bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Childhood Disorders
Authors: Cohen Bruce J
Published: November 2023

Evaluating children is inherently more difficult than evaluating adults since children often cannot fully examine their feelings and therefore are more prone to “demonstrate” psychiatric disturbances through problematic behavior. In assessing children, clinicians often must “work backwards,” inferring the presence of a clinical disorder on the basis of these behaviors. Often, clinicians must assemble data from multiple sources, supplementing history provided by the child with descriptions of the child’s behavior in other settings provided by parents and teachers. Ancillary studies such as intelligence testing, educational testing, and projective testing often play more important roles in child psychiatry than in adult psychiatry. Sometimes children only express how they are feeling indirectly, through their drawings or their free play. Clinicians therefore have to be able and willing to engage children by using language and behavior that is appropriate for their particular developmental level. Most of the adult psychiatric disorders can present during childhood, including the mood disorders, anxiety disorders, and schizophrenia. However, their phenomenology may differ in children since children aren’t simply “little adults.” For example, until recently, clinicians believed that neither major depressive disordernor bipolar disorder presented before adolescence. However, a variety of case series and prospective studies has demonstrated that these disorders do in fact occur during childhood and that they often respond to the same treatments employed in adults. In contrast, there are other disorders that almost exclusively first present during infancy, childhood, or adolescence. These disorders include mental retardation, learning disorders, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, conduct disorder, and autism.
Must god’s commands conform to moral standards?
Authors: Rachels James
Published: November 2023

In both the Jewish and Christian traditions, God is presented as a lawgiver who has created us, and the world we live in, for a purpose. That purpose is not completely understood, but much has been revealed through the prophets, the Holy Scriptures, and the church. These sources teach that, to guide us in righteous living, God has promulgated rules that we are to obey. He does not compel us to obey them. We were created as free agents, so we may choose to accept or to reject his commandments. But if we are to live as we should live, we must follow God’s laws. This, it is said, is the essence of morality. This line of thought has been elaborated by some theologians into a theory about the nature of right and wrong, known as the Divine Command Theory. Essentially, this theory says that “morally right” means “commanded by God,” and “morally wrong” means “forbidden by God.”From a theoretical point of view, this conception has a number of pleasing features. It immediately solves the old problem about the subjectivity/ objectivity of ethics. According to this theory, ethics is not merely a matter of personal feelings or social custom.
Is god omnipotent?
Authors: Geach Peter
Published: November 2023

It is fortunate for my purposes that English has the two words “almighty” and “omnipotent,” and that apart from any stipulation by me the words have rather different associations and suggestions. “Almighty” is the familiar word that comes in the creeds of the Church; “omnipotent” is at home rather in formal theological discussions and controversies, e.g., about miracles and about the problem of evil. . . . I shall use the word “almighty” to express God’s power over all things, and I shall take “omnipotence” to mean ability to do everything. I think we can in a measure understand what God’s almightiness implies, and I shall argue that almightiness so understood must be ascribed to God if we are to retain anything like Christian belief in God. The position as regards omnipotence, or as regards the statement “God can do everything,” seems to me to be very different. Of course even “God can do everything” may be understood simply as a way of magnifying God by contrast with the impotence of man. . . . I have no objection to such ways of speaking if they merely express a desire to give the best honour we can to God our Maker, whose Name only is excellent and whose praise is above heaven and earth.
Is God Obliged To Make Us Happy?
Authors: Schlesinger George N
Published: November 2023

The world is full of suffering. God is either helpless to prevent it, in which case He is not all-powerful, or does not choose to prevent it, in which case He is not all-good. For generations this has been regarded as the most effective argument against the belief that an omnipotent and omnibenevolent being exists. Naturally, theists have tried their hardest to come up with an adequate reply. Among the numerous suggestions as to how to meet the atheistic challenge we find some that contain important religious ideas yet, unfortunately, do not mitigate the problem. Many of us have heard it said that (1) we must not take for granted all the joy and moral beauty in the world, which by far outstrips the amount of existing pain and moral ugliness; or that (2) all suffering ultimately brings about a greater good and hence is not to be regarded as evil. There is wisdom in these sayings, but they are irrelevant to the problem of evil. Multiply or divide the amount of pain in the world by a billion, and its incompatibility with divine goodness and omnipotence is not affected.
Why Does God Hide His Existence?
Authors: Murray Michael J
Published: November 2023

The sentiments expressed by Job in the above epigram are ones that have been expressed by the sophisticated atheist as well as the typical church-goer. Most of us, in fact, have wondered at one time or another why it is that God does not reveal Himself in some dramatic fashion if He actually exists. Yet, while this question is widely entertained, it has received surprisingly little attention in the philosophical literature. In addition to puzzling many theists, the fact of divine hiddenness has prompted some non-theists to challenge the theists to provide some explanation for God’s apparent silence. The problem they have raised can be roughly stated as follows: If, as most theists claim, belief in God is essential to ultimate human fulfillment, one would expect that God would provide us with unambiguous evidence for His existence. However, such evidence is not forthcoming. Therefore, it is unlikely that the theist’s God exists.
Is God Vain?
Authors: Talieferro Charles
Published: November 2023

