paris have exhibited combinatorial algorithms whose computations always terminate, but for which termination is not provable in elementary arithmetic. However, termination of these computations can be proved by adding an axiom first introduced by Goodstein in 1944. Our purpose is to investigate this axiom of Goodstein, and some of its variants, and to show that these are potentially adequate to prove termination of computations of a wide class of algorithms. We prove that many variations of Goodstein's axiom are (...) equivalent, over elementary arithmetic, and contrast these results with those recently obtained for Kruskal's theorem. (shrink)

Background: Organizational climate refers to an individual's perception and experience of the climate of the work environment, and it is the most important environmental variable that affects individuals’ work performance. This study aims to classify characteristics of transformational leadership among kindergarten principals and examine their relationship to organizational climate. Methods: Convenience sampling yielded 498 kindergarten principals who completed the “Questionnaire on the Principal’s Transformational Leadership Behavior” and “Questionnaire on Organizational Climate.” Ethics approval was obtained from the Academic Ethics Committee of (...) the College of Psychology of Northeast Normal University prior to starting the study. Results: Three latent classes were identified, including the high-level (68.8%), care-virtues (35.7%), and virtues groups (5.3%). There were significant differences in support, directive, restrictive, colleague, intimate, and disengaged behavior scores between groups. In terms of support, colleague, and intimate behavior, the high-level group had the highest scores, followed by the care-virtues group and virtues group, respectively. Regarding restrictive and disengaged behavior, the highest scores were received by the virtues group, followed by the care-virtues and high-level group, respectively. Conclusion: The study suggested that principals’ transformational leadership could be classified into three latent classes that are related to organizational climate. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that the pessimistic reading of Horkheimer and Adorno’s Dialectic of Enlightenment, which suggests reason is ensconced within the domination of myth, misses a key component of the authors' argument. Specifically, it misses the possibility that the liberation from the heteronomy of myth might occur via a critique of myth. Using Owen Hulatt’s reinterpretation of Adorno’s account of the tension between mimesis and self-preservation as a point of orientation, I show that while myth for Horkheimer and (...) Adorno is synonymous with a heteronomous form of life, they simultaneously recognize it as an incomplete but largely untapped mediator of the history of human experience (via language), and thus a promising source of rational self-knowledge. Specifically, myth can illuminate fragments of both the contingent factors that led to human sociality becoming entwined with domination, while also offering momentary reflections of the kinds of life that were relinquished in the drive for instrumentalised survival. I propose that for Horkheimer and Adorno it is myth’s linguistic mediation between a community of speakers and their (often violent and ambiguous) pasts that is unique. It is thus myth’s capacity to offer a meditation on those other possibilities of human existence that presents a renewed chance of enlightenment. (shrink)

Mild hypoferremia represents an aspect of the ability of the body to withhold iron from pathogenic bacteria, fungi, and protozoa, and from neoplastic cells. However, our iron-withholding defense system can be thwarted by practices that enhance iron overload such as indiscriminate iron fortification of foods, medically prescribed iron supplements, alcohol ingestion, and cigarette smoking. Elevated standards for normal levels of iron can be misleading and even dangerous for individuals faced with medical insults such as chronic infection, neoplasia, cardiomyopathy, and arthritis. (...) We are becoming increasingly aware that the wide-spread hypoferremia in human populations is a physiological response to insult rather than a pathological cause of insult, and that attempts to correct the condition by simply raising iron levels may not only be misguided but may actually impair host defense. (shrink)

Contemporary philosophers who are concerned with the following three philosophical issues can learn much from Scotus: (1) the defense of agent-causal accounts of the will; (2) the search for common ground between ancient and Kantian ethics: and (3) the co-existence of free will and the capacity for sin in heaven.1) Free Will and Agent Causation: According to Scotus, the will moves itself to act, but does not cause itself. Human actions are done for reasons determinedby the agent; they are not (...) reducible to events (which are themselves necessitated by prior events).2) Reconciling Ancient and Kantian Ethics: Like Kant, Scotus thinks that creatures cannot be morally responsible for their actions if happiness is their solemotivation for choosing whatever they choose; Scotus distinguishes between motivations and ends, although less sharply than Kant does. For Scotus, thedesire for happiness includes the desire for self-perfection; thus happiness for Scotus is never reducible to hedonism, nor is happiness our sole motivation.Our freedom lies in the will’s ability to love good things according to the value they have in themselves, not according to the value that they have for us.3) Is Heaven a Problem? A familiar explanation of the problem of evil is that evil is permitted because free will is required for moral goodness; without free willthere would be no moral evil, but neither would there be any moral goodness, so the world is better than it would be if God had chosen not to create freecreatures. But if free will is such a great good, then we must retain the capacity to sin in heaven, or else heavenly existence is inferior to earthly existence.And, if we do retain the capacity to sin in heaven, then heaven is not essentially devoid of evil. Scotus would respond to this problem by stating that love, notfreedom, is the greatest good. Thus, his account of heaven is consistent with what it means to love God above all, for his own sake, and without the motivationof happiness or any other benefit. (shrink)

