Kitāb al-ʻibar. Muqaddimah by Ibn Khaldūn, 1332-1406; criticism and interpretation.

Many apparently complex mechanisms in biology, especially in embryology and molecular biology, can be explained easily by reasoning at the level of the “efficient cause” of the observed phenomenology: the mechanism can then be explained by a simple geometrical argument or a variational principle, leading to the solution of an optimization problem, for example, via the co-existence of a minimization and a maximization problem . Passing from a microscopic level to the macroscopic level often involves an averaging effect that gives (...) birth to a global functional feature . We will illustrate these general principles by building in four different domains of application “a minima” models and showing the main properties of their solutions: extraction of a minimal RNA structure functioning as the first “peptidic machine,” a kind of ancestral ribosome; study of a genetic regulatory network of Drosophila centred on Engrailed gene and expressing successively two genes inside a limit cycle; study of a genetic network regulating neural activity and proliferation in mammals; and study of a simple geometric model of epiboly in zebrafish. (shrink)

Sir Thomas Smith was a humanist scholar, colonialist and diplomat, and also held a prominent position in the court of Queen Elizabeth. First published in 1906, this book contains the original 1583 text of De republica Anglorum, Smith's pioneering study of the English social, judicial and political systems. The work was written from 1562 to 1565, when Smith was Elizabeth's ambassador to France. This edition contains an editorial introduction and appendices, including information on manuscripts and versions of the text after (...) 1583. It will be of value to anyone with an interest in Smith's writings and the nature of Elizabethan government. (shrink)

In The Souls of Black Folk, W.E.B. Du Bois introduces double consciousness as a result of racial prejudice and oppression. Explained as a state of confliction felt by black Americans, Du Bois presents double consciousness as integral to understanding the black experience. Later philosophers question the importance of double consciousness to current race discussions, but this paper contends that double consciousness provides valuable insights into black and white relations. To do this, I will utilize the modern slang term, “Oreo,” to (...) highlight how a perceived incompatibility between blacks and whites could prevent America from achieving a greater unity. (shrink)

On this episode of The Owl, Lauren Ware sits down with host Ian Olasov to talk about how fear and other emotions shape our understanding of risk, about what fear is and when it's rational, and about why Halloween is a thing.

In C.Q. xliii , p. 39, Mr. J. H. Quincey quotes the opening lines of Catalepton 5 as, Ite hinc,-inanes, ite, rhetorum ampullae, inflata rhoso* non Achaico verba, and adds, ‘the second line is corrupt and no satisfactory emendation has been proposed’. The MS. readings are: rhorso B, roso Mu, om. in lacuna Ar. In face of these voces nihili many have fallen back on the rore of the Aldine edition of 1517. But this does not really help, for one (...) does not inflate with dew: orators are not dew-bags, but wind-bags. It occurred to me some years ago that what is needed is some word meaning breath or wind to go with inflata, and that in view of the rh in rhorso it was probably a Greek word which a scribe had failed to recognize. I conjectured οζ, and found subsequently that this had been proposed by K. Münscher in Hermes, xlvii , pp. 153–4. οȋζος used of any rushing sound, is applied to speech by Philostratus , and by Pollux . It is easy to see how rhoezo could degenerate into rhoeso-rhoso-roso. (shrink)

Editor's Note: Over a long period of time, the evil bourgeois reactionary line has created antagonism between two groups of students in schools—antagonism on the basis of one's family background. This antagonism became very obvious during the initial stage of the Cultural Revolution, and has lasted to this day. It has prevented further criticism of the bourgeois reactionary line and hindered further development of the Cultural Revolution.

Conference held June 1990 under the auspices of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

In his recent book, Reasons and Persons, Derek Parfit propounds a version of the psychological criterion of personal identity.1 According to the variant he adopts, the numerical identity through time of persons consists in non-branching psychological continuity no matter how it is caused. One traditional objection to a view of this sort is that it is circular, since psychological continuity presupposes personal identity. Although Parfit frequently denies the importance of personal identity, he considers his own psychological account of identity important (...) enough to attempt to defend it against the charge of circularity. The aim of this paper is to argue that Parfit's attempted defence is unsuccessful because it ultimately rests on an analysis of the unity of consciousness that is itself either circular or otherwise inadequate. (shrink)

A weak form of intuitionistic set theory WST lacking the axiom of extensionality is introduced. While WST is too weak to support the derivation of the law of excluded middle from the axiom of choice, we show that beefing up WST with moderate extensionality principles or quotient sets enables the derivation to go through.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and (...) made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

Mental illness may be manifested in the impairment of understanding or of volitional control. Impairment of understanding may be manifested in delusions. Impairment of volitional control is shown when a person is unable to act in accordance with good reasons that he himself accepts. In order for an impairment of understanding or of self-control to exculpate, the offence must be causally connected with the impairment in question. The rationale of exculpation in general, which applies also to the case of mental (...) illness, is that the offence does not indicate a morally bad attitude in the offender. A consequence of this rationale is that Kenny is wrong to hold that no injustice would result from the elimination of the legal defence of diminished responsibility. (shrink)

How are social relations appearing in computers? How are social relations realised in a different kind of medium, in the hardware and software of computers? How are the organising principles of computer building related to those of the life-worlds in a social system? Following a partly social constructivist and partly hermeneutic line a more general answer will be presented. The basic conclusion of this approach is simple: computers are constructed under the influence of the ideas of modernity and represent its (...) structure, interests and values, in contrast to computer networks, which embody the ideas of postmodernity. (shrink)

Theoretical basis of the article is the interpretation of the lexis as a system, conditioned by the natural unity of the linguistic and extra-linguistic factors. But the main factor that influences the lexical system still is the relations of the reality itself, ordered in this language system. The article discusses the need to create a body of new thesaurus dictionaries of integrated type. The novelty of the problem is based on the achievements of modern linguistics in the study of lexis, (...) as well as the dynamics and variability of modern life when the whole layers of lexical units becoming ''obsolete'' (for example, in sections ''Man'', ''Society'') and quite a significant part of the lexical units on the contrary is updating. The paper defines the principles and forms of creating new generation of the dictionaries of the Russian language. The article concept may be of interest to foreign professionals engaged in lexicography. (shrink)