An objection to theism which has received scant attention in the literature may be called the problem of divine vanity. It may be argued that Christian theism exults in a view of God as vain, egoistic, pompous. The problems of vanity arises in three general (broad) areas, creation, worship, and redemption. With respect to creation, God’s bringing into existence creatures in His likeness is akin to bringing into being selfportraits, which is hardly a humble undertaking. God appears to be a super Narcissus who delights in His own reflection. Worship seems inescapably egoistic. God has not only created images of Himself, but expects these images to worship Him, to recount many of His greatest deeds, to be abased before the Divine glory and adore Him. We are even commanded to worship none other than God. Similarly, in salvation history God insists upon being at the center stage. Creaturely moral failure is offensive to the Creator. But instead of creatures succeeding in effecting reconciliation, God Himself does so. God may have taken on human flesh to bring about redemption, but it is still God qua divine and human ego who is the principal saving agent. God wants to be the talk of the town.
Does God Suffer?
Authors: Wolterstodf Nicholas
Published: November 2023

My heart grew sombre with grief, and wherever I looked I saw only death. My own country became a torment and my own home a grotesque abode of misery. All that we had done together was now a grim ordeal without him. My eyes searched everywhere for him, but he was not there to be seen. I hated all the places we had known together, because he was not in them and they could no longer whisper to me, ‘Here he comes!’ as they would have done had he been alive but absent for a while. . . . My soul was a burden, bruised and bleeding. It was tired of the man who carried it, but I found no place to set it down to rest. (Augustine, Confessions IV, 4; IV, 7)1 It is in passages such as this, where he exposes to full view the grief which overwhelmed him upon the death of his dear friend from Tagaste, that Augustine is at his most appealing to us. . . . We are attracted both by the intensity of his love and grief, and by his willingness to expose that grief to his friends and the readers of his Confessions. To any who may have experienced torments similar to those Augustine here describes, the passage also has the mysteriously balming quality of expressing with delicate precision the grief they themselves have felt. All
Does God Change?
Authors: Hasker William
Published: November 2023

The claim that God is timelessly eternal, until recently a majority view among orthodox Christian theists, has suffered massive defections in recent years. Still, the doctrine of divine timelessness continues to enjoy acceptance among philosophers . . .and it may retain even more of its popularity among theologians. So it may be worthwhile to state briefly the reasons for preferring the view that God is temporal-that he lives and interacts with us through the changes of time. First of all, it is clear that the doctrine of divine timelessness is not taught in the Bible and does not reflect the way the biblical writers understood God. In spite of appeals by defenders of the doctrine to texts such as Exodus 3:14, John 8:58 and Peter 3:8, there simply is no trace in the Scripture of the elaborate metaphysical and conceptual apparatus that is required to make sense of divine timelessness.2 On the positive side, the biblical writers undeniably do present God as living, acting and reacting in time, as Nicholas Wolterstorff has powerfully argued. In the face of this, the defender of timelessness has to say either that the scriptural texts do not mean what they seem plainly to say or that what they say (and mean) is, strictly speaking, false: what they say may be adequate for the religious.
Asceticism
Authors: Wimbush Vincent L , Valantasis Richard , Byron Gay L , Love William S
Published: November 2023

From meditation and fasting to celibacy and anchoritism, the ascetic impulse has been an enduring and complex phenomenon throughout history. Offering a sweeping view of this elusive and controversial aspect of religious life and culture, Asceticism looks at the ascetic impulse from a unique vantage point. Cross-cultural, cross-religious, and multidisciplinary in nature, these essays provide a broad historical and comparative perspective on asceticism--a subject rarely studied outside the context of individual religious traditions. The work represents the input of more than forty preeminent scholars in a wide range of fields and disciplines, and analyzes asceticism from antiquity to the present in European, Near Eastern, African, Asian, and North American settings. Asceticism is organized around four major themes that cut across religious traditions: origins and meanings of asceticism, which explores the motivations and impulses behind ascetic behaviors; hermeneutics of asceticism, which looks at texts and rhetorics and their presuppositions; aesthetics of asceticism, which documents responses evoked by ascetic impulses and practices, as well as the arts of ascetic practices themselves; and politics of asceticism, which analyzes the power dynamics of asceticism, especially as regards gender, cultural, and ethnic differences. Critical responses to the major papers ensure the focus upon the themes and unify the discussion. Two general addresses on broad philosophical and historical-interpretive issues suggest the importance of the subject of asceticism for wide-ranging but serious cultural-critical discussions. An Appendix, Ascetica Miscellanea, includes six short papers on provocative topics not related to the four major themes, and a panel discussion on the practices and meanings of asceticism in contemporary religious life and culture. A selected bibliography and an index are also included. The only comprehensive reference work on asceticism with a multicultural, multireligious, and multidisciplinary perspective, Asceticism offers a model not only for an understanding of a most important dimension of religious life, but also for future interdisciplinary study in general.
Mirabai as Wife and Yogi
Authors: Hawley John Stratton
Published: November 2023