In this paper I discuss Hans Blumenberg’s The Rigorism of Truth, a short polemic that criticizes Freud and Hannah Arendt for placing a misplaced faith in the liberatory potential of rational truth in moments of historical disaster. The secondary literature suggests that this piece exhibits either all the signs of a late, Romantic capitulation to the ‘need’ for myth, or Blumenberg’s failure to recognize his own faith and debts to the ‘mythology’ of reason’s emancipatory hopes. My argument hinges on the (...) claim that these readings put undue emphasis on the philosophical anthropology component of Blumenberg’s work. Instead, I offer a new reading of the essay, in keeping with an alternative reading of his theory of myth. The essay transforms, then, from a polemic regarding the need for myth, into a nuanced description of the ways in which we can overestimate our capacity to overcome it. (shrink)

We show that there is a first order sentence φ(x; a, b, l) such that for every computable partial order.

A quantum measurement-like event can produce any of a number of macroscopically distinct results, with corresponding macroscopically distinct gravitational fields, from the same initial state. Hence the probabilistically evolving large-scale structure of space-time is not precisely or even always approximately described by the deterministic Einstein equations.Since the standard treatment of gravitational wave propagation assumes the validity of the Einstein equations, it is questionable whether we should expect all its predictions to be empirically verified. In particular, one might expect the stochasticity (...) of amplified quantum indeterminacy to cause coherent gravitational wave signals to decay faster than standard predictions suggest. This need not imply that the radiated energy flux from gravitational wave sources differs from standard theoretical predictions. An underappreciated bonus of gravitational wave astronomy is that either detecting or failing to detect predicted gravitational wave signals would constrain the form of the semi-classical theory of gravity that we presently lack. (shrink)

本书汇集了各种报告或讲座中具有代表性的一部分,旨在创设一种民主自由的学术氛围,使各种观点、理论相互切磋、撞击,让读者置身于一个清美高洁,又五彩斑斓的学术百花园。.

The series MISCELLANEA MEDIAEVALIA was founded by Paul Wilpert in 1962 and since then has presented research from the Thomas Institute of the University of Cologne. The cornerstone of the series is provided by the proceedings of the biennial Cologne Medieval Studies Conferences, which were established over 50 years ago by Josef Koch, the founding director of the Institute. The interdisciplinary nature of these conferences is reflected in the proceedings. The MISCELLANEA MEDIAEVALIA gather together papers from all disciplines represented in (...) Medieval Studies - medieval history, philosophy, theology, together with art and literature, all contribute to an overall perspective of the Middle Ages. (shrink)

This volume collects essays which are thematically connected through the work of Kent Emery Jr., to whom the volume is dedicated. A main focus lies on the attempts to bridge the gap between mysticism and a systematic approach to medieval philosophical thought.

I offer an interpretation and a partial defense of Kit Fine's ‘Argument from Passage’, which is situated within his reconstruction of McTaggart's paradox. Fine argues that existing A-theoretic approaches to passage are no more dynamic, i.e. capture passage no better, than the B-theory. I argue that this comparative claim is correct. Our intuitive picture of passage, which inclines us towards A-theories, suggests more than coherent A-theories can deliver. In Finean terms, the picture requires not only Realism about tensed facts, but (...) also Neutrality, i.e. the tensed facts not being ‘oriented towards’ one privileged time. However unlike Fine, and unlike others who advance McTaggartian arguments, I take McTaggart's paradox to indicate neither the need for a more dynamic theory of passage nor that time does not pass. A more dynamic theory is not to be had: Fine's ‘non-standard realism’ amounts to no more than a conceptual gesture. But instead of concluding that time does not pass, we should conclude that theories of passage cannot deliver the dynamicity of our intuitive picture. For this reason, a B-theoretic account of passage that simply identifies passage with the succession of times is a serious contender. (shrink)