Systematic experiments to establish the spatial distribution of physiologically effective stimuli,of unidentified nature

Summary Many persons react to a kind of external agent by unconscious muscular reactions if they move across a place where this agent is supposed to be particularly active. Such places normally coincide with geological discontinuities, such as water veins, mineral ores. Practitioners of this art of detecting claim that the reaction patterns on different levels above ground are identical as vertical projections of the source pattern, this without perceptible attenuation. In some cases the supposed source was believed to have been found up to several hundred meters below ground surface. The statement of perpendicular propagation, which is the subject of this paper, is of prime importance for an approach towards understanding and all kinds of prospecting.Acknowledgments. The author expresses his gratitude to Hoffmann-La Roche for support of the project, particularly to Prof. Dr. A. Pletscher, to the operators Dr P. Treadwell (TR) and Mr Rupp (RU) for their indefatigable participation, and to the operator M. Aeberli (AE) as well as to all persons who contributed to this investigation.     

Dissecting weak discernibility of quanta

In this paper I critically examine latest attempts to formalize quantum-mechanical relations that are supposed to weakly discern elementary particles. I argue that all of them make illegitimate and unavoidable reference to numerical identity, and therefore cannot be used as a means to ground (or derive) quantitative facts of identity/distinctness in the qualitative characteristics of quantum systems. I compare my criticism of weak discernibility with the general circularity objection known from the literature, and I show that my argument is more specific, as it is based on a particular criterion which differentiates between legitimate and illegitimate uses of identity. In the end I suggest that we should reevaluate the role of permutation invariance in expressing the facts of qualitative differences between particles. Taking into account the inevitable symmetrization requirement applied to operators in tensor product spaces, it may be claimed that particles of the same type can be absolutely discerned in some accessible states.     

Measurements,disturbances and the quantum three box paradox

A quantum pre- and post-selection paradox involves making measurements at two separate times on a quantum system, and making inferences about the state of the system at an intermediate time, conditional upon the observed outcomes. The inferences lead to predictions about the results of measurements performed at the intermediate time, which have been well confirmed experimentally, but which nevertheless seem paradoxical when inferences about different intermediate measurements are combined. The three box paradox is the paradigm example of such an effect, where a ball is placed in one of three boxes and is shuffled between the boxes in between two measurements of its location. By conditionalising on the outcomes of those measurements, it is inferred that between the two measurements the ball would have been found with certainty in Box 1 and with certainty in Box 2, if either box been opened on their own. Despite experimental confirmation of the predictions, and much discussion, it has remained unclear what exactly is supposed to be paradoxical or what specifically is supposed to be quantum, about these effects. In this paper I identify precisely the conditions under which the quantum three box paradox occurs, and show that these conditions are the same as arise in the derivation of the Leggett–Garg Inequality, which is supposed to demonstrate the incompatibility of quantum theory with macroscopic realism. I will argue that, as in Leggett–Garg Inequality violations, the source of the effect actually lies in the disturbance introduced by the intermediate measurement, and that the quantum nature of the effect is that no classical model of measurement disturbance can reproduce the paradox.     

The problem of grounding natural modality in Kant's account of empirical laws of nature

One of the central problems of Kant's account of the empirical laws of nature is: What grounds their necessity? In this article I discuss the three most important lines of interpretation and suggest a novel version of one of them. While the first interpretation takes the transcendental principles as the only sources of the empirical laws' necessity, the second interpretation takes the systematicity of the laws to guarantee their necessity. It is shown that both views involve serious problems. The third interpretation, the “causal powers interpretation”, locates the source of the laws' necessity in the properties of natural objects. Although the second and third interpretations seem incompatible, I analyse why Kant held both views and I argue that they can be reconciled, because the metaphysical grounding project of the laws' necessity is accounted for by Kant's causal powers account, while his best system account explains our epistemic access to the empirical laws. If, however, causal powers are supposed to fulfil the grounding function for the laws' natural modality, then I suggest that a novel reading of the causal powers interpretation should be formulated along the lines of a genuine dispositionalist conception of the laws of nature.     

Remote viewing

Summary Remote viewing is the supposed faculty which enables a percipient, sited in a closed room, to describe the perceptions of a remote agent visiting an unknown target site. To provide convincing demonstration of such a faculty poses a range of experimental and practical problems, especially if feedback to the percipient is allowed after each trial. The precautions needed are elaborate and troublesome; many potential loopholes have to be plugged and there will be strong temptations to relax standards, requiring exceptional discipline and dedication by the experimenters. Most reports of remote viewing experiments are rather superficial and do not permit assessment of the experimental procedures with confidence; in many cases there is clear evidence of particular loopholes left unclosed. Any serious appraisal of the evidence would have to go beyond the reports. Meanwhile the published evidence is far from compelling, and certainly insufficient to justify overthrow of well-established scientific principles.     