Yet, for all her accessibility, there is a dark, enigmatic side to Mira. To begin with, it is much harder in Mira's case than in that of her male rivals to have any confidence that she actually composed a substantial portion of the poetic corpus attributed to her.
Peculiar Conversions: Revival and Reaction in New Jersey and New York
Authors: Balmer Randall
Published: November 2023

On January 9, 1726, after the Sunday-morning service in New York City’s Dutch church, Dominie Gualtherus Du Bois detained his congregation for a few moments to address them on a matter of no small importance. “Inasmuch as under Divine Providence, we are all subjects of his Royal Majesty, George, the King of Great Britain, our most gracious Sovereign,” he began, “and inasmuch as we are living in a Province where the English language is the common language of the inhabitants: there cannot but be a general agreement by each and all of us that it is very necessary to be versed in this common language of the people, in order properly to carry on one’s temporal calling.” But having in effect acknowledged English suzerainty, Du Bois continued in a much different vein. All who “prefer the worship of the Dutch Reformed Church” and “the devout hearing of pious sermons in the Dutch language,” he said, also recognize the necessity “to be versed in the language in which God’s worship is conducted and exercised.” The dominie expressed regrets that, because of “a wretched carelessness of necessary things,” his congregation had “now for some years neglected to have their children receive instruction in the Netherlandish tongue.” Already, Du Bois claimed, their dilatoriness had resulted in a gradual attrition from the church among the younger generation (those, incidentally, most likely to have attended schools run by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel).
Ovid’s Metamorphoses
Authors: Fantham Elaine
Published: November 2023

Oxford Approaches to Classical Literature (Series Editors: Kathleen Coleman and Richard Rutherford) introduces individual works of Greek and Latin literature to readers who are approaching them for the first time. Each volume sets the work in its literary and historical context, and aims to offer a balanced and engaging assessment of its content, artistry, and purpose. A brief survey of the influence of the work upon subsequent generations is included to demonstrate its enduring relevance and power. All quotations from the original are translated into English. Ovid’s Metamorphoses have been seen as both the culmination of and a revolution in the classical epic tradition, transferring narrative interest from war to love and fantasy. This introduction considers how Ovid found and shaped his narrative from the creation of the world to his own sophisticated times, illustrating the cruelty of jealous gods, the pathos of human love, and the imaginative fantasy of flight, monsters, magic, and illusion. Elaine Fantham introduces the reader not only to this marvelous and complex narrative poem, but to the Greek and Roman traditions behind Ovid’s tales of transformation and a selection of the images and texts that it inspired.
Creation, Flood, and Fire
Authors: Fantham Elaine
Published: November 2023

How does one kick-start a cosmogony? And what models did Ovid have for his representation of the beginning of the universe? Roman thought depended on Greek, and the Greek natural philosophers seem to have had three models for their conception of the birth of the cosmos: some represented it as a living organism, others as an artifact created by a divine being, and yet others in terms of a political or social entity. In fact, Plato combines the first and second models in the Timaeus, with “a god who took over all that was visible: seeing that it was not in a state of rest but in a state of discordant and disorderly motion, he brought it into order out of disorder” (Tim. 30a).
Fantasy, the Fabulous, and the Miraculous Metamorphoses of Nature
Authors: Fantham Elaine
Published: November 2023

Ancient myth and modern science fiction have in common their special ingredients of the fabulous, the miraculous, and the monstrous. These three adjectives all have Latin roots and go back to classical ideas about the license of different genres to indulge in fantasy. Roman rhetoric, for example, distinguished true historical narratives and plausible comic narratives from fabulous stories that were neither true nor plausible, citing as an example of the latter Medea’s “huge winged dragons yoked to a car” from Ennius’s tragedy.
Nothing To Admire
Authors: Yu Christopher
Published: November 2023

