Between Kinds and Properties: Bare Plurals across Languages

No abstract

The Case of the Disappearing (and Re-Appearing) Particle

A novel prediction is derived by the Two-State-Vector-Formalism (TSVF) for a particle superposed over three boxes. Under appropriate pre- and postselections, and with tunneling enabled between two of the boxes, it is possible to derive not only one, but three predictions for three different times within the intermediate interval. These predictions are moreover contradictory. The particle (when looked for using a projective measurement) seems to disappear from the first box where it would have been previously found with certainty, appearing instead within the third box, to which no tunneling is possible, and later re-appearing within the second. It turns out that local measurement (i.e. opening one of the boxes) fails to indicate the particle's presence, but subtler measurements performed on the two boxes together reveal the particle's nonlocal modular momentum spatially separated from its mass. Another advance of this setting is that, unlike other predictions of the TSVF that rely on weak and/or counterfactual measurements, the present one uses actual projective measurements. This outcome is then corroborated by adding weak measurements and the Aharonov-Bohm effect. The results strengthen the recently suggested time-symmetric Heisenberg ontology based on nonlocal deterministic operators. They can be also tested using the newly developed quantum router.Comment: Accepted to Nature Scientific Report

Decays in Quantum Hierarchical Models

We study the dynamics of a simple model for quantum decay, where a single state is coupled to a set of discrete states, the pseudo continuum, each coupled to a real continuum of states. We find that for constant matrix elements between the single state and the pseudo continuum the decay occurs via one state in a certain region of the parameters, involving the Dicke and quantum Zeno effects. When the matrix elements are random several cases are identified. For a pseudo continuum with small bandwidth there are weakly damped oscillations in the probability to be in the initial single state. For intermediate bandwidth one finds mesoscopic fluctuations in the probability with amplitude inversely proportional to the square root of the volume of the pseudo continuum space. They last for a long time compared to the non-random case

After the Afghan War: Nationalism and the Changes in the Balance of Power in Central Asia

No abstract available DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5564/mjia.v0i8-9.125 The Mongolian Journal of International Affairs; Number 8-9, 2002, Pages 12-2

The Mystical Correspondence Between The Epoch Of The Hijra And The Biblical Year Of Creation Supported By A Tradition Mentioned By Abu Al-Fadl And Abd Al-Qadir Baduni

The connections between astronomy and timekeeping are longstanding. One approach to the teaching of Astronomy is it can serve as a unique platform to illustrate the advancement of science from ancient times along with the strong interrelation between science and religion. Here we chose to describe the influence of astronomical measurements that led to the determination of calendars with emphasis on the Islamic epoch: During the second century the Ethiopian Church placed the world’s year of creation (YOC) at exactly 5500 years before the Incarnation, thus expressing the view that it is related to the first day of the second half of the sixth millennium since their believed to be the YOC. The Ethiopian Church also believed that the astronomical visualization of the sky in the YOC which placed the vernal equinox and the newmoon in the same day, repeated itself in the year 5500. In a previous work we showed that “Astronomical coincidence" is a notion originated from Jews who believed that the YOC, Exodus, and the building of the Temple were mystically connected by similar rare newmoon events relative to the vernal equinox. Here we show that the founders of Islam believed in a similar mystical coincidence, explicitly that the 16th of July, 622 AD,- the epoch of the Islamic calendar-, is exactly the day in which the 6000th lunar year started after the biblical creation based on the number of solar years from creation as determined by Eusebius. We show that our astronomical calculations are in accordance with a tradition mentioned by Abu al-Fadl and Badauni

Teaching The Astronomical Visualization Used For The Explanation Of The Ancient Ein-Gedi Archaeological Zodiac And Its Related Inscription

In teaching the history of astronomy, mosaics found at ancient synagogues in the Middle East are invaluable. The ancient Zodiac signs forming such mosaics are related to the seasons indicating the fact that the precession of the Earth axis had been neglected or even unknown. We demonstrate that the sage’s derivations of the patriarch’s ages in the chronology of the Septuagint version of the bible correspond to the signs of the zodiac, an assumption supported, for example, by the inscription found in the ruins of the Jewish synagogue in Ein-Gedi. Through our astronomical calculations we solve the sun-moon conjunctions occurring at the beginning of the zodiac signs – at the Vernal Equinox - considering the real sun's orbit. Since the Septuagint version of the bible is assumed to have been translated into Greek in the 3rd century BC from an earlier existing Hebrew source, the fact that the ages of the patriarchs correspond to the observations of the real sun's motion, leads to the conclusion that the Septuagint version is an important book of the history of science. As a result of our findings, the bible can, thus, be regarded as one of the most ancient detailed scientific teaching sources leading to improved astronomical models which determined the planetary orbits

Using Astronomical References For Biblical Dating Of Noah’s Deluge And The Destruction Of Solomon’s Temple

In recent years, the astronomy teaching community has been called upon to include more cultural aspects of the influence of astronomy across the world in university courses. As an important component connecting the science of predictable sky alignments with historical human events, students studying the history of science and astronomy often find it cognitively challenging to recognize the fact that till the 16th century AD the most fundamental picture of the planetary system had been distorted with the sun considered to be the fourth planet of the earth rather than the center of our modern planetary system. Similarly, students are often amazed in realizing that the vast majority of all professional and knowledgeable astronomers had also believed that planets control the destiny of all human beings,and, in particular, in predicting extreme events. In this presentation, we concentrate on such impacts of astronomers who stood behind the determination of the chronology of the Bible. Having illustrated that the ancient astronomers believed that when the Sun, the Moon, and the first point of Aries form a straight celestial line, important historical events described in the Bible could be revealed, and one could systematically examine the relative positions of these three celestial objects when events would occur and symbolize for the sages the end of an era. We first describe how the largest celestial separation between the sun, the moon, and the Vernal Equinox (VE) was identified by the writers of the chronology to occur in association with the destruction of Solomon’s Temple; and then we illustrate the additional result that such a separation was also made to be associated with a biblical flood