Neither/Nor

Abstract: On one formulation, epistemological disjunctivism is the view that our perceptual beliefs constitute knowledge when they are based on reasons that provide them with factive support. Some would argue that it is impossible to understand how perceptual knowledge is possible unless we assume that we have such reasons to support our perceptual beliefs. Some would argue that it is impossible to understand how perceptual experience could furnish us with these reasons unless we assume that the traditional view of experience is mistaken. For reasons explained here, I think that the epistemological argument for metaphysical disjunctivism rests on mistaken assumptions about reasons and their rational role. Neither disjunctivist view is needed to understand how perceptual knowledge is possible

A study of water-mist recirculation system for filtration and cooling effect in the kitchen hood ventilation system

Water-mist spray system in several heavy-duty kitchen hood canopies are installed to efficiently control the high heat loads and grease emissions produced from the cooking process and for safety purposes. Cold water is used in the water�mist system and work as a mist curtain inside the exhaust plenum of the canopy. The main purpose of this study is to reduce the water consumption by introducing the water-mist recirculation system to replace the current method water-mist system since it is working as water loss. A standard ASTM 2519 and UL 1046 full-scaled experiment was developed in the laboratory. An existing Halton Europe/Asian water�mist operating system was adopted in this study. Twelve (12) cycles (at 24 hours water-mist activation) has been studied to determine the maximum water-mist activation cycle. The data was collected at two (2) hours water-mist activation at every water-mist recirculation cycle. The water-mist spray fluids viscosity is 0.7 cP from fresh water until the 4th cycle (8 hours water-mist spray) and increase 14.29% (0.8 cP) at 5th cycle to 12th cycle. On average, the difference in gas emissions percentage for CO concentration between fresh water until 4th cycle is 10.81 – 18.92% while the CO2 concentration is 12.33 – 18.22%. On average, the difference in cooling effects percentage for ducting temperature between fresh water until 4th cycle was 5.55% while the hood temperature was 2.33%. From the study, the water-mist recirculation system could save up to 611,667 liter per year and 466,798.5 liter per year water for all U.S, European, and Asian kitchen hood designs per hood length. By adopting the new water-mist recirculation system to the current water-mist kitchen hood, the water operational cost for water successfully reduced to RM 4,889.63 per year and RM 6,977.86 per year for U.S design and European or Asian design per hood length respectively. The water-mist recirculation system has great potential to improve the current water-mist system for the commercial kitchen hoo

Characterization and biodegradation of poly (vinyl alcohol)/cassava starch

A series of poly (vinyl alcohol)/cassava starch (PVA/CS) blends at 50, 60, 70 and 80 wt.% cassava starch contents were prepared in one-step compounding process. One step compounding means, all blends were compound together without solely plasticized PVA or cassava starch at beginning. All blends were characterized and testing accordingly. In this research, comparison between one-step compounding and two-step compounding (plasticized PVA/CS at the beginning) were tested by tensile strength. It shows that their tensile strengths were comparatively higher than the two-step compounding process of PVA/CS blends. In term of impact test, it indicates that CS acts as non-reinforcing filler. The compatibility of PVA/CS represents the similarity functional group and possess same polar group. Studies on thermal stability and crystallinity shows, increasing the cassava starch loading in PVA matrix, has reduced the enthalpy of melting point as well as degree of crystallinity. The onset degradation had shifted to a higher temperature when a higher percentage of cassava starch was used in PVA matrix. This is due to cyclic hemiacetal had been introduced into PVA blend by cassava starch. It resist to thermal attack. In biodegradability test, several factors have been determined to evaluate the rate of biodegradation. Increase the humidity as well as increasing the cassava starch loading in PVA matrix will improve the susceptibility contact of microorganism onto the surface of PVA/CS blend. Aspergillus Oryzae had been selected as a good reagent used to degrade the sample of PVA/CS blend compared to Bacillus Amyloliquefaciens and effective microorganism. The biodegradation process of PVA/CS blends in anaerobic condition is much more faster compared to aerobic conditions