Nothing to Admire argues for the persistence of a central tradition of poetic satire in English that extends from Restoration England to present-day America. This tradition is rooted in John Dryden’s and Alexander Pope’s uses of Augustan metaphor to criticize the abuse of social and political power and to promote an antithetical ideal of satiric authority based on freedom of mind. Because of their commitment to neoclassical conceptions of political virtue, the British Augustans developed a meritocratic cultural ideal grounded in poetic judgment and opposed to the political institutions and practices of their superiors in birth, wealth, and might. Their Augustanism thus gives a political meaning to the Horatian principle of nil admirari. This book calls the resulting outlook cultural liberalism in order to distinguish it from the classical liberal insistence on private property as the basis of political liberty, a conviction that arises within the same general period and often stands in adversarial relation to the Augustan mentality. Dryden and Pope’s language of political satire supplies the foundation for the later and more radical liberalisms of Lord Byron, W.H. Auden, and James Merrill, each of whom looks back to the Augustan model for the poetic devices he will use to protest the increasingly conformist culture of mass society. Responding to the banality of this society, the later poets reinvigorate their predecessors’ neo-Horatian attitude of skeptical worldliness through iconoclastic comic assaults on the imperial, fascist, heterosexist, and otherwise illiberal impulses of the cultural regimes prevailing during their lifetimes.
“The Analects Can Be Hard to Read”
Authors: Selover Thomas W
Published: November 2023

Tao-hsiieh interpretations were part of a general Sung period re-evaluation of the Confucian scriptural heritage. Steven Van Zoeren describes this period as “a major turning point in the history of classics studies, analogous in many ways to the revolution in the reading and authority of scripture in the Christian Reformation.”1 On the other hand, as John Henderson has pointed out, “such classical revivals, renaissances, and reformations ... often obscure significant continuities in these traditions.”2 While apparently conflicting, these two readings of the situation can be seen to correct for each other. From the Tao-hsueh thinkers’ own point of view, their insight was at once a major turning point and a profound continuity, precisely because they believed they had accomplished what previous commentators in the tradition had not been able to do, namely to recover the original meaning of the texts.
Knowing Jen
Authors: Selover Thomas W
Published: November 2023

Opening the Issue Neo-Confucians of the Tao-hsueh revival shared, along with Confucius’s direct disciples and with recent interpreters of the Analects in the West, the sense that jen is both key to the Tao taught by Confucius and very difficult to define exactly. The problem in any case is not really one of definition, but of developing an experiential knowing, or taste, for what it means to be jen. Before turning to Hsieh’s approach to this problem, this section will first briefly review something of the recent discussion among modern interpreters of theAnalects concerning jen.
The Facts About Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA)
Authors: Koehn Cheryl , Palmer Taysha , Esdaile John
Published: November 2023

The Plan To Win begins with arming yourself with knowledge about RA. Understanding what a diagnosis of RA means, recognizing symptoms, knowing how they affect your joints and internal organs, and exploring the causes of RA, all provide you with the information you need to make sense of what is happening in your body. Knowing these facts will enable you to have informed discussions with your rheumatologist (a physician specializing in arthritis detection and treatment) and other members of your health care team, and help you make sound decisions about all aspects of your treatment plan. By learning as much as possible about RA, you can gain a sense of control over the disease, and ultimately, achieve optimal health. It may take several readings of this chapter before you understand the complexities of the cause and course of RA. You may wish to make notes as you read along, then ask your physician for clarification, if necessary.
Your Health Care Team
Authors: Koehn Cheryl , Palmer Taysha , Esdaile John
Published: November 2023

The Plan To Win involves coming to terms with your RA and believing that you, personally, can affect the outcome of your treatment plan. In the end, it is your fight, and to succeed it’s essential to learn everything you can about RA and accept responsibility for the factors within your control. That doesn’t mean, of course, you must face this fight alone. There are all kinds of experienced and dedicated health care professionals ready to help you on your quest for achieving wellness. Ultimately, however, you are in the best position to decide who is on your health care team, and the goals of your treatment plan. After all, only you know what factors are most important to your own health and happiness. Perhaps, for example, you consider pain relief to be your most important goal in the short term, but in the long term, it’s important to you to be able to play sports again, or work full-time in a particular occupation. Or maybe your short-term goal is to be able to do daily tasks without having to ask for help, while in the long term, you hope to have a baby. Whatever your individual desires, becoming clear about them will help you decide what help you need and who should provide it.
The Mind-Body Connection
Authors: Koehn Cheryl , Palmer Taysha , Esdaile John
Published: November 2023

Browsing over the shelves of almost any bookstore, one discovers the myriad ways in which our attitudes, emotions, and thoughts are believed to influence our physical well-being. Popular writers such as Louise Hay, Bill Moyers, Bernie Seigal, Andrew Weil, and Deepak Chopra have taken mindbody ideas once considered fringe in the western hemisphere and brought them into our society’s mainstream. While some mind-body ideas are still considered far-fetched in western medical circles, others carry the stamp of approval that comes with rigorous scientific study. In fact, several fields of scientific research devote themselves solely to studying the relationship between the mind and the rest of the body. These include health psychology, biological psychiatry, and psychoneuroimmunology. A large amount of evidence indeed exists to support the notion that our mental states have a real effect on our physical well being. By taking full advantage of the connection between mind and body, people with RA can directly influence their experience of the disease. For example, certain attitudes and personality attributes have been shown to be linked to decreased pain, less disability, and better overall health. And practice of mind-body techniques (such as yoga or guided imagery) is well documented to stimulate relaxation, which in turn is proven to aid sleep, decrease pain, and provide other health-related benefits.
Work, Family, and Leisure
Authors: Koehn Cheryl , Palmer Taysha , Esdaile John
Published: November 2023

