A Conscious Event and Its Neural Correlate

A conscious event，as for instance a sensation，as for instance a twinge of pain，appears in sense perception as a burst of neural impulses and hence is precisely that which so appears. Fundamentally，it is merely one of the indefinitely many things of indefinitely many different types which appear. It differs in that it has a special epistemological status，on account of which it gives rise to the infamous problem of consciousness. When a conscious event occurs，it is not the case that two events，a very peculiar one，the conscious event，and an ordinary physical one，the burst of neural impulses，its neural correlate，occur. Rather，just one event occurs，a natural event which appears in sense perception as a burst of neural impulses. But this is the key to the solution of the problem of consciousness.philosophymetaphysicsconsciousnessmindbrai

Fragment sofa Dialog on Death

"Contrary to widespread belief, even if death is the end it entails no loss for the one who dies, and contrary to all-but-universal belief, though there is of course such a thing as point of view, there is no such thing as subjectivity. The objective picture of one's own death, or anyone else's, is the true picture. "philosophymetaphysicsmortalityconsciousnesssubjectivit

Preliminary Thoughts on the Problem of Mortality

"By ""the problem of mortality,"" I mean human concern about the fact of mortality: the fact that every human being dies within a limited time from birth. This concern generates a host of interesting philosophical questions, many of them very difficult. Below, I consider a few of these questions in a preliminary, unsystematic, and to a considerable extent speculative way. It is possible that contradictions lurk among my answers. If so, they represent a task for a later time-if there is one!"philosophymetaphysicsmortalitydeathsurviva

Investigation of Factors Influencing the Use of Wet Strength Resin on Unwashed NSSC Pulp

To improve the wet strength of paper, colloidal dispersions of thermosetting wet strength resins are added to the papermaking furnish. However, these resins show low efficiency when applyed to unwashed neutral sulfite semichemical corrugating medium. To determine the reason for this, experiments were made in which corrugating mill stock was made into handsheets using Paramel HE and Kymene 557 wet strength resins. It was found that Kymene 557 gave poor wet strength when used at levels less than .67%, but that further addition brought increasingly larger gains. The wet strength attained with Paramel HE showed a rapid rise up to a .33% level of addition, but more resin gave smaller gains and the highest wet strength achieved was less than one third that obtained with Kymene. Hydrochloric acid, sulfuric acid and alum were used as pH adjusting agents with Paramel HE. Hydrochloric acid gave the best results and alum caused hard sizing of the sheet. Both Kymene and Paramel were tested on unwashed stock over a range of pH. It was found that Kymene and Paramel were tested on unwashed stock over a range of pH. It was found that Kymene gave best results at pH 8, while Paramel gave increasing wet strength with decreasing pH. Through experimentation, it was found that the amount of wood fines in the furnish had little effect on the development of wet strength. Wet strength increased rapidly, however, with washing of the stock. This indicates that the wet strength inhibiting material was part of the residual black liquor carried with the pulp. A list of the materials found in N.S.S.C. spent liquor was compiled, and these materials or representative model compounds were added to washed samples of pulp, which were tested for wet strength development. None of the compounds, except sodium sulfite and sodium lignosulfonate, exhibited an effect on wet strength resin efficiency. The sulfite was shown to be slightly detrimental while the lignosulfonate drastically reduced wet strength. As little as 3% sodium lignosulfonate reduced wet strength values by 80%. The lignosulfonate anion could be attracted to, and form a counterion layer around the cationic resin micelles, thus preventing them from being deposited on the fibers. This was believed to be the only major factor inhibiting wet strength on this grade. Wet strength resin was tried on a furnish loaded with calcium chloride in an attempt to change the sodium lignosulfonate into harmless calcium lignosulfonate, but it was found that to form the calcium precipitate, the calcium chloride requirements would be too high to be practical. It appears, that at present, the only way to get practical wet strength on this grade is to use a high level of resin addition or partially wash the pulp or both