Remote viewing

Remote viewing is the supposed faculty which enables a percipient, sited in a closed room, to describe the perceptions of a remote agent visiting an unknown target site. To provide convincing demonstration of such a faculty poses a range of experimental and practical problems, especially if feedback to the percipient is allowed after each trial. The precautions needed are elaborate and troublesome; many potential loopholes have to be plugged and there will be strong temptations to relax standards, requiring exceptional discipline and dedication by the experimenters. Most reports of remote viewing experiments are rather superficial and do not permit assessment of the experimental procedures with confidence; in many cases there is clear evidence of particular loopholes left unclosed. Any serious appraisal of the evidence would have to go beyond the reports. Meanwhile the published evidence is far from compelling, and certainly insufficient to justify overthrow of well-established scientific principles.     

Gravity’s cause and substance counting: contextualizing the problems

This paper considers Newton’s position on gravity’s cause, both conceptually and historically. With respect to the historical question, I argue that while Newton entertained various hypotheses about gravity’s cause, he never endorsed any of them, and in particular, his lack of confidence in the hypothesis of robust and unmediated distant action by matter is explained by an inclination toward certain metaphysical principles. The conceptual problem about gravity’s cause, which I identified earlier along with a deeper problem about individuating substances, is that a decisive conclusion is impossible unless certain speculative aspects of his empiricism are abandoned. In this paper, I situate those conceptual problems in Newton’s natural philosophy. They arise from ideas that push empiricism to potentially self-defeating limits, revealing the danger of allowing immaterial spirits any place in natural philosophy, especially spatially extended spirits supposed capable of co-occupying place with material bodies. Yet because their source ideas are speculative, Newton’s method ensures that these problems pose no threat to his rational mechanics or the profitable core of his empiricism. They are easily avoided by avoiding their source ideas, and when science emerges from natural philosophy, it does so with an ontology unencumbered by immaterial spirits.     

基于任务的多Agent系统Rough集模型

本文在Rough集框架内建立基于任务的多Agent系统（MAS）形式模型,讨论了任务求解的条件和任务的协同度。在求解基于任务极小MAS的基础上,对Agent进行了基本分类,为Agent的角色划定和责任分配提供依据,同时研究了成员Agent的重要度。     

基于磁性微泡对比剂的超声和磁共振影像融合算法

文中提出了一种新的基于磁性微泡对比剂的超声影像和磁共振影像之间的融合算法．首先利用磁性微泡对比剂对体模进行超声和磁共振显影,并对显影进行边缘分割．运用非采样contourlet变换（nonsubsampled contourlet transform．NSCT）对源图像进行分解,然后对低频子带系数采用自适应动态加权非负矩阵分解（dynamic weighted non-negative matrix factorization．DWNMF）结合分割图像进行融合．然后对各带通方向子带系数采用空间频率激励的脉冲耦合神经网络进行融合,最后利用NSCT逆变换得到融合图像．研究结果表明,利用磁性微泡对比剂并结合上述算法对超声影像和磁共振影像进行融合,可以获得预期的融合效果．     

The quantitative content of statistical mechanics

I give a brief account of the way in which thermodynamics and statistical mechanics actually work as contemporary scientific theories, and in particular of what statistical mechanics contributes to thermodynamics over and above any supposed underpinning of the latter׳s general principles. In doing so, I attempt to illustrate that statistical mechanics should not be thought of wholly or even primarily as itself a foundational project for thermodynamics, and that conceiving of it this way potentially distorts the foundational study of statistical mechanics itself.     

Topische Bestimmung des zerebralen Angriffs von Reserpin (Serpasil)

Summary The impact of Reserpine (Serpasil) has been investigated by stimulating different parts of the rabbit's brain (Cortex, Diencephalon, Rhinencephalon,Subst. reticularis). Simultaneously the spontaneous brain activity and the electrically induced discharge have been recorded and studied in the cortex, the thalamus (Nucl. dors. med. andlat.), the rhinencephalon and theSubst. reticularis of the brain stem.Reserpine has a depressing influence on the diencephalo-cortical system. It raises the threshold of the afterdischarge induced by stimulation of the cortex and of the thalamus.Nevertheless the drug induces no electrographic sleep pattern. It maintains a steady electric pattern of alertness and increases the electrical ground activity of the rhinencephalon.Reserpine also depresses the spikes induced in the cortex and in the thalamus by stimulation of the pontobulbar reticular system. This effect is supposed to be due to a pharmacological action located at the thalamocortical level rather than in the bulbar segment of the arousal system.     

Modelling and representing: An artefactual approach to model-based representation

The recent discussion on scientific representation has focused on models and their relationship to the real world. It has been assumed that models give us knowledge because they represent their supposed real target systems. However, here agreement among philosophers of science has tended to end as they have presented widely different views on how representation should be understood. I will argue that the traditional representational approach is too limiting as regards the epistemic value of modelling given the focus on the relationship between a single model and its supposed target system, and the neglect of the actual representational means with which scientists construct models. I therefore suggest an alternative account of models as epistemic tools. This amounts to regarding them as concrete artefacts that are built by specific representational means and are constrained by their design in such a way that they facilitate the study of certain scientific questions, and learning from them by means of construction and manipulation.     