Many people who develop RA become suddenly aware of how they once took for granted their ability to perform everyday activities. From the smallest of tasks such as opening a door or brushing one’s teeth to the larger responsibilities of running the house, providing for the family, and holding down a job, the “activities of daily living;’ as occupational therapists refer to them, can take on a new significance. If you’re struggling with activities that once seemed basic, you’re not alone. Painful joints, restricted mobility, and fatigue can cause many people with RA to leave the paid labor force or cut down significantly on the number of hours they work outside the home, participate less in social and recreational activities, and to some degree become dependent on others for assistance with certain tasks. However difficult some physical activities may be, take heart: It is possible to limit the negative impact of the disease on your day-to-day life and continue to work, care for your family, and pursue most of the activities you enjoy.
The Transformation of Property
Authors: Mills C Wright
Published: November 2023

What happened to the world of the small entrepreneur is best seen by looking at what happened to its heroes: the independent farmers and the small businessmen. These men, the leading actors of the middle-class economy of the nineteenth century, are no longer at the center of the American scene; they are merely two layers between other more powerful or more populous strata. Above them are the men of large property, who through money and organization wield much power over other men; alongside and below them are the rank and file of property less employees and workers, who work for wages and salaries. Many former entrepreneurs and their children have joined these lower ranks, but only a few have become big entrepreneurs. Those who have persisted as small entrepreneurs are not much like their nineteenth century prototypes, and must now operate in a world no longer organized in their image.
The Status Panic
Authors: Mills C Wright
Published: November 2023

Prestige involves at least two persons: one to claim it and another to honor the claim. The bases on which various people raise prestige claims, and the reasons others honor these claims, include property and birth, occupation and education, income and power-in fact almost anything that may invidiously distinguish one person from another. In the status system of a society these claims are organized as rules and expectations which regulate who successfully claims prestige, from whom, in what ways, and on what basis. The level of self-esteem enjoyed by given individuals is more or less set by this status system. The extent to which claims for prestige are honored, and by whom they are honored, may vary widely. Some of those from whom an individual claims prestige may honor his claims, others may not; some deferences that are given may express genuine feelings of esteem; others may be expedient strategies for ulterior ends. A society may, in fact, contain many hierarchies of prestige, each with its own typical bases and areas of bestowal, or one hierarchy in which everyone uniformly ‘knows his place’ and is always in it. It is in the latter that prestige groups are most likely to be uniform and continuous. Imagine a society in which everyone’s prestige is absolutely set and unambivalent; every man’s claims for prestige are balanced by the prestige he receives, and both his expression of claims and the ways these claims are honored by others are set forth in understood stereotypes.
Communities Of Dissent
Authors: Stein Stephen J
Published: November 2023

Alternative religious groups have had a profound influence on American history-they have challenged the old and opened up new ways of thinking about healing, modes of meaning, religious texts and liturgies, the social and political order, and the relationships between religion and race, class, gender, and region. Virtually always, the dramatic, dynamic history of alternative religions runs parallel to that of dissent in America. Communities of Dissent is an evenhanded and marvelously lively history of New Religious Movements in America. Stephen J. Stein describes the evolution and structure of alternative religious movements from both sides: the critics and the religious dissenters themselves. Providing a fascinating look at a wide range of New Religious Movements, he investigates obscure groups such as the 19th-century Vermont Pilgrims, who wore bearskins and refused to bathe or cut their hair, alongside better-known alternative believers, including colonial America’s largest outsider faith, the Quakers; 17th- and 18th-century Mennonites, Amish, and Shakers; and the Christian Scientists, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Black Muslims, and Scientologists of today. Accessible and comprehensive, Communities of Dissent also covers the milestones in the history of alternative American religions, from the infamous Salem witch trials and mass suicide/murder at Jonestown to the positive ways in which alternative religions have affected racial relations, the empowerment of women, and American culture in general.
Twentieth-Century Sects and Cults
Authors: Stein Stephen J
Published: November 2023

The 1960s was a decade of social, political, and religious turmoil, a time when many Americans celebrated the unconventional, the alternative, and the radical. Social unrest gave birth to the counterculture and hippie communes; political agitation fueled the Civil Rights movement and opposition to the war in Vietnam; religious ferment found expression in new interest in Eastern traditions and other spiritualities. The social, the political, and the religious were inseparable from one another.
At the Crossroads: Since 1967
Authors: Diner Hasia R
Published: November 2023

Most changes in the way people live and think take place gradually. We do not usually see history changing before our eyes as we go about our daily activities. But sometimes particular years stand out. Dramatic events take place, and people realize that a new era has begun. Jews in America knew that 1967 was one of those years.