The organizational implications of medical imaging in the context of Malaysian hospitals

This research investigated the implementation and use of medical imaging in the context of Malaysian hospitals. In this report medical imaging refers to PACS, RIS/HIS and imaging modalities which are linked through a computer network. The study examined how the internal context of a hospital and its external context together influenced the implementation of medical imaging, and how this in turn shaped organizational roles and relationships within the hospital itself. It further investigated how the implementation of the technology in one hospital affected its implementation in another hospital. The research used systems theory as the theoretical framework for the study. Methodologically, the study used a case-based approach and multiple methods to obtain data. The case studies included two hospital-based radiology departments in Malaysia. The outcomes of the research suggest that the implementation of medical imaging in community hospitals is shaped by the external context particularly the role played by the Ministry of Health. Furthermore, influences from both the internal and external contexts have a substantial impact on the process of implementing medical imaging and the extent of the benefits that the organization can gain. In the context of roles and social relationships, the findings revealed that the routine use of medical imaging has substantially affected radiographers’ roles, and the social relationships between non clinical personnel and clinicians. This study found no change in the relationship between radiographers and radiologists. Finally, the approaches to implementation taken in the hospitals studied were found to influence those taken by other hospitals. Overall, this study makes three important contributions. Firstly, it extends Barley’s (1986, 1990) research by explicitly demonstrating that the organization’s internal and external contexts together shape the implementation and use of technology, that the processes of implementing and using technology impact upon roles, relationships and networks and that a role-based approach alone is inadequate to examine the outcomes of deploying an advanced technology. Secondly, this study contends that scalability of technology in the context of developing countries is not necessarily linear. Finally, this study offers practical contributions that can benefit healthcare organizations in Malaysia

Tsong dbon nor bzang

MP4 video‘Tsong dbon nor bzang’ was told by Mkha’ ‘gro mthar in A mdo Tibetan. Rta rgyugs, a subdivision of Rka phug Administrative Village, is a farming village located in Khams ra Town, Gcan tsa County Town, Rma lho Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Qinghai Province, PR China. In 2010, there were 15 Han Chinese households and 18 Tibetan households in Rta rgyugs Village. The total population was 175 residents (33 households). Most Han Chinese residents were fluent in Tibetan and communicated in Tibetan with local Tibetan villagers. རྐ་ཕུག་སྡེ་བའི་ཁོངས་སུ་གཏོགས་པའི་རྟ་རྒྱུགས་སྡེ་བ་ནི་ཞིང་ལས་གཙོ་བོར་གཉེར་བའི་བོད་སྡེ་ཞིག་ཡིན་ལ། དེ་ནི་ཁམས་ར་གྲོང་བརྡལ་དུ་ཆགས་ཤིང་གཅན་ཚ་རྫོང་མཁར་དང་བར་ཐག་སྤྱི་ལེ་༣༥ ལྷག་ཡོད། གཅན་ཚ་རྫོང་ནི་ཀྲུང་གོའི་མཚོ་སྔོན་ཞིང་ཆེན་རྨ་ལྷོ་བོད་རིགས་རང་སྐྱོང་ཁུལ་གྱི་རྫོང་བཞིའི་ཡ་གྱལ་ཞིག་ཡིན་ཏེ། ༢༠༡༠ལོར་རྟ་རྒྱུགས་སྡེ་བར་བསྡོམས་པས་ཁྱིམ་ཚང་སུམ་ཅུ་སོ་གསུམ་ཡོད་ལ། དེའི་གྲས་སུ་ཁྱིམ་ཚང་བཅོ་ལྔ་ནི་རྒྱ་རིགས་ཡིན་པ་དང་། ཁྱིམ་ཚང་བཅོ་བརྒྱད་བོད་རིགས་ཡིན། རྒྱའི་མི་ཁྱིམ་ཕལ་ཆེ་བས་བོད་སྐད་བཤད་ཤེས་པ་དང་དུས་རྒྱུན་དུ་བོད་སྐད་བཀོད་སྤྱོད་བྱས་ནས་སྡེ་བའི་ནང་གི་བོད་མི་ཚོར་འབྲེལ་འདྲིས་བྱེད། ད་ལྟ་རྟ་རྒྱུགས་སྡེ་བར་འདུས་སྡོད་བྱེད་པའི་མི་གྲངས་ ༡༧༥ཡིན། Rka phug sde ba'i khongs su gtogs pa'i rta rgyugs sde ba ni zhing las gtso bor gnyer ba'i bod sde zhig yin la/ de ni khams ra grong brdal du chags shing gcan tsha rdzong mkhar dang bar thag spyi le 35 lhag yod/ gcan tsha rdzong ni krung go'i mtsho sngon zhing chen rma lho bod rigs rang skyong khul gyi rdzong bzhi'i ya gyal zhig yin te/ 2010 lor rta rgyugs sde bar bsdoms pas khyim tshang sum cu so gsum yod la/ de'i gras su khyim tshang bco lnga ni rgya rigs yin pa dang/ khyim tshang bco brgyad bod rigs yin/ rgya'i mi khyim phal che bas bod skad bshad shes pa dang dus rgyun du bod skad bkod spyod byas nas sde ba'i nang gi bod mi tshor 'brel 'dris byed/ da lta rta rgyugs sde bar 'dus sdod byed pa'i mi grangs 175yin/ 尕布大九村位于坎布拉镇西北部，距尖扎县城 35公里。尖扎县是中国青海省黄南藏族自治州四个县之一。 2010年，大九村共有33户，共有175人，其中汉族15户，藏族18户。大多数汉族户都精通藏语，他们用藏语与村里的藏族交流

