An investigation of learning processes and contexts of a curriculum program for the formation of spiritual directors

In recent times Spiritual Direction has grown in popularity amongst lay people seeking to nurture their own spirituality. This trend has given rise to an increased enrolment of people seeking to train as Spiritual Directors. This study aims to identify key factors underpinning the learning processes in a spiritual direction curriculum program that is part of a graduate course offered by an Australian University. Having identified the factors, the researcher will assess its effectiveness in forming spiritual directors, from the perspective of participants involved in the program. This qualitative study was based on the insights of adults who are already qualified spiritual directors trained in this particular spiritual direction formation program or are current participants in the same program. Their perceptions of the course were drawn upon to investigate the impact of their curriculum program on the formation of spiritual directors. Unstructured in depth interviews were utilized to gain the perspectives of participants. The original principles of grounded theory (Glaser & Strauss, 1967) were drawn upon to identify, conceptualize and analyze key insights into the learning processes associated with one spiritual direction curriculum with a view to identifying an emerging theory. Based on the emerging theory, this timely study aimed to ascertain the implications for improvement of both the design and delivery of learning processes within spiritual direction courses, and ongoing professional development offerings. The findings indicated that the approach to formation was enhanced by the development of collegial, interactive learning spaces in which participants’ relational qualities were influential in shaping these spaces. The qualities of trust, openness, vulnerability and integrity were identified as the core relational factors that contributed to the enhancement of the interactive learning spaces generated between the participants. Contemplative processing of learning was extended when participants adopted these relational qualities when reflectively and critically engaging with experiences. Used in combination with the principles and processes of Lectio Divina (Binz, 2008) and Theory U (Scharmer, 2009), participants’ relational qualities promoted the broadening and deepening of the formational learning process. The influence of formators was significant in demonstrating the application of the relational qualities in the way they taught and participated in the learning process. The formators continued to maintain their authority and leadership of the learning process in conjunction their enactment of the relational qualities through collegial engagement. The promotion of a range of approaches to safety resulted from participants’ willingness to cooperatively apply the qualities of trust, openness, vulnerability and integrity with each other within the diverse learning community. Based on these findings, the implications of the emerging theory were presented that offer ways in which these findings can be applied within a range of formation programs to enhance participants’ learning opportunities. One recommendation for further research focused on the possibility of exploring spiritual direction formation programs associated with other traditions or which have a different emphasis. Another suggestion for further research would be to explore spiritual direction formation programs from the formators’ perspective

Normalisation of Weights and Firing Rates in Spiking Neural Networks with Spike-Timing-Dependent Plasticity

Maintaining the ability to fire sparsely is crucial for information encoding in neural networks. Additionally, spiking homeostasis is vital for spiking neural networks with changing numbers of weights and neurons. We discuss a range of network stabilisation approaches, inspired by homeostatic synaptic plasticity mechanisms reported in the brain. These include weight scaling, and weight change as a function of the network's spiking activity. We tested normalisation of the sum of weights for all neurons, and by neuron type. We examined how this approach affects firing rate and performance on clustering of time-series data in the form of moving geometric shapes. We found that neuron type-specific normalisation is a promising approach for preventing weight drift in spiking neural networks, thus enabling longer training cycles. It can be adapted for networks with architectural plasticity.Comment: Developmental Neural Networks Workshop, The 2019 Conference on Artificial Life (ALife 2019). Newcastle, United Kingdo

The Spirituality of Louise de Marillac: Moved by the Spirit to Charity

This article continues the one that immediately precedes it in this issue. It traces the development of Louise de Marillac’s spirituality just before, during, and after the establishment of the Daughters of Charity. Anxiety over her son was the last major obstacle to the tranquility she needed to begin the Company. By 1633, she could devote herself to the spiritual formation of the Daughters and to foster the love they had for each other, which in turn was to be motivated by the love that Christ crucified had for the poor. All other relationships were to be put aside in the face of that love. The article then explains how “Louise’s prayers and meditations followed the rhythm of the liturgical year.” Topics include the three essential virtues of the Daughters (humility, simplicity, and love), the Company’s relationship to Mary and Louise’s contemplation about her, the redemption, and God’s will, among others

Describing the FPGA-Based Hardware Architecture of Systemic Computation (HAoS)

his paper presents HAoS, the first hardware architecture of the bio-inspired computational paradigm known as Systemic Computation (SC). SC was designed to support the modelling of biological processes inherently by defining a massively parallel non-conventional computer architecture and a model of natural behaviour. In this work we describe a novel custom digital design, which addresses the SC architecture parallelism requirement by exploiting the inbuilt parallelism of a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) and by using the highly efficient matching capability of a Ternary Content Addressable Memory (TCAM). Basic processing capabilities are embedded in HAoS in order to minimize time-demanding data transfers. Its custom instruction set can be expanded based on user requirements, since the optional use of a CPU provides high-level processing support if required. We demonstrate a functional simulation-verified prototype, which takes into consideration programmability and scalability, and review various communication interfaces between HAoS and the CPU. Analysis shows that the proposed architecture provides an effective solution in terms of efficiency versus flexibility trade-off and can potentially outperform prior implementations

From evolutionary ecosystem simulations to computational models of human behavior

We have a wide breadth of computational tools available today that enable a more ethical approach to the study of human cognition and behavior. We argue that the use of computer models to study evolving ecosystems provides a rich source of inspiration, as they enable the study of complex systems that change over time. Often employing a combination of genetic algorithms and agent-based models, these methods span theoretical approaches from games to complexification, nature-inspired methods from studies of self-replication to the evolution of eyes, and evolutionary ecosystems of humans, from entire economies to the effects of personalities in teamwork. The review of works provided here illustrates the power of evolutionary ecosystem simulations and how they enable new insights for researchers. They also demonstrate a novel methodology of hypothesis exploration: building a computational model that encapsulates a hypothesis of human cognition enables it to be tested under different conditions, with its predictions compared to real data to enable corroboration. Such computational models of human behavior provide us with virtual test labs in which unlimited experiments can be performed. This article is categorized under: Computer Science and Robotics > Artificial Intelligence