On June 5 war broke out in the Middle East, pitting Israel against Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, and Algeria. Backed by the Soviet Union, Arab forces declared that they would totally destroy the Jewish state, or, as they called it, the “Zionist entity.” From Egypt Radio Cairo announced, “The existence of Israel has continued too long. . . . The great hour has come. The battle has come in which we shall destroy Israel.”

Everyone in Israel and in the Jewish communities around the world took these words seriously. The small nation had never been accepted by its neighbors in the region, and since 1948 these hostile neighbors had vowed to wipe it out.
On Sins
Authors: Aquinas Thomas
Published: November 2023

It seems that an act is, for the following reasons: Augustine says that “sin is a word or deed or desire contrary to the law of God.” But an act is implied in each of those three things. Therefore, an act is involved in every sin. Augustine says that sin is so voluntary that there is no sin unless it is voluntary. But nothing can be voluntary unless by an act of the will. Therefore, there needs to be at least an act of the will in any sin. Contraries belong to the same genus. But merit and demerit are contraries, and merit belongs to the genus of action, since we merit by our acts. Therefore, it seems that demerit or sin belongs to the genus of action by the same reasoning. Sin is a privation, since sin is nothing, as Augustine says. But sin is grounded in something. Therefore, there needs to be an act to ground sin.
On the Causes of Sin
Authors: Aquinas Thomas
Published: November 2023

It seems that God does, for the following reasons: The Apostle says in Rom. 1:28: “God delivered them up to a depraved way of thinking, so that they do unrighteous things.” And a gloss of Augustine on this text says: “God is evidently active in the hearts of human beings by inclining their wills to whatever he willed, whether to good or to evil.” But the inclination of the will to evil is sin. Therefore, God causes sin. People have said that the will’s inclination to evil is attributed to God insofar as such inclination is a punishment, and that is why Augustine in the cited text speaks of the judgment of God. But the same thing cannot in the same respect be a punishment and a moral wrong, since punishment is by its nature contrary to the will, and moral wrong is by its nature voluntary, as I have said before. And the will’s inclination belongs to the nature of voluntariness. Therefore, if God inclines the will to evil, it seems that he himself also causes moral wrong as such.
On Original Sin
Authors: Aquinas Thomas
Published: November 2023

It seems that no sin is so contracted, for the following reasons: Sir. 15:18 says: “Life and death, good and evil are set before human beings; whichever they choose will be given to them.” And we can understand from this that sin, which is the spiritual death of the soul, consists of human beings’ willing sin. But nothing that human beings contract by their physical descent consists of their willing. Therefore, human beings do not contract any sin by their physical descent. Accidents are transmitted only if their subject is transmitted, and the subject of sin is the rational soul. Therefore, since the rational soul is not transmitted by physical descent, as the work On Church Dogmas maintains, it seems that neither is any sin transmitted by physical descent. People have said that although the subject of sin is not transmitted, the flesh is, and the flesh causes sin. But the transmission of insufficient causes does not suffice to transmit accidents, since given the insufficiency of causes, effects do not result. And the flesh is not a sufficient cause of sin, since it rests in the power of the will to consent or not consent to sin, however much the flesh entices persons to sin. And so the will itself is the sufficient cause of sin. But the will is not transmitted. Therefore, the transmission of the flesh does not suffice to transmit any sin.
On the Punishment of Original Sin
Authors: Aquinas Thomas
Published: November 2023

It seems that the privation of the vision of God is not, for the following reasons: As the Physics says, means that do not attain their end are pointless. But nature ordains human beings for happiness as their ultimate end, and this happiness consists of the vision of God. Therefore, the existence of human beings is pointless if they should not attain the vision of God. But God did not cease to cause the generation of human beings because of original sin, as Damascene says. Therefore, since nothing regarding the works of God is pointless, it seems that human beings do not incur the guilty condition of privation of the vision of God because of the sin that they contract by their physical descent. Ez. 18:4 says: “All souls belong to me; as the soul of a son is mine, so also is the soul of the father.” And we can understand from this that God directly creates all souls, and that one is not transmitted by another. Therefore, a person should not be punished for the original sin transmitted by our first parent with a punishment that belongs only to the soul. But the privation of the vision of God is a punishment that belongs only to the soul, just as the very vision of God belongs only to the soul. Therefore, the privation of the vision of God is not a proper punishment for original sin. Augustine says in his Enchiridion that the punishment of those punished only for original sin is the mildest. But Chrysostom says in a homily on the Gospel of Matthew that the privation of the vision of God is the greatest punishment and worse than hell. Therefore, the privation of the vision of God is not a fitting punishment for original sin.
On Venial Sin
Authors: Aquinas Thomas
Published: November 2023

