Reconsidering the Necessary Beings of Aquinas’s Third Way

Surprisingly few articles have focused on Aquinas’s particular conception of necessary beings in the Third Way, and many scholars have espoused inaccurate or incomplete views of that conception. My aim in this paper is both to offer a corrective to some of those views and, more importantly, to provide compelling answers to the following two questions about the necessary beings of the Third Way. First, how exactly does Aquinas conceive of these necessary beings? Second, what does Aquinas seek to accomplish in the third stage of the Third Way? In answering these questions, I challenge prominent contemporary understandings of the necessary beings of the Third Way

Evaluative Perception: Introduction

In this Introduction we introduce the central themes of the Evaluative Perception volume. After identifying historical and recent contemporary work on this topic, we discuss some central questions under three headings: (1) Questions about the Existence and Nature of Evaluative Perception: Are there perceptual experiences of values? If so, what is their nature? Are experiences of values sui generis? Are values necessary for certain kinds of experience? (2) Questions about the Epistemology of Evaluative Perception: Can evaluative experiences ever justify evaluative judgments? Are experiences of values necessary for certain kinds of justified evaluative judgments? (3) Questions about Value Theory and Evaluative Perception: Is the existence of evaluative experience supported or undermined by particular views in value theory? Are particular views in value theory supported or undermined by the existence of value experience

How many random questions are necessary to identify n distinct objects?

AbstractSuppose that X and A are two finite sets of the same cardinality n ⩾ 2. Assume that there is a bijective mapping φ: X → A which is unknown to us, and we must determine it. We are allowed to ask a sequence of questions each posed as follows. For a given B ⊂ A what is φ−1(B)? In this paper we study a case when the subsets B are chosen uniformly at random. The main result is: if each subset has to split all the atoms of a field generated by the previous subsets, then the total number of questions (needed to determine the mapping completely) is log2 n + (1 + op(1))(2 log2 n)12. Here op(1) stands for a random term approaching 0 in probability as n → ∞

Assessing Conceptual Knowledge of Differential Equations

The differential equations and linear algebra math classes at Valparaiso University participate in an online tutoring survey consisting of conceptual questions from the field. The test was originally constructed by a team of math professors from San Diego State University. The questions are available in an online format and most questions provide scaffolding, or a tutoring set of questions when a primary question is answered incorrectly. This project analyzes the effectiveness of the scaffolding on a subset of questions with specific focus on areas of separable variables and Euler’s method. Special attention has been given to questions with multiple knowledge components, which may complicate the effectiveness of the scaffolding. In several questions, we have found that the scaffolding is not impacting student understanding of the subject area. We are also discovering surprising anomalies in students’ conceptions that the test creators did not predict. Thus, in some cases, it may be necessary to adapt the scaffolding or question wording to maximize test efficiency and overall student comprehension

A Skeptic’s Case for Sovereign Bankruptcy

This essay describes fundamental flaws in the sovereign debt restructuring regime, but questions the prevailing arguments for sovereign bankruptcy. The author concludes that efficient debt outcomes may well come about without bankruptcy, but that a statutory regime is necessary to achieve sovereign autonomy and political legitimacy

Polyadic Constacyclic Codes

For any given positive integer $m$, a necessary and sufficient condition for the existence of Type I $m$-adic constacyclic codes is given. Further, for any given integer $s$, a necessary and sufficient condition for $s$ to be a multiplier of a Type I polyadic constacyclic code is given. As an application, some optimal codes from Type I polyadic constacyclic codes, including generalized Reed-Solomon codes and alternant MDS codes, are constructed.Comment: We provide complete solutions on two basic questions on polyadic constacyclic cdes, and construct some optimal codes from the polyadic constacyclic cde

Necessary and impossible: on spiritual questions in relation to early induced abortion

No matter how technically developed and medically sophisticated our society becomes, in the end we are all going to die. In other words, as human beings we are, from time to time, forced to deal with situations of existential significance. Existential and spiritual questions remain relevant—even in a country where most people­ have abandoned institutional forms of religion. But how do people­ deal with these questions? Sweden continues to uphold an extreme position, from a global perspective, when it comes to religiosity and traditional values. No other country in the world has, to such a great extent, left traditional and survival values on the behalf of those based on rationality and self expression. Religious and ethnic minorities have brought new forms of piety to the Swedish scene, but secularization and religious privatization dominate. In this situation, it is important to study people’s ways of dealing with existential life situations. What do people think, feel, believe and do in the presence of the ultimate questions—when there exists no common ground for meaning-making? This article begins with an outline of the state of religion in Sweden, against the backdrop of the contemporary climate in Western culture. This is followed by an introduction to abortion in Sweden, and to abortion research of interest for this paper. Ritual participation is the next topic, leading to concepts of importance for the pilot study: existential homelessness and individualized rituals. In the rest of the article the focus is on the pilot study and a discussion of its results in relation to the existential situation in Sweden at large.