Embodied cognition and linguistic comprehension

Traditionally, the language faculty was supposed to be a device that maps linguistic inputs to semantic or conceptual representations. These representations themselves were supposed to be distinct from the representations manipulated by the hearer’s perceptual and motor systems. Recently this view of language has been challenged by advocates of embodied cognition. Drawing on empirical studies of linguistic comprehension, they have proposed that the language faculty reuses the very representations and processes deployed in perceiving and acting. I review some of the evidence and arguments in favor of the embodied view of language comprehension, and argue that none of it is conclusive. Moreover, the embodied view itself blurs two important distinctions: first, the distinction between linguistic comprehension and its typical consequences; and second, the distinction between representational content and vehicles. Given that these distinctions are well-motivated, we have good reason to reject the embodied view of linguistic understanding.     

Why the ultimate argument for scientific realism ultimately fails

In this paper, I argue that the ultimate argument for Scientific Realism, also known as the No-Miracles Argument (NMA), ultimately fails as an abductive defence of Epistemic Scientific Realism (ESR), where (ESR) is the thesis that successful theories of mature sciences are approximately true. The NMA is supposed to be an Inference to the Best Explanation (IBE) that purports to explain the success of science. However, the explanation offered as the best explanation for success, namely (ESR), fails to yield independently testable predictions that alternative explanations for success do not yield. If this is correct, then there seems to be no good reason to prefer (ESR) over alternative explanations for success.     

Why history matters to philosophy of physics

Naturalized metaphysics remains the default presupposition of much contemporary philosophy of physics. As metaphysics is supposed to concern the general structure of reality, so scientific naturalism draws upon our best physical theories to attempt to answer the foundational question “par excellence ” viz., “how could the world possibly be the way this theory says it is?” A particular case study, Hilbert's attempt to analyze and explain a seeming “pre-established harmony” between mind and nature, is offered as a salutary reminder that naturalism's ready inference from physical theory to ontology may be too quick.     

便携式发电机整流稳压电源设计

针对便携式发电机的特殊要求,给出了一种能够满足宽压和宽频输入的整流电源的设计方案。为了使系统获得良好的稳态和动态性能,在系统中加入了反馈控制和前馈控制相结合的复合控制。实验证明,该系统不仅能够适应宽压和宽频输入,而且在输入电压和频率大幅度变化时仍能稳定可靠地工作。     

International Scientific Cooperation During the 1930s. Bruno Rossi and the Development of the Status of Cosmic Rays into a Branch of Physics

During the 1920s and 1930s, Italian physicists established strong relationships with scientists from other European countries and the United States. The career of Bruno Rossi, a leading personality in the study of cosmic rays and an Italian pioneer of this field of research, provides a prominent example of this kind of international cooperation. Physics underwent major changes during these turbulent years, and the traditional internationalism of physics assumed a more institutionalized character. Against this backdrop, Rossi's early work was crucial in transforming the study of cosmic rays into a branch of modern physics. His friendly relationships with eminent scientists — notably Enrico Fermi, Walther Bothe, Werner Heisenberg, Hans Bethe, and Homi Bhabha — were instrumental both for the exchange of knowledge about experimental practices and theoretical discussions, and for attracting the attention of physicists such as Arthur Compton, Louis Leprince-Ringuet, Pierre Auger and Patrick Blackett to the problem of cosmic rays. Relying on material from different archives in Europe and the United States, this case study aims to provide a glimpse of the intersection between national and international dimensions during the 1930s, at a time when the study of cosmic rays was still very much in its infancy, strongly interlaced with nuclear physics, and full of uncertain, contradictory, and puzzling results. Nevertheless, as a source of high-energy particles it became a proving ground for testing the validity of the laws of quantum electrodynamics, and made a fundamental contribution to the origins of particle physics.     

电子束焊机高压电源控制方法的研究

介绍了电子束焊机用的全桥逆变式高压电源的工作原理,设计了电压反馈式的PWM脉冲产生及控制电路,根据电子束焊机的特点设计了高压电源的保护电路。最后,通过实验验证了设计的可行性。     

Depressor effects of muscarinic and non-muscarinic mediation induced by lateral hypothalamic stimulation in the cat

Transient sympathetically-mediated depressor effects were induced by stimulation of a small locus in the lateral hypothalamic peri-fornical region, medial to the fields of Forel. The ganglionic blocking agent, atropine methyl nitrate (ATMN), was used to show that muscarinic as well as non-muscarinic sympathetic ganglion receptor neurotransmission was involved. Evidence is presented that stimulation of this LH site co-activates a number of mechanisms and that depending on which of these are activated, the ganglionic blocking agent ATMN may either block, reverse or potentiate the depressor effect.     

Depressor effects of muscarinic and non-muscarinic mediation induced by lateral hypothalamic stimulation in the rat

Summary Transient sympathetically-mediated depressor effects were induced by stimulation of a small locus in the lateral hypothalamic peri-fornical region, medial to the fields of Forel. The ganglionic blocking agent, atropine methyl nitrate (ATMN), was used to show that muscarinic as well as non-muscarinic sympathetic ganglion receptor neurotransmission was involved. Evidence is presented that stimulation of this LH site co-activates a number of mechanisms and that depending on which of these are activated, the ganglionic blocking agent ATMN may either block, reverse or potentiate the depressor effect.