It seems that we do not, for the following reasons: As Augustine says in his work Against Faustus, “Sin is a word or deed or desire contrary to the eternal law.” But every sin contrary to the eternal law is mortal. Therefore, every sin is mortal. Therefore, we do not properly distinguish sin into mortal and venial sin. Sin by its nature deserves punishment. But pardon, which takes away punishment, is contrary to punishment. Therefore, the venial is contrary to the nature of sin. But no specific difference dividing a genus is contrary to the genus. Therefore, the mortal and the venial cannot properly distinguish sin. Whoever turns inordinately, turns toward a transitory good and away from the immutable good, since in every movement, one who approaches one terminus recedes from the other. Therefore, whoever sins turns away from the immutable good. But this is to sin mortally. Therefore, whoever sins sins mortally. Therefore, there are not two kinds of sin: one mortal, the other venial.
On Envy
Authors: Aquinas Thomas
Published: November 2023

It seems that envy is not, for the following reasons: We do not praise or blame emotions, as the Philosopher says in the Ethics. But envy is an emotion, for Damascene says in his work On Orthodox Faith that “envy is chagrin at the good things belonging to others.” Therefore, we blame no one on that account. But one is rendered blameworthy because of sin. Therefore, envy is not a sin. The involuntary is not a sin, as Augustine says. But envy, inasmuch as it is the emotion of sadness, is involuntary, for “sadness concerns things that befall us against our will,” as Augustine says in the City of God. Therefore, envy is not a sin. Since good is the contrary of evil, good does not move one to sin, which is evil, just as one contrary never moves anything to the other contrary. But the cause of envy is good, for Remigius says that envy is sorrow over the good of another. Augustine says in The City of God that there is in every sin a disordered turning toward a transitory good. But envy is a turning away from, rather than a turning to, a transitory good, since envy is chagrin at the good of another. Therefore, envy is not a sin.
On Anger
Authors: Aquinas Thomas
Published: November 2023

Jerome, explaining Mt. 5:22, “Everyone angry with his brother,” etc., says: “Some codices add ‘without cause,’ but the statement is unqualified in authentic codices, and anger is completely reproved. For if we are commanded to pray for our persecutors, every occasion for anger is removed. Therefore, we should delete ‘without cause,’ since human anger does not accomplish God’s justice.” Therefore, all anger is evil and forbidden. As Dionysius says in his work On the Divine Names, anger is natural to dogs but unnatural to human beings. But what is contrary to the nature of human beings is evil and sin, as Damascene makes clear in his work On Orthodox Faith. Therefore, all anger is sin.
On Gluttony
Authors: Aquinas Thomas
Published: November 2023

It seems that gluttony is not, for the following reasons: No one sins regarding what one cannot avoid, as Augustine says in his work On Free Choice.1 But no one can avoid gluttony, for Gregory says in his work Morals that “in eating, pleasure is mixed with need; we do not know what need requires, or what plea-sure suffices. Therefore, gluttony is not a sin. Augustine says in his Confessions: Who is there, O Lord, who does not partake of food a little beyond the measure of need?”3 But doing such belongs to gluttony. There-fore, we cannot avoid gluttony. Therefore, gluttony is not a sin. Augustine says in his work On Free Choice that there is no moral fault where nature and need dominate.4 But nature and need move us to gluttony. Therefore, it seems that gluttony is not a sin.
On Devils
Authors: Aquinas Thomas
Published: November 2023

It seems that devils do, for the following reasons: Augustine says in his Literal Commentary on Genesis: “Regarding the spirit of a rational creature, the very fact that it lives and gives life to bodies is good, whether ethereal bodies, as in the case of the spirit of the devil himself and other devils, or earthly bodies, as in the case of the souls of human beings.” But a body given life is by nature joined to the spirit giving life, since life is something natural. Therefore, devils have ethereal bodies joined to them by nature. Many memories of the same thing from past sense perceptions produce experience, as the opening of the Metaphysics says. And so there is sense perception wherever there is experience. And there is no sense perception without a body joined by nature to one with experience, since sense perception is the activity of a bodily organ. But devils have experience, for Augustine says in his Literal Commentary on Genesis that they know some truths in part because they thrive with more subtle mental powers, in part because of their shrewder experience, in part because they learn from holy angels. Therefore, devils have bodies joined to them by nature.
Mispricing of Mutual Funds
Authors: Singal Vijay
Published: November 2023

The net asset values (NAVs) of mutual funds may be based on prices that are several hours old. That means the NAV may not reflect the most recent market movements. For small-cap funds with many illiquid stocks and international funds where markets close several hours before 4 P.M., the NAVs may be severely mispriced, especially on volatile days when large price movements occur.