Labor force participation of women in Malaysia

The article analysis the women labor force participation in Malaysia. The rapid absorption of women into the labor market has been influenced by several factors. The rapid economic growth was due largely to important growth in the manufacturing and services sectors, where substantial and proportionally larger increase of female workers has been registered. Among all sectors of the economy, the manufacturing sector has recorded the highest growth rate during the last decade. The increase in the female labor force participation may also be attributable to improving economic incentives in employment and policies favoring the employment of women. In addition, the combined effects of increased years of schooling, access to family planning services, improved maternal and child care, leading to arise in the average age at marriage, have allowed women to take advantage of the increased employment opportunities

Neither Ants nor Hermites

Acceleration of renewal of technologies make management more complex and induces organizations to absorb more and more knowledge, in less and less time; of course each member of the organization accomplishes this task of its own but only a collective effort is doomed to be efficient. To cope with such a situation, it seems that we need a new breed of managers or leaders

Malay, Chinese, and internet banking

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to focus on the impact of cultural traits on the intention to use internet banking. Drawing from the technology acceptance model and trust literature, the paper examines the influence of perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, and trust on the intention to use internet banking among Malay and Chinese ethnic groups. Design/methodology/approach: The questionnaire was distributed to final year business students and Master of Business Administration students at four public universities in Malaysia. A separate multiple regression was employed to analyze the data for each ethnic group. Findings: For both ethnic groups, the results showed that perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, and trust, all have significant effect on the intention to use internet banking. Further examination of the regression coefficients revealed the cultural traits that may explain the extent to which they influence factors that affect the intention to use. Research limitations/implications: Respondents of this study were students. This factor may decrease generalizability of the study because students' interest on the use of internet banking may be different from those of the general public. One research implication of this study is that there is a need to consider the role of culture in examining factors that affect behavioral intention. Practical implications: Banks need to highlight the benefits of internet banking, make internet banking easy to use, and enhance internet banking's security to improve consumers' trust. Given the fact that culture affects one's behavior, each customer group needs to be evaluated differently and the "one-size-fit-all" approach to encourage internet banking usage should be avoided. Originality/value: This paper attempts to link cultural traits that may explain the extent to which it influences factors that affect the intention to use internet banking