The Modal Argument and a Rejoinder to Contingent Physicalism

Since the time of Descartes, various versions of a modal argument have been proffered for substance dualism. Until recently, the premise most frequently attacked is one that moves from conceivability to metaphysical possibility. However, more recently, a new criticism has surfaced, viz., an argument from contingent physicalism. The purpose of this article is to show that what I take to be the most sophisticated contingent physicalist criticism fails as a defeater of the modal argument. After stating and clarifying my version of the modal argument, I present arguments from contingent physicalist Trenton Merricks that are intended explicitly to be defeaters of premise (2) of the modal argument. Along the way, I give reasons for thinking that these arguments fail as defeaters of (2) and that Merricks’ contingent physicalism is false

An Economics Study Of Tomato Production In Cherokee County, Texas

Fresh green-wrap tomatoes were the leading vegetable crop in East Texas until 1952, with an annual value of approximately 12 million dollars. The Texas tomato industry started about 1890 near Jacksonville, Cherokee County, in East Texas, and has expanded to practically all vegetable-growing sections of the state. The industry is largely a spring enterprise which is divided into the early spring crop in the Rio Grande Valley and a late spring crop in East Texas. There is some fall tomato production in the state. The tomato areas supplement each other and give Texas almost a year-round tomato production season. The main problems of tomato production in Texas are the low price paid to farmers and the poor quality of tomatoes. The low prices and poor quality are related. Because of the low prices received by farmers, quality is often neglected for volume. An increase in poor quality tomatoes reduces terminal prices and the demand for East Texas tomatoes. The tomato industry in Cherokee County has decreased considerably in the last few years. Many farmers have dropped them completely, others have cut production in half, and still, others grow an acre or two as a side-line while holding some other public Job. They contend that producing tomatoes purely as a cash crop does not pay to sell as green-wrap and there are extremely low prices received for ripe tomatoes

Culture Wars and the Soul Part 3

I have tried to show that we are in a culture war today which is really not just something that\u27s American, it\u27s a part of a much broader conflict between the Kingdom of God and the kingdom of darkness

Overcoming Heartache

Some of you are struggling with very deep personal emotional issues and perhaps sinful habits in your life. And sometimes you just think is it worth it? You want to throw in the towel. There\u27s an awful lot of heartache in this world. I\u27d like to give you three tips that I hope will help you if you\u27re going through something hard right now

Attention explores space periodically at the theta frequency

Voluntary attention is at the core of a wide variety of cognitive functions. Attention can be oriented to and sustained at a location or reoriented in space to allow processing at other locations—critical in an ever-changing environment. Numerous studies have investigated attentional orienting in time and space, but little is known about the spatiotemporal dynamics of attentional reorienting. Here we explicitly manipulated attentional reorienting using a cuing procedure in a two- alternative forced-choice orientation-discrimination task. We interrogated attentional distribution by flashing two probe stimuli with various delays between the precue and target stimuli. Then we used the probabilities that both probes and neither probe were correctly reported to solve a second-degree equation, which estimates the report probability at each probe location. We demonstrated that attention reorients periodically at ~4 Hz (theta) between the two stimulus locations. We further characterized the processing dynamics at each stimulus location, and demonstrated that attention samples each location periodically at ;11 Hz (alpha). Finally, simulations support our findings and show that this method is sufficiently powered, making it a valuable tool for studying the spatiotemporal dynamics of attention

Influence of Pre-Swirl and Eccentricity in Smooth Stator/Grooved Rotor Liquid Annular Seals, Measured Static and Rotordynamic Characteristics

Circumferential grooves are machined into the rotor surface of liquid annular seals to reduce leakage. Analyses in the literature regarding rotordynamic coefficients for smooth stator/grooved rotor (SS/GR) seals are scarce, and measured results are absent despite the significant effect of these annular seals on pump rotordynamics. Furthermore, few annular seal test rigs can impose and measure pre-swirl. Consequently, this study aims to quantify the effect of pre-swirl and operating static eccentricity on measured static and dynamic characteristics of the SS/GR seal. The test seal has a nominal minimum radial clearance of Cr = 203.2 µm (8 mil) and the length-to-diameter ratio of L/D = 0.5. The rotor surface has 15 square grooves with a depth of 1.524 mm (60 mils). This geometry is based on measured dimensions in an Electrical Submersible Pump. The author conducts tests at speeds of 2, 4, 6, and 8 krpm, axial pressure drops of 2.07, 4.14, 6.21, and 8.27 bar (30, 60, 90, and 120 psi), and eccentricity ratios up to ε0 = 0.80. Pre-swirl is imposed and varied over low, medium, and high values. The lubricant is ISO VG 2 oil at 46.1⁰C (115⁰F) to ensure turbulent flow at all operating conditions. Measured grooved seal results are compared to results of a smooth seal of equal length, diameter, and nominal clearance. Note that no published predictions for this seal exist, precluding measurement-versus-prediction comparisons. Static measurements include leakage rate, applied static load, eccentric position, pre-swirl ratio (PSR), and outlet swirl ratio (OSR). At 2 krpm and 8.27 bar, the SS/GR seal leakage rate is lower than the smooth seal by a factor of 0.7 for a total reduction of 19 LPM. However, at high speeds and low pressures, grooved seal leakage is 0.8 to 0.9 times that of the smooth seal with reductions in leakage rate on the order of 2 LPM. Consequently, adding rotor grooves to restrict leakage is more advantageous at high pressure drops and low speeds. Outlet swirl is measured for the first time in a liquid-annular-seal test rig. Contrary to expectation, measured OSR is generally lower than 0.5, possibly due to the axial and radial location of the pitot tube within the outlet chamber. Dynamic measurements include rotor-stator relative displacement, stator acceleration, and applied dynamic excitations. The author calculates dynamic-stiffness values, rotordynamic coefficients, whirl frequency ratio, and effective damping. Most notable of the dynamic results is the negative direct stiffness of the SS/GR seal. Negative direct stiffness would have a detrimental effect on pump rotordynamics, lowering both the natural frequency and the onset speed of instability. Calculated whirl frequency ratio is generally high (≥0.5) with values up to 1.2 for the grooved seal. Finally, effective damping is lower for the grooved seal than the smooth seal indicating that the SS/GR seal has worse stability characteristics than a comparable SS/SR seal. Overall, increases in PSR have a detrimental effect on SS/GR seal rotordynamic performance leading to modest decreases in direct stiffness, increases in the magnitude of cross-coupled stiffness, and increases in whirl frequency ratio. Additionally, operation at high eccentricity ratios for the SS/GR seal has negative effects. Leakage increases, and direct stiffness decreases as eccentricity ratios approach 0.80