Investors can use this information in at least one of two ways. They can construct a trading strategy to earn abnormal returns by buying funds when NAVs undervalue the stocks they hold and selling those funds a few days later. Second, they can protect themselves against other short-term traders by not investing in funds that use stale prices while not taking steps to restrict opportunistic trading.

The net asset value (NAV) of a mutual fund is the 4 P.M. price at which investors can purchase or redeem shares of the fund, usually at no additional cost. The NAV is calculated based on the last traded price of stocks that the fund holds. If the last trade does not take place close to 4 P.M., the NAV may be based on stale prices and could be incorrect.
Statistical Thermodynamics And Thermal Energy Storage
Authors: Chen Gang
Published: November 2023

The quantum mechanics principles covered in the previous two chapters give the allowable energy states of matter. The number of allowable states in typical macroscopic matter is usually very large, and at any instant, the matter can be at any one of these states. Although our mathematical treatments in the previous two chapters were based on solving the steady-state Schrodinger equation for the energy states and the wave functions, matter will not stay at one particular quantum state (a microscopic state) for long because of the interactions among particles (atoms, molecules, electrons, and phonons) in the matter. For example, we assumed a harmonic potential between atoms to obtain the phonon dispersion relation. In reality, the interatomic potential is not harmonic, as one can easily infer from examining the Lennard-Jones potential. When the anhar monicity (the deviation from the harmonic potential) is small, the solutions of the Schrodinger equation for the quantum states based on the harmonic potential are approximately correct. Yet a small degree of anharmonicity can cause a rapid (10-9-10-13 s) change of the matter from one quantum state to another. Due to the large number of quantum states available in matter, it is impractical to follow the real time evolution of matter among its allowable quantum states. The bridge connecting the allowable quantum states to the macroscopic behavior is provided by statistical thermodynamics, which determines the probability that matter will be at a particular quantum state when it is at equilibrium. Through statistical thermodynamics, temperature enters into the picture of energy storage and transport.
Energy Conversion And Coupled Transport Processes
Authors: Chen Gang
Published: November 2023

The collision of carriers may cause both energy and momentum transfer among them. Energy conversion processes must involve energy exchange between at least two different carriers. For example, Joule heating is due to the relaxation of energy from electrons to phonons, and thermal radiation from a solid results from the conversion of the energy of phonons or electrons in the solid into photons. The exchange of energy among electrons, phonons, and photons can in principle be determined by evaluating the collision integral in the Boltzmann equation. Discussions in the previous two chapters are based on the relaxation time approximation, which is strictly valid only for elastic scattering processes that do not involve energy exchange among carriers. The relaxation time approximation, however, is often used even for inelastic collision without rigorous justification. Traditionally, the constitutive equations obtained from the relaxation time approximation are used in combination with the energy conservation law to describe energy exchange processes. For example, in heat conduction processes involving Joule heating, one combines the Fourier law with the first law of thermodynamics to derive the heat conduction equation that determines the temperature distribution. Joule heating is included in the conservation law without consideration of how electrons deliver their energy to the lattice systems. This approach is adequate in most macro scale processes and in systems in which electrons and phonons are close to equilibrium and heat generation occurs over a region much larger than the carrier mean free path, but can fail when these conditions are not satisfied.
knowledge
Authors: Appiah Kwame Anthony
Published: November 2023

Brain surgery is getting better all the time. Though we can’t do brain transplants yet, one day we may well be able to. Let’s imagine that we are living in a time when they are possible. Unlike other transplants, of course, the person who survives the operation is presumably the owner of the organ, not the owner of the body! But like all organ transplants, brain transplants involve an intermediate stage. For a while, a brain has to be stored outside its old body before it is connected into a new one. Now suppose that someone—call him Albert—is very badly injured in an accident. His body is hopelessly damaged. Fortunately, his brain was protected by a helmet, and it isunhurt. So a neurosurgeon sets about removing Albert’s brain from his body in order to transplant it to a new one
Morality
Authors: Appiah Kwame Anthony
Published: November 2023

Suppose I asked you to pick one kind of action that was clearly and obviously wrong. You might well suggest, as an uncontroversial example, killing  an  innocent  person. One reason why terrorism in the modern world is so shocking is that its victims are usually ordinary, apparently innocent people. There is no reason to believe they are responsible for the wrongs that terrorists claim they are trying to put right. Most people share this reaction. Most would agree, at least to begin with, that killing innocent people is clearly and obviously wrong. But by now you have done enough philosophy to know that this obvious answer to an apparently straightforward questionhides many difficulties. Let us consider just two of those difficultiesfor the principle: